Country Day

Hillery invited us up to her place for a day in the "country".  Five of us headed up after church on Sunday for an afternoon of brunching, chatting, and strolling through her cute town.  She lives about 30 minutes out of the city in Westchester County...specificially Chappaqua (home to Bill & Hillary).  It was a delightful afternoon!

Hillery's country "cottage"

The gardens out back

We fought over this "magic" apron

(notice it says net weight 100lb)

Hillery made a refreshing drink of peach

tea with scoops of lemon sorbet - yum!

Enjoying my fun drink

We had a pancake bar.  So fun!  I chose raspberries

& chocolate chips for one and the other had walnuts,

blueberries, and bananas.  Both were amazing!

Megan & I

Hillery, Meg, Kim and I

Strolling through the pretty neighborhood

A garden so small, you could fit it in your pocket!

I can't think of a better way to spend a Sunday afternoon!  Can't wait for the next adventure up North!

NYC in a Day

My best friend from college, Becca, came to visit last week for about 36 hours! She had never been to NYC before so we planned to just walk as much of the city as we could during her 1 day here. We actually got a lot done and it felt like the longest day ever...something I had specifically prayed for - I cherish the small amounts of time I get with sweet Becca these days (or years would be more accurate). The day was truly refreshing to my soul...there's just something about Becca and our friendship that is like no other. So, what did we choose to do in Becca's quick intro to the city??

She got in on a Wednesday night and although it was late, we both needed dinner, so we strolled along the Upper West Side until I decided that the Shake Shack would be a great NY place to take her. I haven't had shake shack in so long and it was so good! It's just burgers and fries, but some of the best burgers in the city! She was impressed.

I took Thursday off work so I could enjoy the day with Becca. We started the day with breakfast at Alice's Tea Cup. Why don't I go here more often?? It is so cute and yummy, too. Becca and I split a delicious pot of Alice's signature tea..yum. I had eggs and a scone that was simply to die for. I can't wait to go back for another!

Breakfast was followed by walking, and walking, and walking. We walked through and around the park, ending up on 5th Avenue. We briefly went into The Plaza and looked around for a while, but mostly we just wanted to use their bathrooms! We did a little shopping on 5th Ave and ended up at Rockefeller Center so Becca could pretend she was in an episode of "30 Rock". From Rockefeller, we hopped on a subway and went to Greenwich Village for more strolling. We stopped for a quick bite...a Sabrett hot dog from a cart and a Magnolia cupcake...yum. We wound up near the river and Becca wanted to check it out. We ended up on a Pier I've never seen before...I loved it! Well, for the most part. I did not love the mobs of people laying out...many guys stripped down to their tighty-whiteies. Weird. The views from the pier were so pretty though and the breeze that came through there was glorious on such a hot day.

That would be Jersey behind us

The 2 guys on the far left are stripped to their undies!

The view of Manhattan from the pier's end.  That's the Empire

State Building in the middle.

Upon leaving the pier, we walked up the boardwalk along the river all the way to the Meatpacking District. We strolled along the Highline for a bit and then did a little shopping in the Chelsea Market.

After all that walking, we headed to Times Square where we waited for a while in a long line at the TKTS booth, but we scored good tickets for half-price to the musical "Next to Normal". As soon as we got our tickets, we jumped back on a subway that was Chinatown bound. Becca wanted to see it and eat there. We went to Joe's Shanghai (the only option in Chinatown in my opinion). It was really good. We started with their dumplings, of course. Becca wanted to be adventurous so she got the Peking Duck and it was a full duck they brought to our table! I stuck to my usual sesame chicken, which is usually so good there, but didn't seem up to par that night. After dinner, we had a little time so we strolled through Little Italy and into SoHo where we had time to pop into a few more shops.

Finally, we rushed back to the theatre district for our show. "Next to Normal" was sooo good! I thought I had heard it was about teenagers and I thought it was going to be a fun, cute musical (I'm thinking Glee, of course). Turns out I was wrong. Although there were teenagers in the show, it was really more about the adults and it wasn't a very fun/happy story. It was very good though and the singing was excellent. We loved it!

