God's Beach

I felt very privileged to get to spend a Sunday afternoon on "God's Beach" 2 Sundays ago!

God's Beach is located in Ocean Grove, NJ.  It's seriously a Christian beach.  I still don't totally understand the whole concept, but apparently a group of Christian's came together over 100 years ago and bought a section of the beach and some of the land nearby and began to hold summer-long revivals or retreats with their families.  It sounds like at one point hundreds of families would come for the summer and stay in tents surrounding the chapel area.  There are still many tents there and they are handed down through family lines or volunteers can use them for the summer.  The association (I forget the exact name of it) holds events all summer long - speakers and concerts and church services on the beach.  Kim and I went down to hear Lee Strobel speak, but also to enjoy some beach time!

Ocean Grove is SUPER cute!  There is a Main Street filled with shops and restaurants surrounded by a neighborhood of adorable Victorian houses.  We loved it and want to go back when we have more time.  We hit the beach for a couple of hours and then went to Main Street for a great dinner of salads.  Kim asked me if I wanted to pop in a few of the shops while we waited on the food...of course I did!!  I could go back and do all the shops though.

One of the many Victoria houses

Kim was so excited they had a lake named after her!

These little, older ladies hanging out on the pier

were just too cute not to snap a picture of!

Some of the tents people stay in for the summer

Can never get enough of this!

Lee Strobel was a great speaker.  For those who are not familiar with him he is the author of a book called "Case for Christ" (among others).  He is a graduate of the University of Missouri's journalism school and Yale Law School.  If you know anything about those schools, you know he's clearly no dummy.  "Case for Christ" was written based on research he did (when he was still an atheist) to find evidence of Jesus Christ.  And who is better equipped to research such a subject than a journalist and attorney?  Well, through his research, he found the evidence of Jesus to be so overwhelming that he could no longer not believe that Jesus lived not simply as an ordinary man, but as the Son of God and that He died on the cross and rose again 3 days later.  After 2 years of learning more and more about the proof behind Jesus' life and death, Lee Strobel became a Christ follower.  Pretty cool.  His talk that Kim and I heard was basically that story and it was really good.  I have heard of the book for some time, but now I'd like to actually read it myself!  And if you are someone who is questioning your beliefs or wondering if you are saved or just want to draw nearer to Christ, then I think this is a book you might benefit from.

Philharmonic

The Community Group girls and I went for our annual picnic at Philharmonic in the Park!  It's one of our very favorite events of the year - as it is for most of the residents of Manhattan and beyond.  We felt a little lucky this year because it was not super crazy crowded with the million people who normally come.  It had poured rain earlier in the day and the forecast wasn't much better so I think that kept a lot of people inside...we decided to go for it anyway and were so glad we did.  We had a great spot on the lawn and could actually HEAR the music this year - amazing!  We enjoyed snacking and chatting and the fun fireworks show at the end (that was definitely better than the Bangor show I saw on the 4th :))

I didn't get any pictures that night except for the fun snacks I made.

Super easy appetizer that people love!

Summer fun flower sugar cookies (I'd already packaged

them up in a ziplock - sorry for the picture quality)!

SI for a Day

Mindy and I went on a little excursion to Staten Island a few Saturdays ago.  I have had Staten Island on my list of places to go for years now.  I had a goal of hitting all 5 boros of New York City and although Staten Island doesn't have much to offer, I still needed to check it off the list.  So, when I received an event email about an exhibit going on at a museum over there I decided I should go since it was something we could actually do on Staten Island!  Mindy was up for the adventure so we met on Saturday after one of her auditions and took the ferry over.  The museum was the Alice Austen Museum and it is located in the house Alice Austen grew up in.  Miss Austen was a photographer in the late 1800's early 1900's.  Mindy and I both enjoyed pouring over her photo albums and seeing views of the city and surrounding areas from someone during that time period.

Views of Manhattan from Staten Island

Cute Alice Austen house

Complete with a white picket fence!

After the museum, we headed out for some Italian food because Staten Island is known to have good Italian food and good pizza.  We ended up at a nice little restaurant with a cute patio so we sat outside and enjoyed some lobster ravioli and salad.

It was a nice afternoon and I am glad to be done with Staten Island.  I really don't need to go back there - I wasn't very impressed with what we saw going to and from the museum.

