NYC/Birthday Weekend

So when I realized my birthday was on a Saturday this year, I knew I wanted to go to NYC to celebrate.  It turned out to be a 4.5 day weekend for me as well, which was even better!  We had 3 days+nights of fun in the city, but we were totally exhausted by the end (and throughout) so I think if we go again, we will just do 1 day and then come home and sleep!

My picture taking on this trip was a little inconsistent-I took a bunch of pictures of just a few things and then no pictures of other things we did.  I am including a few, but you can see the whole random album here if you are interested.

We drove to NYC on Friday evening and we didn't hit any traffic, just lots of rain.  We decided to stay out of Manhattan, in Queens, to save some money and it turned out to be a great location and was just 15 min to Times Square by subway.  Once we arrived, we headed right in because we needed to pick up our New York Passes from Planet Hollywood.  Times Square at night is something everyone should experience sometime in their life (I had before, this was John's first).

Times Square

After picking up our passes, we put them to use right away and headed to the Empire State Building to the 86th floor observation deck.  The view is so amazing and of course, pictures just don't do it justice!

View of the Chrysler Building from the Empire State Building

Saturday morning we decided we wanted a view of the city in the light, so we went to the Top of the Rock at Rockefeller Center.  It was a hot day, but another great view of the city.

View of Central Park from the Top of the Rock

We spent the afternoon riding bikes we had rented through Central Park.  I took no pictures in Central Park-a good example of how unbalanced my picture taking was.  We picked up lunch at a deli along the bike path to the Hudson River and enjoyed a shaded lunch at Riverside Park.  After lunch we hit up Madame Tussaud's Wax Museum.  I was so fascinated my the figures and took a ridiculous amount of pictures.

Our last outing was a Harbor Lights sailing cruise out to the Statue of Liberty.  We underestimated how long it would take to get where we needed to be and we just made it onto the boat before they pulled away from shore-as in we literally ran down the entire pier to get on the boat.  It was worth it though-the view of the Brooklyn Bridge and Manhattan and New Jersey and the Statue of Liberty and everything else was so cool.  It was a great way to end a really busy but fun birthday!

Brooklyn Bridge
By Sunday we were pretty exhausted and sadly, we missed the tour of NBC Studios we had tickets for that morning.  So we had a really nice brunch and then walked around the Museum of Modern Art for awhile.  I have to admit, I was a little bored.  There was some cool stuff, but I'm not sure I "get" most modern art.  One piece was a bunch of candy wrapped in blue, red, and white wrappers piled in the corner.  Really?

Starry Night

After that, we took the ferry out to Liberty Island to see the Statue up close.  The best part of this trip was just sitting on the ferry, enjoying the breeze, the ocean, and the great views!

As soon as we got back to Battery Park, we got a call that we had been selected in the lottery for David Letterman tickets we had entered the day before!  We were really excited because we were pretty bummed about missing our studio tour, but this would be even better because we would actually get to be a part of a taping!

The big event (at least for me) was Sunday night-Billy Elliot on Broadway!  Recently the son of some friends of mine started as Billy (one of 5 boys that play him) so we were really excited to get to see him perform.  We had gone back to the hotel to change before the show, and once again, we were cutting it too close on time for getting to the theater.  So once again, I found myself running through NYC crowds to get somewhere.  Only this time, I was wearing heels.  So I took them off and ran BAREFOOT from 41st St to 45th St to get to the show just a couple minutes before they started dimming the lights and the the show started.  I'm sure I looked crazy (and maybe I am), but at least we made the show!  And it was AMAZING! I absolutely loved the whole show and Tade was so, so good as Billy.  I seriously can't believe how talented he is and what an awesome opportunity at only 11 years old.  We were able to visit with him and his mom, Tanya, after the show.

With Tade after the show

Monday we had planned to take a side trip in to New Jersey to go to Six Flags, but since we had the tickets to Letterman (and because we thought we might be overdoing it a bit), we decided to skip it and had a leisurely morning in the city.  We walked across the Brooklyn Bridge, explored Brooklyn a little bit and visited the 9/11 Memorial preview site and then got to the Ed Sullivan Theater with plenty of time to spare.

The taping of the show was really fun!  The guest was Jason Segel (from "How I Met Your Mother and he is in the new movie "Bad Teacher") and Buck, the horse whisperer, who has a new documentary out about him and also some band...I can't remember their name.  The showed aired on Thursday and we watched it and all the jokes were still funny the second time.

Overall it was a great weekend and such a fun way to celebrate my birthday!