This year, I was worried about going on the trip because Andy still wasn't feeling great. BUT, Eddie's mom was coming in, and Monday night before we left, he had "The Big Bang" as I am calling it-- the explosion that our doctor said to watch for to let us know the clear out was beginning. Since he had that, and I felt like things were moving, AND because my mother in law was coming-- we felt okay leaving them.
Mimi arrived Monday night and my mom and I left Tuesday morning, early. My alarm clock went off at 4:30, but it wasn't needed because my littlest friend has been getting up every.single.morning around 4:00. Seriously. It is like an alarm clock-- this has been going on for weeks. I think it's a combo of daylight savings and his tummy issues. He is usually my really good sleeper, so this has been a total butt kicker. He will go back to sleep in my bed (and there's not a lot of room there with two adults and him) or if I sleep on his floor (which is soooo comfy.... or not at all).
ANY WAY...
Mom and I headed to the airport for our 7:15 flight and we landed in NYC. After a series of funny events at the airport (apparently a de-icer caught on fire and had the whole terminal in a hot mess....), and a crazy cab ride (I literally NEVER get car sick, and I was ready to hurl all over the back of that cab!), we were at our hotel! And it was SNOWING! Yay for snow in New York!
We dropped our bags at the bag check and headed out for some fun! It was cold out so we had to bundle up:
Our first stop was Macy's, as per usual. We hit up the basement and grabbed a lunch and some bloody Marys. It was seriously the perfect way to start our trip! The bloodys were so so good and we felt relaxed and grateful to be with each other.
After lunch, we went upstairs to do some
We shopped the rest of the day and had a blast doing whatever we wanted to do, whenever we wanted to do it-- that's our motto for our trip. We had dinner reservations at a restaurant, Beauty and Essex:
and let me just tell you... it was AH-mazing. See that picture above? That's the entrance. I goes into a pawn shop. A PAWN shop. We walked in and just kind of stood there (looking like two girls from NC!) until a girl (working the cash register at the PAWN shop) told us to walk through the back doors. We walked into the most beautiful restaurant I think I have ever seen. It was just gorgeous. The only time we could get reservations was at 6:45-- and it was packed while we were there. No empty tables in the huge place.
We ordered from a menu of small plates and we were not disappointed by the food. The first thing we had was the grilled cheese in tomato soup spoons. This was better than I can even describe (why am I talking so much about food?). It was so good I had to take a picture:
And then there were the salt and vinegar fries...
Oh, and the bathroom? It was gorgeous. Who says that about a bathroom? Me. That's who. This was part of the bathroom... OH, did I mention they give you complimentary champagne in the bathroom?!?! Yes, they do!
After dinner, we decided to visit the ladies room for a little bubbly:
The restaurant turns into a big time party scene at night and is supposedly a ton of fun. Since we had been going hard since 4am, we called it a night pretty early. But I wanted to remember how great this place was!
Wednesday morning, we woke up and set out on the town, again bundled up against the cold! And, it was soooo cold up there! The snow stopped about 4 minutes after we landed, but the temps stayed low!
We walked miles and miles and hit up a bunch of stores and we really were having fun! Then Patty called to tell me Andy had a great day at school-- he pooped some before school and then pooped four times at school (all of which happened on te potty). They were on the way home and all was well. Then Eddie called soon thereafter to tell me that Andy threw up everywhere. Well, let me just tell you, looking at clothes is so trivial and non-important when you have a sick baby at home. I felt awful for not being there. I felt fear that he would have to go to the hospital without me there. I felt guilt that I would leave him in the first place when he wasn't feeling 100%. Mom and I both just had pits in our stomachs thinking of poor Nug at home. I texted Patty asking if we should book an earlier flight. She called me and reassured me that he was totally fine and was in good hands-- which I already knew that part! She told me to not feel guilty at all and promised she would call me if she thought I should come home. Mom and I took a deep breath tried to carry on...
The best thing we could do was go for our annual tradition of tea and the St. Regis hotel...
...and no tea is complete without a bottle of champagne! Once we were sure we weren't going to be booking an earlier flight home, we decided to calm ourselves down with a hot cup of tea and a cold glass of bubbly-- really a perfect combination.
We did some more walking and taking it all in that night and saw the big tree up in Rockefeller. Since there are no lights on that tree, and there's nothing to see but scaffolding, we took a picture with some other sparkly lights behind us. We are facing the tree here...
As we were walking past Bergdorf's (you notice I saw walking past it. Not walking in it...), we saw a bunch of people set up on the street with a photographer setting up about to take pictures of something in one of the windows. I saw a girl crawling into the window-- on ice-- and I saw her tattoos. At first, all I could see was her rump since she was crawling in. She clearly wasn't a 6'1'' model weighing in at 98 pounds. When she turned around, I told mom it looked like Lena Dunham from Girls. Then she spoke into her walkie talkie and the photog said, "Lena, can you hear me?" It was Lena! I don't know what the shoot is for, but I will be excited to see it when it comes out. I took one quick picture before a guard told me no cameras were allowed. Boo.... but still really neat:
Then we headed to the roof top bar at the Peninsula Hotel. We sat under heaters with out hats and gloves on and they brought us blankets-- it was so fun!
Forever ago, I sent in a request for tickets to Kelly and Michael and a week before we left, I got the letter saying we got tickets! We got up early Thursday morning and headed over to the studio for the show. We did this a few years ago and happened to sit in the front row. This time, we were in the last row of the upper level! ha! It was still so fun and Michael is just hilarious! He entertains the audience with a microphone at every commercial break-- cracking jokes and talking to everyone. He really made it fun.
This was waiting in line to go in.... another cold morning!
Our seats in the wayyyy back!
Michael chatting up the crowd!
After the show, we went back to our hotel to pack and check out, then we grabbed lunch and it was time to head to the airport. We flew home to a beautiful sunset!
We were worried about Andy a lot on this trip, which was hard-- you can't fully relax when you are worried about someone-- but we still managed to have a lot of fun. I am so lucky that my mom and I are able to do this together (and that we want to do this together!)
The boys were up when I got home and Andy seemed to be feeling better. He went to school on Friday and everyone commented that he seemed to be back to his happy self again-- here's hoping....! I will do a full Andy update soon. Again- can't thank everyone enough for reaching out to me with all of this. It is scary when your kid is sick and when you don't really know why (other than filled with poop!). Your fb messages, texts, emails, etc mean so much to me... thank you!
Now, I have a 4am wake up call..... g'night!