Becca was on a plane back to West Texas the next morning. So, it was super short trip, but I am still amazed at how it seemed much longer than that.  The day could not have been more perfect.

MichELLIS Island

A couple of weeks ago, Michelle came to NYC for a quick weekend as part of her Northeast Tour 2010.  It had been a bit too long since she had visited so I was more than ready for her to be back in the city!  The main thing on our list of to-do's was to visit Ellis Island.  This is something Michelle had been wanting to do and since I'd never done it, I needed to check it off my list as well.  We had 9AM reservations on Saturday morning, but since Michelle's flight was approximately 18 hours late, we kind of missed our reservation.  Luckily, the Ellis Island folks are sweet people and when we showed up after 1:00 with our explanation for tardiness, they just let us on the next boat over (saved us about 2 hours of wait time in lines!!).  The day could not have been more gorgeous, making our ferry ride extremely pleasant...we even got suntans!  Because we got there so late in the day, we were not able to stop off on Liberty Island (that's where Lady Liberty resides).  We did get some nice views of the pretty lady.

Liberty Island

So after bypassing the Lady Liberty stop, we headed straight for Ellis.  We decided to do the audio tour of the museum and it was great!  We got a thorough explanation of what it would have been like to have immigrated to the US with a stopover on Ellis Island.  It is a beautiful building with beautiful grounds and amazing views of the NYC skyline.

Ellis Island

I'd like some of these cool trunks for my apartment!

The main hall where immigrants waited in lines

Gorgeous views from Ellis Island - don't

think I could ever tire of this view

Heading back to the city

Back on Manhattan Island, we ran into a man selling pictures with snakes.  I jokingly asked Michelle if she wanted to stop for a picture.  But she really did!  Yikes!  Freaked me out just to take the pictures.  She is a brave soul!

While Ellis Island was our #1 goal of the weekend, we also had show tickets and dinner plans...of course!  We were supposed to see a play on Friday night, but since Michelle wasn't going to make it, I was able to arrange for us to go on Sunday afternoon instead.  We went to see "Collected Stories" starring Linda Lavin (she's up for a Tony) and Sarah Paulson.  They were both great.  I actually love Sarah Paulson...mostly from back in the day when she was on the Fox TV show "Jack & Jill".  This play was so good!  I have a love/hate relationship with plays in that they either actually bore me to tears so that I hate them or I love them so much I'd pay to see it a second time.  This fell into the love category.  It was a great story and was set in NYC (you can never go wrong there).  Plus, the acting by the only 2 characters was pretty phenomenal.

On Saturday night, we saw South Pacific.  I had never seen this old Rodgers & Hammerstein musical.  What is it about those guys and their musicals??  They are all so freaking good!  South Pacific was no exception.  It is playing in a theatre at Lincoln Center (love any opportunity to attend any show or event there).  The theatre this was in is quite small so there really is no bad seat in the house.  We were seated on the 4th row and it was great!  The singing was good (love it when I know some of the music), dancing was good, story was interesting, and acting was again great.  Loved the lead actress in this - Laura Osnes - I've got to remember this girl and watch for her in future performances!

Of course, we ate well while Michelle was here!  Michelle recently read Andre Agassi's autobiography and noted a couple of restaurants he mentioned he and Brooke Shields use to love.  So, we went to those!  First up was dinner at PJ Clarke's.  I'd been here before and it is really good.  And there is one right across from Lincoln Center so it was super convenient to go right before our show on Saturday night.  We split a burger and their mac & cheese.  The Mac & Cheese was some of the best I've ever had - loved it.

