Thanksgiving was a great weekend. It seemed to go on forever and that’s always nice! You can see pictures from the weekend here!
Brooke and her mom arrived on Wednesday evening and we headed directly to the Upper West Side where the balloons for the parade were being inflated. It was cold, crowded, and starting to drizzle, but it was still fun to see some of the balloons! They were on 2 streets, but we just walked down one of the two streets. The most exciting part was when we walked by The Beresford—my mom had told me before that a lot of celebrities live there. Sure enough, Jerry Seinfeld was standing right outside the door! We all got a good glimpse of him. I’m not sure what he was doing, but my guess is that he was waiting for his car to pull up to the curb to take him somewhere. Brooke’s mom suggested Italian for dinner so I took them to a place in my neighborhood called Pietrasanta. I knew they had Pumpkin Ravioli and I thought that was a good fit for Thanksgiving! Brooke got that and it was really good! Her mom and I tried other things, but we were all very happy with the food! Afterwards, we walked around Rockefeller Center some. I had not seen it since they’d put all the Christmas decorations up and it looks so pretty! We also saw Sak’s and it has blue snowflake lights all over the building and every so often, they play Christmas music and the snowflake lights do a dance to it. It was really cool! I was originally going to stay at the hotel w/ them, but their room got messed up and they had only 1 bed and my place is less than 10 minutes away, so I ended up just going home for the night and that worked out well.
Thursday was the parade, of course! Unfortunately, it was a miserable day for the parade. It was raining and only got up to about 37 degrees. Brooke was a trooper and went downstairs at 5:45am to save us a curb spot! I got there around 6:45 and she was already soaked and so was the quilt she was hoping we could sit on. I went on a search for crates to sit on, but ended up walking home and getting 3 little stools we have. So, Brooke, her mom, and I sat lined up on the curb on our stools under our umbrellas until the parade finally started coming by around 9:30. We did have a good view, though! We lasted for probably 3/4ths of the parade and were too cold and decided to call it quits. We went upstairs to their hotel room and watched the rest on TV just like the rest of America! It was much more enjoyable there. It took me a LONG time to warm up! I’m glad I got to see the parade in person, but it would have been so much better if the weather had been nice.
For lunch, we went to a family-style Italian restaurant called Tony’s Di Napoli. Brooke’s aunt was in town because she’s a dance coach and a group of her girls were in the parade. So, we had lunch with Brooke’s aunt, cousin, and all these high school girls and their mothers. It was really enjoyable and our food was good. They had a Thanksgiving meal that day, but we opted for the Italian menu. Pretty much everyone there was from Waco and the lady sitting next to me (one of the dancer’s mom’s) was so nice to talk to!
After lunch, I had to head home and to the airport. The airports were so empty that night and I had 3 seats to myself on the plane! I was exhausted by that point and slept all the way to St. Louis. Then, I had a 2 hour drive to Columbia, so I didn’t get in until after midnight. It was GREAT to see my family and Bob & Miriam Perry (who we stayed with and are long-time family friends)!
I also got to see some of my friends from high school while I was there. On Friday morning, my mom, Miriam and I went to my friend Courtney’s parent’s house to visit her family. Courtney is two years younger than me, but we grew up taking piano lessons from Miriam and going to church together. She also went to Baylor and still lives in Waco. She had a baby boy in the spring so I got to see him for the first time. Very, very cute baby! It was good to see her family after so long, too! Her mom was my junior high school business teacher—one of my favorite classes and teachers!
For lunch that day, I met 4 longtime girlfriends, Kelly, Maggie, Jessica, and Jill, for lunch at Shakespeare’s. In my opinion, Shakespeare’s is the best pizza in the entire world. I can’t make a trip to Columbia without having some! The company was nice too! We all went to Jr. high and High School together and everyone but Kelly went to elementary school together, too. And Jill and I started going to church together when we were 2 or 3 and preschool when we were 4. Actually, I think my first two memories are of Jill—she broke her leg when we were 4 and I guess I was traumatized or intrigued by it because both my first 2 memories revolve around her leg. Basically, I’ve known these girls for a long time! Jill and Kelly live in Columbia now and it was nice that Maggie and Jessica were home from Chicago and Austin so we could all catch-up!
Beth & Brian went out Friday night so I got to give Ryder his bath and put him to bed. I was trying to find his jammies and turned around and he had found his dad’s hat and put it on—so cute! This weekend was also the first time I got to see him walking!
On Saturday, I got to go to the MU football game and sit in a box. My sister’s friend works for coke so she got us all tickets in their box. It was a lot of fun. The weather couldn’t have been more perfect for football. Ryder loved it the game! And Mizzou dominated KU. Jill’s family has a box a few doors down from the coke box, so we got to visit with her and her mom and see Jill’s baby girl, Sydney, who I hadn’t seen in a year—too many cute babies this weekend!
My mom and I did some shopping later on Saturday—Columbia has several newer boutique type stores that were very cute! I was impressed with the new additions!
Beth, Brian, my dad, and I went to the good ol’ Columbia mall on Saturday as well. Beth wanted an Orange Julius—she worked there in high school and The Perry’s own it, so they’re a favorite drink of hers. We also let Ryder try out the carousel and he loved it! He rode it twice and cried when we left.
That evening, my family went to some friend’s house to visit. It was fun! They had been to New York recently (I was out of town) and they had a couple of places I hadn’t heard of that I have now added to my list of places to go!
My family left early on Sunday—I would have as well, but the flights were SO much cheaper on Monday, so I waited. Sunday morning, I tried out a newer church in Columbia called The Crossing. I’d heard about it several times and wanted to check it out. I enjoyed the teaching and the music. There were a lot of people there—mostly young people. I wish they’d had something like that when I lived there—seemed like a good place to be involved!
Sunday afternoon was slow and lazy. I felt like I’d already done everything there is to do in Columbia! It is such a nice town and so pretty, but I’m not sure I could go back to living somewhere so slow-paced. I find myself a little bit antsy and bored. But, Miriam had taped Grey’s and we hadn’t watched it yet so we did that. Then, we started getting out her Christmas decorations! That night, I went and had dinner with my friend Kelly and her husband Greg. He did all the cooking and it was really good! I also got to tour her house, which they had just barely moved into last time I’d seen it. I also got to see her wedding pictures from the last time I was in Columbia a year ago.
Monday morning, I was off to St. Louis. I left early enough so that I could hit a mall—specifically a mall with a Chick-fil-a! Got lunch, did some shopping and driving around St. Louis and then caught my flight back home!
It was a great long weekend!
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