New York New York

July 3-6

We had a whirlwind of a weekend visiting Scott and Julie in NYC.  Our flight ended up being delayed in Chicago for over 8 hours, and we missed our show to Newsies that we already had tickets for, but we had a wonderful weekend regardless.  Because of that delay we only had two full days in the city, so we practically ran around from one thing to the next until we were so exhausted and I could hardly move.  

It was so much fun to see where Scott and Julie lived, where they worked, and just a little bit of what their lives are like there in Manhattan.  I wished I had gotten a picture of their adorable studio apartment.

And now...pictures.

Day 1.

^^We got bagels for breakfast and walked through Central Park.  It was cool and rainy on Friday and not crowded at all.  Such a beautiful park to walk through. 

^^So much fun at this toy store.

^^The most amazing, amazing Chocolate {blob} cookies at Levain's Bakery.  Chocolate heaven.  

^^The highline was beautiful.  I loved being up there with all the greenery but seeing it next to all of those buildings and railroad tracks.  

We wandered through Chelsea Market and Eataly, which were both so fun.

We popped in the American Museum of Natural History because it was raining pretty hard in the afternoon, and enjoyed wandering around there and seeing a few of the exhibits, including the massive, life sized whale.

We watched fireworks by the Brooklyn Bridge and then headed to Time Square.  Time Square was seriously insane to me...I could not believe all of the buildings, advertisements, and most of all, PEOPLE! 

Day 2.

For some crazy reason, we decided to get up early and go wait in line at the Dominique Ansel Bakery for a Cronut.  Something about how we didn't know when the next time we'd be in New York was and we might as well.  We all woke up, realized we slept in a little, threw on some clothes and got ourselves to the Bakery as fast as we could.  We got in line about 6:45 and got our cronuts about two hours later.  Hence the reason we all look so tired and makeup-less this day.  And they truly were amazing and worth the wait.

^^The 9/11 Memorial was really amazing.  I loved seeing it and thought it was done perfectly.

^^Ferry ride out to Staten Island to see the Statue of Liberty.  Marcus had warned me that the statue wasn't as big as I was probably imagining, but I was very impressed.

^^Amazing, amazing pizza at Juliana's.  I think it would have been amazing anyway, but it helped that we had walked miles for it and were all famished by this point.

^^After some delicious ice cream from the Brooklyn Ice Cream Factory

^^I loved walking across the Brooklyn Bridge.  It was hot and sweaty but pretty amazing.  I loved seeing the view. Eating pizza, ice cream and walking that bridge was probably one of my favorite parts of the trip.

^^Beautiful public library.

^^Most fabulous tour guides ever.

^^We ended our last night at the Empire State Building around 10:30.  The line was soo long and I was exhausted.  We decided instead to head to Sprinkles, pick up some cupcakes to take back to Scott and Julie's and call it a night.

Not pictured:  Rockefeller Center, Bryant Park, the flat iron building, seeing the temple, popping in stores like Century 21, Zara, Nike, and Anthropology to do a little bit of shopping.  And of course we had to try Shake Shack.

We left bright and early Sunday morning to head home, but it was so much fun to see New York.  Thanks Scott and Julie for having us!