4th in Maine

So, I made the decision last summer that I should make a weekend in Maine an annual occurence.  Out of my 5 summers in NYC, this was my 3rd time to go to Maine.  It is so peaceful there and a great get-away from the business of NYC, plus I get to hang out with Tonya & Sean!  I left late Friday night and we pretty much just hit the beds once we got to their place after they picked me up at the airport....we didn't want to waste the next day sleeping all day! 

Saturday was filled with everything a good day in Maine should be...a little sunning on the dock, a trip to South Harbor for some exploring and an excellent meal, and to finish off the night, a bonfire with friends.

The view from Sean & Tonya's dock

South Harbor, ME

Lots of signs of lobstering going on

This sticker was on a car window.  Any

insights as to what in the heck it means??

HUGE tree roots!

Exploring trails on South Harbor

Trying to figure out how to

get up to this lighthouse

Found the backside of the lighthouse!

There it is!

The Sea Wall

Sean was the only one whose feet could
stand the freezing cold water for very long

Still Newlyweds...for a few more days!

Why does New England have the cutest

Public Library's?  Every town should.

Pretty flowers outside the restaurant

in South Harbor

Our 4th of July was filled with everything a good 4th of July in Maine should be....more sunning on the dock, kayaking, a neighborhood feast at the house next door, an amazing lobster dinner, a boat ride to see the fireworks, and another bonfire to end the evening.

Kayaking towards the island in the middle of the lake

We saw one of the new baby loons!

On the island...Tonya swore this was a real trail -

I was not so sure

But then we saw the blue spots on the tree

marking the path, so I believed her

Where's Duke?

All the animal holes in the ground and in

trees freaked me out.  I love exploring,

but hate wildlife.  (We saw no animals

while exploring the island...except Duke)

Senior Pictures!

Our dinner...still alive!

Tonya & Sean work hard to keep their flowers alive!

So pretty at dusk

Two things all lake houses should have:

Tiki Torches and Adirondack chairs

The hottest fire ever.

Fun with leftover wedding sparklers!

We spent most of Monday back out on the dock and had a little picnic lunch with friends and an excellent pie a la Tonya, all before I had to head back to the airport for my flight home.

It was a great weekend and I came back a little sun-kissed which was my #1 goal.  I can't wait to go back next summer!

One of my favorite parts of coming back to the city?  The views of Manhattan from the airplane.  I love when you can see the entire outline of the island on a clear day.

Here, you can see the base of Manhattan in the center
with Liberty Island (the tiny one towards the middle
left), Ellis Island (just north of Liberty) and Governor's
Island is the larger island just south of the base of
Manhattan. (You can click the pic to blow it up if you
really want to see what I'm talking about)

And here, you can see the outline of the southern

portion of Manhattan from about 34th Street down.

Catalog Living

In one of my recent posts, I mentioned that I loved the stacked wood look I'm seeing everywhere.  Well, I had to laugh at this little post in Catalog Living.  Although I do love the look, I can also see the weirdness/hilarity of it.  Have you seen Catalog Living?  It's pretty funny stuff and worth a minute of your time!  I love many of the photos on the blog, but I do admit the comments to go with them are pretty right-on and so funny!

Guest Blogging!

For the next 5ish weeks, I will be guest blogging over at Everyday Snapshots.  This is a blog created by my high school friend, Maggie in Chicago, and her college friend, Ann here in NYC.  They have uploaded a picture from their day every single day of 2010.  While Ann is on vacation visiting family overseas, I'm filling in!  I'm so excited for this opportunity and hope I can live up to the awesomeness they've maintained for the last 6.5 months!  I love that we'll be keeping the Chicago/NYC ratio, but I imagine the blog will look a little different while I'm there since we'll be going from stay-at-home mom to working single!  Make sure to stop by and check it out....Everyday Snapshots.

Dining along the Hudson

Lucy and I met a couple of Fridays ago for dinner after work.  We decided to go to Locanda Verde, one of Robert DeNiro's restaurants in Tribeca.  Lucy had been hearing great things about it.  We enjoyed it, but weren't super impressed - especially not for the price we paid for our meal!  We decided to split a few things.  The best part was the Sheep's Milk Ricotta appetizer.  It was like a creamy spread served with bread and it was soooo good.  We also tried their asparagus that was served with a fried egg on top, a pasta that had duck in it, and a lemon tart to finish it all off.  It was all good, but again, not great.

Afterwards, we walked over to the Hudson, which was just a block away and walked along the boardwalk all the way to West Village.  It was a hot night, but along the water it was pleasant and such pretty views!  Once we got to the West Village area, we stopped off at The Jane to grab a drink in the incredible hotel lobby - love this place!  I had seen the lobby before while brunching there at Cafe Gitane, but is wasn't open at that time of morning.  It's a gorgeous space and I wanted to go back and knew Lucy needed to see it as well.  We had so much fun chatting, taking in all the cool decor of the space, and sipping our Prosecco.

