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.