On Sunday night, we went to the second Andre recommendation which was an Italian restaurant on the Upper East Side called Campagnola.  This place was great.  It felt truly authentic with all Italian servers.  It also felt very neighborhoodish.  As in, everyone there seemed to be regulars from the UES.  We sat near a man who said he's been eating there a few times a week for 15 years and 90% of the waiters have been the same all those years.  Amazing!  It was a very nice restaurant and I thought it would be very expensive.  It was pricey, but I was happy that it wasn't nearly as pricey as I had thought.  They served us an antipasto plate with salami, 2 cheeses, olives, and bread to start...for free!  Now that's a way to reel me in as a customer!  It was yummy.  I had their gnocchi with pesto for my meal and it was also very good.  I love me some gnocchi!

For Sunday brunch, we got to try a new place I recently heard about.  There is a new boutique hotel in the West Village called Hotel Jane.  It's super cute and has an equally cute restaurant called Cafe Gitane.  There is a Cafe Gitane in SoHo that I had been to for dinner before and I enjoyed.  This one was more quaint and fun.  I just loved it.  The decor was very Frenchy and there were a lot of people there so it was loud, but in a good, fun way.  I got some eggs and an almond croissant.  The croissant was soooo amazing.  The eggs were not anything extraordinary.  Despite the eggs, I loved this place and can't wait to go back.  Afterwards, we did a little snooping around the hotel and found their amazing bar/lounge....can't wait to go back there for an evening cocktail!

On Sunday afternoon, we had just a bit of extra time to wander around the Upper West Side for a while.  We stopped at Levain to get some of their amazing cookies and then we browsed through the Columbus Avenue flea market.  I really need to start going there every weekend - they have some great stuff!

So, that was our quick weekend together.  We were able to pack in a lot and were still able to do everything we planned despite Michelle's crazy travel delays.  Fun weekend!

Random Art

We're never short on random art here in NYC. I ran across this display in Bryant Park while strolling at lunch a couple of weeks ago. Apparently these ladies up top the platform were supposed to resemble the hustle & bustle of the business workers in Manhattan. It was actually a pretty accurate picture of it!

Mom's Trip : Wrap Up

As you can probably already tell, mom and I were really on the go while she was in town.  But, the Home tour, Food tour, and Red Carpet sightings were just the tip of the iceberg!  I'm pretty sure I wore her out for a good while, but I think she'll be in good shape by the time I visit Dallas in June!  So, here's the synopsis of everything else we did during her 2010 trip to NYC:

Her first evening in town, we decided to stay close to home.  We went to dinner at Popover Cafe...this was about my 3rd time to eat there in a weeks time after not having eaten there in quite some time.  We really enjoyed our salads and popovers, though!  Afterwards, we passed a mani/pedi place and spontaneously decided to go.  This is a luxury I rarely splurge on since moving to NYC, but it was super fun to do so with my mom!  After getting our nails done, we finished out our evening with desserts at Cafe Lalo.  I love the organization of this place.  Even the way this lavender is situated over their dessert counter makes me happy.

I worked the first day mom was in town and met up with her afterwards for dinner and a show (what else?).  We had dinner at Sardi's.  This is an old famous restaurant that I thought she would appreciate getting to experience.  It's been around for ages and the walls are covered with caricatures of Broadway stars.  She was glad to see it, but really one meal there is enough...it's nothing outstanding.  We did enjoy our dinner though.

We decided to see "Love, Loss, and What I Wore".  This show is based on the book written by Nora Ephron and Delia Ephron.  It was really good!  It is basically a series of monologues and has a rotating cast.  While I loved the cast we got to see I actually think it would be fun to see again with a different cast.

Doris Roberts!

Brooke Shields and Anna Chlumsky

Remember Anna from "My Girl"?  She

was such a cute kid and is still so cute.

I loved her in this!

One afternoon, we stopped to smell the tulips

that line Park Avenue every spring.

We spent our Sunday afternoon at the Frick Museum.

It is my favorite that I've been to in NYC and I was

excited to share it with my mom.  This is one of

the gardens of the Frick.

We participated in a Tribeca Film Festival screening.  It was a documentary about the making of Saturday Night Live.  It was really cool to see all that goes into the making of that show each week - pretty amazing, really.  After the screening, we were treated to an interview with the director and some of the SNL cast.

