Holiday Shops at Bryant Park

Today was a pretty nice day for November...the temperature was in the mid 60s. And since Chris had a lot of school work that he needed to do, I decided to go into Manhattan and do a little Christmas window-shopping. Per Chris's suggestion, I headed to the holiday shops at Bryant Park. Seriously the most versatile park I've ever known, Bryant park becomes this winter-shopping-wonderland in the months of November and December. The ice skating rink is situated in the middle of the park with around 100 individual shops in greenhouse-esque buildings. The normal things to love about Bryant Park - Wichcraft, seating, ping pong etc. - are all still there as well. I had a lovely time browsing the shops and then grabbed some tomato soup and a goat cheese sandwich from Wichcraft, and sat and watched people ice skate. I'm really ready for Christmastime in the City now!!!

It Really Is a Small World, After All

Two things happened this weekend that made me realize what a small and crazy world we live in. Sunday morning, Chris and I went to church at Redeemer on the upper east side. It's a pretty huge church that has multiple services and this particular service meets in a large auditorium at Hunter College. Well we sat next to this couple and came to find out that they were visiting from North Carolina, grew up in SC, and went to Clemson. Then, it turns out that the people they were staying with live in our neighborhood in Brooklyn and also went to Clemson. What?! So crazy!

The second thing happened as a result of reading the Brownstoner blog, a blog that has a reputation for reporting on all things Brooklyn. They posted about a family who recently launched a blog documenting the renovation of a Victorian style house on Albemarle. When I saw pictures of the street I thought that surely that can't be so close, just south of Prospect Park. It also got me feeling guilty that I had never ventured to that neighborhood. There are so many parts of New York City - so many parts of Brooklyn - that we have never explored and probably won't ever get the chance to. So, partly feeling guilty of not knowing my own community and partly doubting that such a place existed so close to my neighborhood, I decided to go on an adventure. It was a beautiful, 65 degree day, perfect for a walk. It took me about 25 minutes, and sure enough, there is a whole neighborhood full of BEAUTIFUL, huge, victorian style houses. It absolutely blew my mind. The neighborhood is called Prospect Park South and was planned in 1899 to be a "country in the city." Amazing. I can't get over how this exists so close to us.

On the way, I passed the corner of Windsor Place and Terrace Place, so of course I had to get a picture! I heart Windsor Terrace!

The Laforces Visit!

Way back in early October, we tested whether or not our apartment could handle six people when the Laforces - Keith, Megan, Eric, and Emily - came to visit! Although our tiny apartment was a tight squeeze for the crowd, we managed and we had a great time with them. This was the first time we had gotten together since Emily and Eric's wedding so it was fun to spend time with the newlyweds.

The subway system decided to shut down that weekend...literally. Every subway line except three (two of which were shuttle services) had some sort of service disruption that weekend. The F was not running from Church Avenue to Jay Street and was replaced by...dum dum dum...shuttle buses. Normally when this happens, we just stay in Brooklyn for the weekend. But of course we didn't want to do that this weekend, so the Laforces got to enjoy the shuttle buses with us ha. They were great sports!

Saturday we walked around midtown and that night we went to see Avenue Q, which was hilarious. We are so glad they came to visit!!!

5 More Visitors

I'm not so good at this blogging thing...

So since it's been over a month since I've posted anything, I have missed 3 separate groups of visitors. First, my cousin Lindsay came to stay with us on her way back to Cairo. It was SO good to see that girl! We don't get to see each other very often, and I'm really glad that we got to catch up, especially since there were Preacher Cookies involved. :)

Next were Tara and Andrew! It was Andrew's first time in NYC, which is always fun. We walked around midtown, went to FAO Schwartz, Burger Joint, and the Museum of Natural History.

Then a couple days later Rebekah and Javier came up to visit! They had a bit of bad luck with the weather, but eventually got to see a match at the US Open...the one where Serena went crazy, nonetheless. We had a great time exploring Central Park with them....for four hours? It was a long time and a lot of walking, but a lot of fun too.

