The rest of NYC

This trip was A M A Z I N G

It sounds so corny, but I really felt like the whole thing was meant to be!

It was kind of a last minute trip (thank you frequent flyer miles!), and it was exactly what I needed.

I desperately want to live in NYC for a few years, but we will have to wait and see how that one works out! In the meantime I'll be looking at these photos and relieving all the wonderful memories.

First off, our apartment. It was an airbnb (which is always my go to) and it was actually affordable! This also meant that it was TINY like really tiny, but who cares! It's not like we were spending much time in it anyways!

Shout out to my younger sister who literally slept on some cushions on the floor definitely not a "pull out bed" as advertised!

Our apartment was also right on the border of Little Italy and Chinatown, but it basically was in Chinatown considering that all the signs were in Chinese. It was fun to see the fruit vendors, but the smell of deah fish being sold on the sidewalk in the hot summer heat was far from pleasant!

We also totally met the Chinese dumpling equivalent of The Soup Nazi  she only sells one flavor of dumplings, and if you don't have exact change, or if you try and ask her any questions, no dumplings for you!! 

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One of my favorite parts of the trip though was just walking around all the beautiful neighborhoods! 

Greenwich village:  you have to check out 10th/11th/12st between 4th and 6th Ave! 

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Soho was also beautiful! And we stumbled on a serious dance battle in the streets. 

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On Friday I celebrated my 21st birthday in the city roaming the streets of new york and taking tons of pictures! Here are a few snaps from the day:

(Eataly) 

(The inside of The Plaza Hotel) 

(Sheep's Meadow) 

(Central Park) 

(The Met)

(The Guggenheim) 

(The Highline) 

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We spent our last few hours in NYC at the 9/11 memorial museum before we had to catch our Monday evening flight. 

It was so powerful. 

We spent 2 hours there and I wish we had time to spend 6 hours there! We honestly didn't even get to see 1/2 of the museum. 

I am old enough that I remember 9/11, but I was too young at the time to really understand it at all. 

It's still so hard to understand how something so horrific could happen and how terrified everyone felt. 

That day brought America to its knees. I hope that it won't be forgotten and that we can learn from it

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And finally, a few other little tidbits that didn't make it into my other posts! 

(Try not to judge the fact that this post has a few dozen photos! I really did spend a long time editing down all the photos I took. It's just hard to pick favorites when you love them all!) 

I promise I'm not a narcissist, sometimes while you're waiting for your family to come out of the dressing room you just have to seize the moment and take a selfie. 

Another funny story: I loved this display of soda bottles at this tiny taco shop, so I took a picture as we walked by. I later found at that there is a secret restaurant in the basement there that you have to get reservations weeks in advance for! Its like a speakeasy, but for food! I'm obsessed with the idea. 

This show was SO GOOD! We got our broadway tickets for a discount from the TKTS booth in Times Square and we had great seats for this AMAZING show! I loved the set design so much and the acting was great! The lead was Matthew Morrison (the choir director from Glee) and Kelsey Grammer (who I know from Frasier) was also in the show! 

I cried. 

The whole thing felt like a little piece of magic! 

Which seems like a perfect note to end this post on. 

Thank you NYC for being so magical! See you soon! ;)

xx Jess 

A Perfect Day in New York City

Sunday May 31st, 2015  may go down in my books as one of the best days ever.

By the end of the day I was sure I had drank felix felicius (the liquid luck potion in HP!), we made a ton of decisions on the fly and everything somehow just worked out perfectly all day long!

Bright and early at 8:30am after grabbing a bagel for breakfast, we made our way over to the 9/11 memorial site to go to the museum, it was supposed to rain all day (which is why we had booked tickets for then) but it was sunny when we arrived, and I was feeling lucky, so we switched our tickets to Monday. And after looking around the memorial fountains we slowly made our way over to Brooklyn.

