My real reason to visit Philly..

was not to see the Liberty bell. It was to catch up with T. and cuddle her cute little babe. C. is 9 months old and they can be a little shy...so I resisted grabbing her up and kissing her all over.


Also, T.'s house is sooo big. 5! bedrooms and a bog ole kitchen with a breakfast nook, sigh. Can you hear my jealousy?
And a yard!
And a mansard roof....

Philly

My friend T. escaped NYC a couple of years ago and bought a house in Philadelphia. I have been promising to visit her for ages. This last weekend, I finally went and it was really fun. One, I took the super cheap Chinatown bus. Two, I have been reading a lot of American history lately. So...the bus was fine, especially for $10, and dropped me in the middle of Philly easy walking distance to the Independence Historical area. The above photo is of Carpenter's Hall, which was the meeting place for the first Continental Congress. The houses below are historic houses also from that Federalist era.



This is the Betsy Ross house- which I didn't go in, but is on my list for the next trip.

Here is Independence Hall- by the time we got here..the tickets were all sold out. Yet another thing for my next trip.
Philly has a lot of really beautiful alleys, full of tiny adorable houses along cobble/ brick roads. This was one of my favorites.

Blue Hill

This is the interior courtyard of the Stone Barns and that guy is famous! Dan Barber is the executive chef of Blue Hill the amazing restaurant located there and also in the West Village. He greeted us after we were so obviously staring and gawking at him....
Here is V. and Z. on our picnic blankets on a hill near the woods under a shade tree....ahh.
Is this a clamatis? My dad would know...

Ridiculously Insane Day

This is Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture. It is 45 min. outside of the city and we went for a picnic with our friends V. and Z. (who have a car). The grounds are amazingly lovely and the barns and restaurants soo beautiful. They have a large field with a wide variety of crops and many pastures with cows, chickens, pigs, turkeys, geese, and sheep all free range and happily pecking away.
These piggies were just fed by a tour group that picked the veggies from the nearby greenhouse and threw it at them and on them. They looked so happy.
There was also a bunch of roosters all hanging out together. I get the feeling that they aren't very nice.
Here is where the cows are.
You can see the portable chicken houses and the sheep. These two sheep were by themselves and like all the boy animals, I think they were alone cause they aren't so friendly?

My House

This is one of my favorite times of the day. It is the only time our apartment gets direct sunlight- 7am. But I am not a morning person...so I am not often sufficiently conscious to enjoy it.

Sister trip

Fri: D. and K. arrived and we picked them up in a rented car. We drove out to Coney Island and had Totonno's pizza. In my opinion it was the best pie in the city. Then we went over to Astroland and walked on the Boardwalk. We rode the Wonderwheel and played Skeeball. Coney Island was topped off with the requisite visit to Nathan's for hotdogs and cheese fries. We then drove through Brooklyn and across the Brooklyn Bridge. Once in Manhattan we went to the Lower East Side. I have been longing for Il Laboratorio del Gelato and everytime we have gone to the shop it was closed. There are no photos there because I was too busy saying "mmmmm, ooo, ohmygosh sogood!...mmmm, yumm, sosogood.." K. also got pickles from Guss Pickles. We drove up the east side and went home to rescue our pooch. He was very "excited" to have visitors and we went out to Gabriela's in our neighborhood.
Sat: Got up early and had breakfast at our place. Then took the subway down to see Trinity Church, World Trade Center, Wall Street, and Federal Hall. We had lunch at Les Halles- which is Anthony Bourdain's restaurant. Then we walked over to the South Street Seaport, NYPD museum, and Fraunces Tavern. After a cup of coffee we took the Staten Island Ferry and saw the Statue of Liberty. We then came home to get the pooch and rest. That night we went out to Ruby Foo's for dinner in Time Square. We walked and shopped and then had desert at Marseille on 9th Ave.
Sun: We went out for brunch at Kitchenette, which is a great restaurant, but we hadn't been there since D.'s last trip two years ago. Then we walked over to Grant's Tomb and Riverside church. We grabbed a cab for the Natural History Museum to see the Horse exhibit. After we went over to Broadway to shop and eat treats like creampuffs and more gelato! There is a KC BBQ restaurant in NYC called RUB that we went to for dinner. Then we went uptown to Rockefeller Center to see the Top of the Rock. It is a really spectacular view of the city. We were really wiped out at this point and came on back home.
Mon: They left this morning and had just enough time to go to Central Park with Sparks.