Swings with a View

Last weekend when Lauren was visiting, we went out to Governors Island. None of us had ever been out to GI and Chris's coworker had a group of people out for her birthday. We caught a free ferry from South Port over to the island and then rented bikes to ride around. It was a gorgeous day and it was so fun to ride a bike for the first time since...I don't even know when. I wish we had read up on some of the history beforehand... we ended up just making up stories. In case you're curious, it has a really interesting history that you can read about here. The majority of buildings from the military fort still remain and personally, I think it would be the ideal place for a university campus.

We rode our bikes around to the other side of the island to get a better view of the Statue of Liberty, when lo and behold, there was a playground with swings. So of course we had to stop and swing. Swinging, while looking at the Statue of Liberty to my left and Lower Manhattan to my right was probably one of the most ridiculously amazing experiences I've had in NYC thus far.

After we got over the amazingness of the swings, we (finally) took our first NYC picture with our Tiger Rag. Go Tigers!

It was so great to be able to spend time with Lauren again! I will miss our Duplin Carolina Red occassions. :)

Two Weeks and Two Visitors

It has been a while since I have posted, but I have good excuses..these past two weeks have been a bit crazy around here! Chris wrapped up the gaming class that he took this summer, which resulted in this really addicting subway game. I had surgery to remove a tumor on my breast. And we had two wonderful guests on back-to-back weekends. Katie, a friend who I have known since elementary school, visited two weekends ago and Lauren, a college friend and roommate, came this past weekend. It was so much fun catching up with both girls...I miss them already! It was also a bit tricky playing host, because both had been to NYC several times and had seen all of the tourist attractions. However, we were able to find a few things to do that neither they nor Chris and I had done before. I might have to break these up into two posts....

Weekend 1:

Since I was a bit out of it on Friday, I was glad that a girl from Chris's program had invited us to come watch The Muppet Movie at one of the piers at Hudson River Park. Yes, it was supposed to be a kids movie...but really, who could pass that up? Then, Saturday, we went into Manhattan and took part in Summer Streets. For 4 hours on Saturday, Park Avenue and other streets were closed to automobile traffic from the Brooklyn Bridge to Central Park. We just walked, but you could also bike or rollerblade without worrying about cars...a relief in NYC.

Saturday night, we walked across the Brooklyn Bridge for the first time! It was beautiful to see the skyline lit up at night.

Sunday, Katie and I went to MOMA. I have to say, I think MOMA is my favorite of all of the art museums in the City. I've been 3 times now and there's always something new and unique. this time, Katie and I took part in the art...

The exhibit is called "Measuring America" and plays off of the notion of measuring children on the doorway as they grow year by year. We were both at the bottom of average. Long story, but the lady tried to make us go to the back of the line and I was confused/stressed and forgot to smile! Anyway, it was a fun weekend and I enjoyed getting to spend time with Katie!

1 Year NYC Anniversary

Today marks our 1-year anniversary of living in NYC. It was this time last year that I got an ulcer from Chris driving a Uhaul across the Verrazano bridge. It was this time last year that I tipped the movers twice as much as they charged because I was so impressed that it took them 30 minutes to unload the Uhaul that had taken Chris, Justin, Daniel, and I 5 hours to pack. It was also this day a year ago that we had our first slice of Joe's pizza...ahhh, Joe's.

We had a fairly busy weekend. We finally made it to the movie theatre, the Pavillion, that is 3 streets up from our apartment, to see 500 Days of Summer (wonderful movie). We made our weekly run up to the Farmer's Market and got some eggplant, apples, and green tomatoes. Saturday evening we had a picnic in the park with our neighbors outside of the bandshell where there was a free concert. Then today we went to church, went to see a play up at Columbia that Grayson was in, and then went to Flipsters on 7th Ave for some amazing burgers. I say all in all, it was a pretty good 1-year NYC anniversary.