HOW COME NO ONE TOLD ME ABOUT BROOKLYN! Visiting Brooklyn was the most unexpected favorite part of my whole trip! heart eye emojis for days!

On Saturday I had desperately wanted to go to this foodie market called Smorgasburg, but my sister had some pretty horrific blisters on here feet, so it didn't work out. I was disappointed, but resigned to missing out on it. But when our morning opened up and my mom and sister said they'd be down to go to this market's Sunday location in Brooklyn, I was ecstatic!

Surprise #2: Our google maps walking directions, from the subway to the market, coincidentally took us on a 20 minute stroll through one of the most beautiful neighborhoods I've ever seen!!

We mainly walked down Joralemon St, which you should definitely check out if you're visiting Brooklyn.

We didn't have any time to go exploring, but next nyc trip I'm definitely going to schedule in an entire day or two for Brooklyn exploring! I've also heard rumors that Brooklyn (in addition to their beautiful neighborhoods) has some great food, so sign me up!

Fortuitous surprise #3 of the day: this foodie market wasn't just in a park (like I thought) but on the pier! So we had the best view of Manhattan AND the Brooklyn Bridge!

The food there was delicious, but you can read all about that in my last blog post HERE. I could definitely talk about all the food we ate for numerous blog posts, but I'm trying not to write a novel here, so I'll move on.

I think the two of them were skeptical that this market would be worth the trek, but I definitely converted them into believers! It's amazing and was the cherry on top of my wish for a trip filled with good food!

We only had an hour at the market and could've used more time, but I'm not complaining because we rushed back to Manhattan just in time to use our tickets for the One World Trade Center observation deck! It had only opened 2 days before! So it was brand new and everyone was excited (even the employees!).

Surprise #4: The film they show right before you go to the observation deck was so cool that everyone in the audience was exclaiming and cheering, when was the last time a museum movie made you do that?! The excitement in the air was infectious. I loved it.

Around 4pm -- after we'd walked around the observation deck several times and taken a billion pictures -- we headed back down to street level, and right as we walked outside the gray clouds started to roll in. I can't believe how lucky we were to have the good weather all day (despite the forecast for rain all day).

So we sat down on a warm bench and tried to figure out our plan for the evening. We ended up sitting and talking for quite a while before deciding to fit in another last-minute adventure to Roosevelt Island.

We made a quick pit stop at Dylan's Candy Bar, then right as we were about to head to the tram station, the heavens opened and it started to POUR. And I mean it! Not just a little rain, or even an average amount of rain, but buckets of water dumping from the sky! We debated if it was worth the mile walk in the rain to get to the tram, but we decided to just brave it. We sprinted down the street stopping briefly under covered awnings to catch our breath.

It was actually a lot of fun, we were all sopping wet, but smiling as we climbed into the tram.

This tram is another hidden gem of NYC, it's actually a commuter tram for people who live on the island. But anyone with a MTA card can ride it . Even with the rain the views were beautiful and from a perspective you usually wouldn't have. It's definitely in my top 5 things I'd recommend!

After the tram we rushed back to the subway station and headed to the Upper West Side in search of the elusive Levain Bakery cookie! If you read my "What to eat in NYC" then you know that the first time we went to Levain they were closed :( but this time we made it with 10min to spare!

Seriously the best cookie I've ever had.

Here are more pictures to document it, because that cookie deserves it.

We then walked down Amsterdam Ave in the sprinkling rain and I decided that I kind of like the UWS, it feels more home-y than the other neighborhoods we went to in manhattan.

Fortuitous surprise #6: our route to dinner passed by Juilliard, the Lincoln Center, and the LDS temple! I was so surprised when I spotted that golden moroni statue among the high rises!

We were famished and wet and tired, but we had an awesome dinner at The Smith!

Then we made our way back to our apartment in chinatown and 5 HUGE rats popped out of the sewers and ran right in front of my feet!! Probably because the sewers had flooded.

But it basically didn't even phase me, because I'm an expert new yorker ;) #welcometothecity