NYC Summer Weekends Kick-Off!!

Have I ever told you how much I love NYC in the summer??  Yeah, I'm sure I have.  There is so much going on all the time and a lot of it is free!  I kicked-off this season of weekend fun in an incredible way!  I would have shared sooner but I was hoping to get some pics from Robyn, who I spent the bulk of the weekend with.  I still haven't gotten them, so I'm blogging on without them, friends!

It started on the first official Thursday night of summer back in June when I met Lucy and Liz at The Bowery Hotel for some FREE art + music.  It was the fact that Rhett Miller was going to be DJing the soiree that got us there.  He also did a short acoustic set.  But, what impressed us most was the space.  The Bowery Hotel may just be my new favorite spot!  The event space is half indoors and half outdoor terrace.  It is beautifully decorated.  After walking about 5-steps in the doorway I said to Lucy, "I think I love this place".  She did too.  And then when Liz came in a bit later, she'd already planned her entire wedding around the space by the time she found us - ha!  The art that was on display was pretty fantastic as well.  A couple of ladies who have an art gallery in upstate New York brought some of their goods down to show off to us city folks.  It was an impressive collection and fit in so well with the space.  I hope to attend many more events in this special little spot down in the Bowery.

I only took one picture at the Bowery Hotel...should have taken many more.  I wish it had turned out better, but I thought this fireplace was gorgeous.  In the design magazines and blogs I've been flipping through lately, I've seen a lot of displays of wood like the one on the sides at the top of the fireplace.  Love it...wish I could put the idea to use (could use it anyway, but would be kind of weird since I don't have a fireplace).

Saturday morning (5:30AM to be exact), I headed for Central Park where I spent 8 hours with my friend Robyn.  We were waiting in the line for Shakespeare in the Park tickets.  They are FREE which makes them difficult to get, but it's a rite of passage for all New Yorkers, so it had to be done!  The day went by extremely quick.  We brought games, magazines, and snacks with us, but mostly ended up chatting and people watching the whole time.  The two guys manning the line gave out #'s for places that would deliver food to the line.  We had breakfast sandwiches brought right to us - it was pretty funny!  The wait really wasn't bad at all - if you're going to have to wait for 8 hours in one spot, it might as well be in Central Park!  And, we got the tickets!!  I am so glad we went early in the season - I had friends go this past weekend and the ones who got there at 2AM got tickets, but the ones who arrived at 4:00AM did not.  5:30AM isn't sounding so bad now, is it??

We split up for the afternoon and came back that night for the show, along with our friends Bethany and Megan (Robyn and I could each get 2 tickets).  Robyn brought pizza and I brought wine to enjoy while watching the show.  We saw The Merchant of Venice starring Al Pacino and Jesse L. Martin (you'd recognize him from Law & Order and other shows).  It was SO good and the perfect evening to be out in the park enjoying some theatre.

That Sunday, I went to teach the kids at church in the morning and from there, Hillery, Robyn and I went out to Governor's Island to attend our first polo match....for FREE, of course!  Governor's Island is just off the south end of Manhattan, not far from Liberty Island (where the Statue of Liberty is).  It was an extremely hot day and very, very crowded so that put a bit of a damper on our fun.  We got to see Prince Harry play, though, and that was worth it!!  I'd love to go to a Polo match another time...but maybe one that isn't so crowded!

The tents were just for the people who bought

$250 tickets.  I tried to win tickets,

but no such luck.  Maybe next year.

Here come the players!

That'd be Prince Harry trying to get the ball

At half-time (or whatever it's called in a Polo Match),

everyone got to go onto the field to stomp the divots

back in the ground - I've always wanted to do that!

We knew there were lots of celebs there (Robyn had

a friend working in the tents and he updated us on who

was there).  We tried to spot some, but no luck.

Pretty views of the city

Harry again!

That evening, I managed to make it back to Manhattan in time for church followed by Rooftop Wine & Cheese.  Lucy and her roommate, Jessica, have been hosting these fun parties on their rooftop after church about once a month.  This was the first time I was able to go and it was so much fun!  I got to talk to lots of people - ones I rarely see and met some new peeps, too.  And life in the hot city is always better when you're on a rooftop!

It couldn't have been a better weekend to kick-off all the summer fun!