wanderings in the village

True to my word, I went back to the Village to wander around.



Check out these great doors. I especially love the one that's crooked. That's not all camera angle; it was built that way. Click to enlarge them and get a closer look.




The buildings there have so much character. Many of them were built in the 1800's.




I love how the streets in the West Village don't follow the grid pattern of most of the rest of the city. Nothing makes sense; it's a fun place to get a little lost.




Of course a stop at Yogurtland is a must. I mean, if you're in the area... you basically have to, right?



The Hudson River Park is another favorite feature of the area. It's really beautiful and very well maintained. It's lovely to walk along the river there in the evening, since it's on the west side of the island you get a great view of the sunset over NJ.




I love these guys' hats.

washington square park

I'm quickly learning that there is no shortage of perfectly lovely parks in this city. Each one I visit is different and beautiful. I think they're my favorite part of New York. This park's most famous feature is the Washington Square Arch.

I remember visiting here with my parents the first time I came to NY, and I remember I loved the buildings on the north side. I thought it would be so delightful to live in one of those red brick buildings with the perfect stoops and clean white doors.

What I didn't remember was that there's this huge, gorgeous fountain right behind the arch, and lots of garden areas with a wide variety of flowers. (In the mid-day heat, I really had to fight the urge to jump in the fountain with the little kids.) I decided today that I love this park. It's definitely one of my favorites.

dear soho, i love you.

I wandered around SoHo a bit this morning. Oh boy, that place is just lovely. I love the beautiful buildings and I love that there are so many stores I like to shop in. I should've taken more than six pictures to try to capture it.

This one's for you, Mom and Dad! I went in for old time's sake to see if our friend who got us in at Balthazar's still works there. He wasn't there. And everything there is still way out of my budget. :)



{My parents took me to NYC for my senior trip when I was 18, and it was quite the shopping extravaganza. Scoop in SoHo will always hold a dear place in our hearts. After buying some jeans there, the guy that helped us was our new best friend. We mentioned we were looking for a place to eat, and he took it upon himself to walk with us to this really nice place which would've been impossible to get reservations at, and get us a table. He knew someone and pulled some strings. It was a fun experience.}

going away party

I'm feeling much better today. Thanks for your nice comments. Something else that cheered me up last night: a party at Casey's with a lot of the BYU interns. Many are going home in the next week. It was fun to get together with everyone and celebrate an awesome summer in NYC. We had brownies and ice cream, watched Wipeout and laughed a ton.

thanks, bloggers!

I just wanted to thank all of you who blogged today. After a long, boring, partly humiliating, awful day at work, it was fun to come home to open up my Google reader and find 18 new posts. Eighteen!! Thank you, faithful bloggers. I don't know if I could've taken the disappointment of finding zero updates to brighten my day, but eighteen? You really outdid yourselves. Thanks for the pick me up! :) Keep posting!

happy sabbath!

Here's where we go to church every Sunday. It's pretty great. We like it.

Today we helped some friends move into our neighborhood; they're fellow BYU transplants.

There was a cool thunderstorm this evening. Thank goodness the rain didn't start until the moment the last item was unloaded from the truck.
Someone up there was watching out for us.

Later we all met up for some dinner and some laughs.




I brought black bean veggie dip. Yes, we ate the whole bowl. There were eight of us.




Hope you enjoyed your day of rest as much as we did!

klane's first ny scout campout

Highlights:

~ Klane teaches scouts how to cook a perfect hot dog over ideal cooking coals. Scouts decide it's taking too long and cook their dogs over the camp stove instead.

~ Klane teaches scouts how to toast a perfect marshmallow over above-mentioned coals. Scouts become impatient and burn marshmallows. However, a few catch on and produce perfect lightly toasted mallows.

~ The group walks near the lake, and the leaders point out constellations. Some of the scouts don't know what stars are (aside from 'tiny lights in the sky') and leaders explain they're actually giant balls of gas burning billions of miles away, to much awe and amazement.