Mr.'s Head

This is in front of Federal Hall on Wall Street where George Washington took the Oath of Office as the first President of the US.
This is the dinosaur at the gigantic Toys R Us store in Times Square.
This dinosaur is at the Natural History Museum.
You can see the waterfall art installation under the Brooklyn Bridge.

They're here!

We began the visit at Coney Island, which is a faded NYC gem. We had Nathan dogs and rode the Wonderwheel. Actually, we did that the other way around- wheel and then hotdogs, otherwise it could make you really sick...
The next day we went downtown and visited Trinity Church. This is Alexander Hamilton's grave and it was the anniversary of his death (July 12th) after the infamous duel with Aaron Burr.
This is the NY Stock Exchange.
I was in charge of the camera, so there are few shots of me. Here is one of them...

Saturday

The NY Police Museum is at 100 Old Slip in an old precinct house. It was really cool. With the history of the department and funny installations like this where we all had our mug shots taken.
Fraunces Tavern dates back to 1762 and George Washington gave his farewell speech to his officers there in 1783.
We took the Staten Island Ferry and on the way back there were some cruises departing from the piers on the west side in the Hudson.
Here's Lady Liberty.
We pushed through our exhaustion for dinner and shopping in Times Sqaure

Sunday

Sunday morning we went to our old neighborhood for brunch at Kitchenette. That always involves quite a bit of gluttony, so afterwards we took a walk over to Grant's Tomb.
The Natural History Museum was having a Horse exhibit and we check out the dinosaurs before went in...
K. brought his Sheriff's hat
Outside the NHM

We are so tired

After an early dinner on Sunday we were able to catch the sunset on the Top of the Rock, the observation deck of Rockefeller Center. This is also right next door is Radio City Music Hall.

Below is Central Park...I think I can see our apartment?
We have about a hundred of these self- portraits.

TV Diet

For me a TV diet is not that hard.  I am at home a lot and listen to my iPod most of the time. But when Mr. comes home, it is challenging.  He is not on the diet and wants to unwind.  He has been very supportive and I am a little less tense from not constantly being aggressively marketed at and not watching any politics.  Look at my beautiful flowers from the greenmarket!!!

I technically broke it for the Fourth of July fireworks and last night we watched a kind of disturbing Dan Rather expose about 1. Walmart and 2. dalits in India...which pretty much re-enforced why I am on a TV diet.  I finished 1776, which was excellent!

Treats

I have been all over NYC looking for popsicle molds all week. I actually thought these were kind of ugly...but really, everyone is sold out, so beggars can't be choosers. These are yogurt blueberry popsicles and very icy. I am gonna make a banana recipe that Mark Bittman (NYTimes) made.
This new shower curtain makes an enormous difference in our bathroom. We have some rather ugly pink tile that we cannot change and it has always hindered our decor. But this really works...
I had my stoop sale (which was really confusing for many New Yorkers- "What are ya sellin' the stoop?). And I made almost $50 bucks for some handknitted bags and old books! It was fun and I met a neighbor who has always said hi to Sparks and us. She happens to be a member of the nearby community garden, a public school teacher, a terrace gardener, and reading a David McCullough book! Very cool.

Garden

I was a little worried about the dianthus once the first bloom was over. But the upper planter is looking full and beautiful. The lower planter is just getting it together. I put all new dirt in this year- so I don't know why things do not grow well down there. Could it be dog pee/poop? I dunno. But I put little scoops of NYC compost around the bottom of each one of them.

So Mr.'s sister is coming into town tomorrow and our house has never, ever been cleaner. And we got some new stuff to distract her from the fact that our apartment is sooo smal. I will post that later. I am having a stoop sale today...

Spots

Sparks and I have been finding Spots. We take a nice long walk in Central Park and then we discover a new Spot and we sit and we look. We look at the people, eat the grass, get pets, and sigh...(and listen to podcasts).
This is our new kitchen cart. We have needed this thing since I received the Kitchenaid mixer which has been living on the piano! So after many wrangles with Crate and Barrel- we got it and put it together. Now I am going to re-arrange the entire apartment to best utilize the new space. How thrilling. Also, day two of TV Diet was successful- thanks to the cart. I am only reading two books at a time now...1776 and Barbara Kingsolver's "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle". Makes me have farm fantasies.

One day down

Phew, I made it through day one! The best thing is that Mr. was very supportive, did not give me a hard time at all. We watched American Gangster, ate dinner, and went to bed. We had already met after work and taken a long walk home with the dog. We are going to meet at the Y tonight for swimming- which is so much fun. So that is limiting the temptation time. Tonight we have La Vie en Rose to watch- but I may just read and let him watch the news and shout to me what is happening in the world.