LtoR:  James Franco (you may know him as an actor,

but he directed this documentary),

Mom found a fake coach purse in Chinatown.  I didn't allot much time for this excursion and she made the comment that next time she could use more time there.  Ha!

We ate a fantastic dinner at La Esquina in SoHo.  This speakeasy-ish restaurant has become one of my favorites.  Excellent food and very cool ambiance.

So, obviously, it was a great 5 days with mom.  We saw/did/ate so many wonderful things.  And, of course, I always love having my mom visit.  Can't wait for next time!

Greenwich Village Tour

Mom and I did one of the Foods of New York Tours while she was in town.  This was my second one to do - I did the Central Village/Soho Tour a few years ago.  This time, we did Greenwich Village. These tours are so good.  I can't wait until they start doing their East Village tour in the fall - that one will be great!  They are not just food tours, although you do get to sample food from several restaurants and they do make sure to point out plenty of other places you should go back to for a meal.  They also highlight other aspects of the neighborhoods like historical spots or famous landmarks or celebrity homes.  It lasts about 3 hours and you are on the go the whole time, but it is so fun and packed full of information!

We started out with a slice of Joe's Pizza.  I've past this little joint many times and it is always packed.  It was good pizza, but I didn't find it to be too extraordinary.

We got Mac & Cheese at Home.  It was delicious.  This tiny restaurant was super cute and had an awesome garden seating area out back.

We went to Murray's Cheese Shop where we got to try 3 cheeses, olives and their cheese puffs along with some sopressata from Faicco's next door.  Murray's is awesome and I wish it was in my neighborhood so I could shop their regularly.  I also need to remember to check out one of their wine & cheese classes sometime.

We went to Milk & Cookies and got a chocolate chip oatmeal cookie that was fantastic.

Soy and Sake is a vegan restaurant where we got a bento box w/ BBQ pork & a dumpling.  The BBQ pork was actually quite good, considering it wasn't pork at all.  Apparently vegan restaurants can create meat like substances from gluten.  Weird.

At Bleecker Street Pizza, we got a slice of the Grandma Pizza and it was excellent!!  Definitely would go back here another time.

Our final stop was at Rocco's for mini Cannoli's.  I keep thinking that I should like all Cannoli's because the ones at Mike's Pastry in Boston are AWESOME.  But, I just do not like any other Cannoli's at all.  I don't know what it is about Mike's that makes me like them.

I love the street I live on, but if I could afford

to live on a street like this?  Yes, please.

I loved the window bars at the Greenwich

Music House.  Also loved the awesome piano

practicing we could hear from the street.

I've seen this before and probably even posted pics on this blog, but I so love this little court in the West Village.  Too cute.

Supposedly Carly Simon's House

Back in the day, this was a horse barn.

The horses would be elevated to the upper

floors with a levy system.  Then they would

hang their heads out those windows.  Cute!

The Friends Apartment

Giselle Bundchen's old house.  She bought

it for like $6mill, but sold it for about $13mill!

Other restaurants I need to keep in mind for future excursions:
Le Gigot - nice country French bistro on Cornelia....get the lamb or crab cakes or go for brunch!
Little Havana - Cuban restaurant on Cornelia...make sure to get some Sangria and flan.  Watch out for a glimpse of the owner & chef...she's almost 80 years old!
Palma - Rustic Italian on Cornelia.  The little Farmhouse out back is adorable and available for small private parties.
Commerce - on Commerce.  Great place to go before a show at Cherry Lane Theatre.  They have good small plates to share.  It used to be a shoe shop which was really just a cover for the speakeasy downstairs.
L'Arte Del Gelato - tiny place, but fantastic gelato!
Trattoria - Italian on Bleecker. They have an excellent antipasto platter for $7.50!
Cornelia Street Cafe - I've been wanting to do dinner and/or a show here forever.  Getting to check out their show space downstairs makes me want to make more of an effort to get there.  It is a tiny little space with a stage where they have poetry readings or live jazz music.

So, once again, I went on an excursion that just caused my list of things to do/see/eat in this city grow even longer!