NEW YORK CITY - SOHO

Sunday morning we moved into the city. We dumped our stuff at the hotel and headed out for my choices in Greenwich Village and Soho. I knew two things that I wanted to do, which may sound stupid to others, but exciting to me. Although we ended up, off the subway, by Gray's Papaya hot dogs we weren't hungry yet so we skipped it (bummer). I also wasn't smart enough on this day to get the addresses and directions to where we were going. This is the only time I can remember Gus being frustrated with me on the trip- thank goodness...it was well deserved too.

Thanks to Gus, he remembered there was a MAC store in SoHo. We called his mom and she gave us the address. We located it only three blocks from where we were standing. I realized that we could look up my choices there with their free internet access. Here's Gus at the MAC SoHo store.

We located my two items and I shall blog about those here:

1. Purl Patchwork Soho. www.purlsoho.com Now, I might not look excited in the picture (and it definitely wasn't my best picture of the trip), but seriously, I was. I found this store online as I started doing research for millaTuelle fabrics. Purl Patchwork carries some WONDERFUL artists' fabrics and it was nice just talking to the two gals working there. The one gal asked where we were from and I said Orange County, California. She tipped me off that their website warehouse is in Costa Mesa, along with their sale fabrics, and they take walk-ins all the time. Therefore, I didn't feel like I had to buy everything in the store while I was there. Call it my shopaholism, but I wanted to buy SOMETHING, so I bought a small bundle of pink and red fabrics. I think I might put them all together into one hippie-type, summery shirt.

Lastly on our trip to SoHo, I decided if we were to live in NYC, I would love to live here (or Greenwich Village right up the street...more in next Blog Post). But alas, Orange County does not have the highest rents across the U.S. We found two summer listings- a one bedroom available June and July for $3,500 per month and Nolita lofts 2,000 sq ft (which is quite big) with 1.5 baths and a gourmet kitchen for $6,500 per month. Hello! We thanked the Lord for our apartment after seeing those signs. Location, Location, Location (apparently).

So goes our story of SoHo. This post was a bit long, so the rest of the day (Greenwich Village choice #2) will be in the next Blog Post. Yay.

New York City Vacation - Mary Poppins Matinee

You might say, "Hey Cami, nice picture of The New Amsterdam Theatre at night." This picture is courtesy of http://isawyournanny.blogspot.com. Interesting website- I can't quite figure out it's purpose, but anyway.

We decided that the $145 per ticket (the cheapest) to see WICKED wasn't going to happen. And our $42 per ticket find for Mary Poppins on www.stubhub.com (with a pickup near Times Square) was a much better choice. Mick and Clarice had also recommended this and so we braved the mass of families that chose Mother's Day to attend and went...in our shorts and Keens. It was great. I wouldn't say it's better than the movie- the movie is a classic- but it's different than the movie. The most popular, original songs are still in the play, but they rewrote the script slightly and wrote new music to fit. They focus much more on the importance of family, from what I remember. The movie does this, but it's much more "in your face" in the play.

They also focus more on relationship between Mr. and Mrs. Banks, which I think is great. After having observed the NYC lifestyle of nannyhood/working mothers (more on that in a future post), I wondered if any New York-life families took the message to heart. In the movie it seems Winifred Banks (the mother) has goals that belong to her and her husband, George, could care less. She does charity work, wears banners for Women's Rights, and is never at home to take care of the children. Her interests seem more important than the family. But in the play, she suggests to George at one point, "Maybe I could stay home with the children," and points out that a neighbor has four children and they don't have a nanny. George waves off the suggestion and says, "But we have a nanny so that you can do your charity work and so you can meet the people that you need to meet" (meaning high society people to get noticed by them). They write beautiful, longing love songs for Winifred to sing, showing her desire to be a better mother and a better wife- to take pride in being called Mrs. Banks. It was a great addition to the story in my opinion. I wondered how many NYC mothers felt a twinge of pain as they might have connected to the actress' words as she sang.

Mary Poppins is highly recommended! If you're in New York, DO NOT miss this. If it comes to your town, try it out as well.

New York City - Washington Jefferson Hotel

We searched and searched for the perfect hotel in New York City. Granted, finding something cheap in NYC means either staying somewhere ghetto, in a hostel, or not staying there at all. We found our cozy little Washington Jefferson (www.wjhotel.com) on Expedia and were very pleased. It is located in the theater district on 51st Street, between 8th and 9th Avenue- a really good place to be in NYC we discovered.

It was in our price range (for NYC, that is) and we knew it would be small-ish from the reviews we read on Expedia. It was small, but very cute. It was literally about 3 times the size of my cubicle, plus a bathroom where you knees skimmed the wall while sitting on the toilet. But we liked it and it was in a great neighborhood. With a little creative placement of our suitcases, we were good to go.

(I'm standing at the doorway in both pictures.)

New York City - Mick and Clarice's Wedding

So this is my first post about our recent New York City vacation. It was great to be in Sunnyside, Queens area for Mick and Clarice's wedding...finally. I only say "finally" because it has taken Mick a while to get here, and dang, were we excited. Gus was a groomsman in the wedding (which I dubbed "singing groomsman" because he unconsciously sang all the words to the processional and recessional song while standing in the front of the church...it was pretty cute) and I was wife for the weekend. The wedding was completed with a very fun reception where Clarice and her bridesmaids surprised Mick with a dancing/lipsynching number to, "Hey Mickey, you're so fine, you're so fine you blow my mind, hey Mickey!" It was great!

We had some good friends that now live in Modesto, CA (Andy and Suzy) that were out in NYC also. I luckily got to sing with Andy at the reception (miss doing that!) and then the four of us jumped onto the 7 Train that evening and headed into Times Square. After grabbing $40 pizza and drinks, they treated us to the Monty Python's Spamalot show. If you've ever seen the Holy Grail movie and enjoyed it, you would enjoy this play- it was funny. We exited the play to ran in Times Square...it was nuts - too many people and my anxiety levels were seriously high. After jumping into a Starbucks, we headed for the subway, ran into some other wedding attendees, and sat and chatted with them in the local Dunkin' Donuts until 12:30am.

All around, it was a great day in New York with some fun memories made.

Marina, May-May

I am going to take this time to gush about my friend Mariner. Since I first met Marina on July 4, 2004, I wanted to be friends with her. After a rough move to Orange County and being sick through the whole winter months of 2005, I really started to see how much she cares for her friends. When I was too sick to leave the house, she brought over Sprite, soup and saltines so I could stay nourished. We have stupid cutesy nicknames for each other and we have baking/cooking nights mingled with craft nights. Once my business is up-and-running, I want her to be my first real employee. She's possibly more excited about me and Gus planning a family and I already trust her with our future children.
My current gush comes from this past week. Gus and I were in New York City for a wedding and we asked Marina if she would like to stay at our place (a quiet haven to study for finals) and to water our already dead plants. We arrived home yesterday to a beautiful bouquet of flowers and a menu on the refrigerator. She had cooked us 3.5 amazing dinner entrees, breakfast biscuits, burritos for lunch and dessert bars that you would hurt someone for. Gus and I have thoroughly been enjoying our meals, but I think we've been enjoying Marina's friendship to us even more. Her thoughtfulness and care for us is over the top, plus taking the time to do that with finals around the corner...seriously. She's awesome! (And good Christian single men, she's available!)