~ A discussion ensues while looking up at the heavens. Topics include God, the universe, the priesthood... and aliens.

~ Klane gets minimal amount of sleep while making sure scouts stay in their tents and out of trouble.

~ Klane announces he'll be fixing Egg McMuffins for breakfast and asks how they like their fried eggs cooked. Scouts have no idea what an Egg McMuffin is, and don't know what he means by asking how they like their eggs. He attempts to explain, they say 'we don't care, just cook them.' The first scout is served an egg over easy and proclaims that his egg isn't cooked because the yellow part is all runny. (?)

~ The scouts discuss music with their leaders. Klane impresses them by revealing that he loves Kanye and the occasional Tupac.



I asked Klane for more details, but he passed out on the bed before I got much more out of him. He's now been snoring for about 90 minutes. I do know he had a lot of fun, and that they also got to go swimming. I'm sure he's going to have a blast with this calling!

single for a night

Klane had a scout campout last night. Pat and Lindsay invited me to come hang out with them around the West Village. It was so fun; I didn't even feel like a third wheel! (Thanks, guys.) We watched a free showing of Ghostbusters on Pier 46. The Hudson River Park, with winding paths, trees and all the piers, is so beautiful. I want to go back! Later we wandered through the tiny, tangled streets in the village. That whole area is so cute. It's very picturesque. I love the narrow tree-lined streets, the cute, small buildings, the cobblestone, all the little shops. I want to get back there with a camera, though I don't know if I could really capture the feel of it. We found Milk and Cookies Bakery for a treat. It was a really cute place, and as you can see below I was very serious about their delicious vanilla ice cream.

Thanks Lindsay for thinking to bring your camera and letting me steal your pics. (See Lindsay's post here.)

counting blessings

Sometimes I get sad and wonder why anyone would ever want to live in this big, stinky, noisy, crowded city. (It's usually on days when I've been cooped up inside the apartment all day. Tuesday it rained. All. Day. Long.)

But then I get to go to work, on Park Avenue, for heaven's sake. My walk there is beautiful in the morning light.



I get to work at a really great office. (This is it:)



I get to meet my cute husband for lunch.



I get to be married to this handsome guy.



We get to meet up with friends for dinner at a crazy cool restaurant.



And then I realize I should stop feeling sorry for myself because life really isn't so bad. There is a lot to be grateful for and although it's inconvenient and lonely and hard sometimes, living in NYC is a once in a lifetime opportunity, so we ought to soak it up while we're here.

east village indian place

Casey and Todd took us to the most awesome restaurant in their neighborhood. We had so much fun! There are four Indian restaurants that look exactly the same and their entrances are right next to each other, and they each have a guy outside persuading you to come to their place. They're all loud and they jokingly fight over the customers, it's hilarious. Then once you choose the one on the top right (Panna II), you go in and you're surrounded by sparkly paper covering the walls, lights, disco balls, beach balls, beads and other random paraphernalia hanging from the ceiling, and booming indian music. The service is quick and the food is yummy, but above all, the whole experience is just crazy awesome. Something you just have to see.

I should've waited till the music was really bumpin, you can only sort of hear it in this vid.
At least you can hear the waiter, and try to decipher if he's speaking English or not.

i don't know if i should be embarrassed about this...

but I'm actually pretty excited for Glee.



This is kind of embarrassing, but every time the trailers played during American Idol, I couldn't help but get chills watching their rendition of "Don't Stop Believing."



I saw another preview the other day and I have to admit I will be watching this come fall. Even if I have to do it on my laptop, so Klane doesn't have to watch it with me. It premiers mid-September. You can watch the pilot episode on Hulu.

riverside park

I went running here this morning. I found these pictures of it on Meg's blog today. I definitely want to go back soon to take some photos of my own. It's a beautiful place. You may recognize the garden from this famous scene in You've Got Mail. I thought it looked familiar when I ran through it...