'Twas The Night Before Christmas

...and a week before the wedding, but let's not talk about that right now.  Let's talk Christmas instead.

I love this picture also taken on Christmas Eve once upon a time. It appears Santa was serious business around here in the 90's. Hubs own father always read Twas the Night Before Christmas to his family on Christmas Eve, and hubs has carried on that tradition with our children too. Our girls might be in their 20's now, but you're never too old to snuggle up on the couch beside your Dad on Christmas Eve.

Here's another throwback. The bride-to-be and the hubs all dressed up and ready to head into the city for the Christmas Spectacular at Radio City Music Hall.  

The bride was two and a half, and we lived in the furthest reaches of New Jersey back then so hubs arranged for a limo to get them into Manhattan. I stayed home with the newborn maid of honor, but I still remember how excited Daughter1 was to call me on the phone. From THE CAR! 

Hey, it was 1990 and we weren't all walking around with phones as added appendages back then.

We were back in Radio City Music Hall yesterday, and the show is every bit as good in 2014. The Rockettes are pure dance perfection. Seriously they never miss a step, are never out of sync, and they make it all look completely effortless.

I have a lot of favorite acts in the program, but the Nativity finale and rousing rendition of Hark the Herald Angels Sing is definitely near the top of my list.

The weather was weirdly warmish (for December anyway), and it was misting only a little, not enough to keep us from a peek at the tree.

THE tree.

Which is not actually blurry in real life, but I didn't want to carry my big camera in the rain, so these were all taken with my phone. Plus, there's all those people, people. You have to be quick, and if there's one thing I'm not when it comes to photography, that would be it. The tree is always stunning, and when you come around the corner and catch that first glimpse it kind of takes your breath away.

We had dinner at one of our favorite places, Bobby Flay's Bar Americain. Wedding planning is a funny thing in that every now and then somebody here spontaneously sheds a tear. Mostly it's the hubs-ha! Kidding! Sort of, but last night it was Daughter2.

I understand completely. We're all so happy for the soon to be newlyweds, and we're super excited for the big day and all the fun and life ahead. Sometimes though, seemingly out of the blue, you are struck in the gut with the knowledge that you're not going to have your sister within easy arm's reach, and as happy as you are for her, you know there will be a new normal to figure out.

 
And that's okay, because we know how to do new here.
Even though you're young, life has taught you that new is good too.

God always makes us ready for next, because life is full of next...new...change. With change we've learned there will come gifts we didn't even know we wanted.

2015 will be a year filled with lots of changes round here. Years ago that would have scared me a little, but right now I feel a sense of happy anticipation to see how the days unfold. I know from first hand experience the challenges that come with geographic distance between me and the people I love. I also know family is knit into the very fabric of who I am, and that amid the whirling, turning, upside-down world in which we live, there they will remain.

I don't know what all the new year will bring, but I do know when I'm writing here this time next year I  can say as I do now- God is good and He is with us.

Circumstances change, and that's a given.
Thankfully He does not.

Merry Christmas Everyone!

Bridging to the Hodgepodge

I realize that in nearly every post I've written in the past month
or four,  I've mentioned the fact that I'm dealing with a very full calendar, and not enough hours in the day. But y'all...it's true. And I'll probably keep talking about it because I cannot believe we're already a week into May. Our weather didn't get the memo, and yes of course I'm also still yammering on about the weather because y'all! It's just barely spring here! And it's May!

Okay, enough shouting...how about a short weekend recap before I post this week's Hodgepodge questions? You can scroll on down to the questions if you must, but why would you?

I was supposed to fly home from South Carolina last Wednesday which would have given me a couple of days to get ready for weekend company, except my flight was cancelled due to-you guessed it-the weather. It was raining buckets here so my brother in law was the lucky duck who got to get up at 4:30 AM on Thursday to take me to the airport. I was home by 10 am, but essentially useless the rest of the day.  Not quite, but almost.

Friends we met in the UK who now live in TX were in the city last week, so on Friday afternoon they trekked out to the NJ countryside to see why the Garden State is called the Garden State.  They still don't know because spring has forgotten us.

We had a wonderful visit anyway. I took them to lunch at our local pub (rather they took me) and hubs ducked out of the office early, so he got to the house about the same time we did. Our friends had been to Eataly the day before so they came bearing Italian deliciousness including cheese, olives, prosciutto, and good bread. Everyone needs friends like these.

Saturday we drove them back into the city, and it was a beautiful day. We stopped at the apartment they were staying in, which coincidentally belongs to another couple we knew in the UK, so that was a fun quick catch up. The other couple had plans with family so they couldn't join us for the afternoon, but the rest of us decided to take advantage of the sunny skies and walk across the Brooklyn Bridge.

We rode the subway over to the bridge, which isn't as bad as non-New Yorkers imagine, and proceeded across the bridge with a whole lot of other people who had also experienced a little too much winter and not enough Vitamin D.

There is a lot going on as you traverse the bridge. The walking portion of the bridge is above the roadway so you're not dodging traffic, and the bridge itself is a pretty piece of architecture. About midway across you're treated to a nice view of the Statue of Liberty.

There are literally hundreds of locks attached to the bridge, the kind you put on a school locker back in the day. Attaching a lock to the structure is a tradition started on a bridge in Rome, and has now spread to other sites around the globe.

Visitors to the bridge "lock up their heart, and throw away the key'.
Literally into the East River.

Romantic, no?

Walking the Brooklyn Bridge is on my list of 101 in 1001 (see link in sidebar), and along with that I said I wanted to eat pizza at Grimaldi's, which is under the bridge on the Brooklyn side. Apparently I am not the only one with a list because have mercy! the queue to get in was ridunkulous. We scooted on down the sidewalk to another Italian place, and had a lovely meal there instead.

Since we couldn't eat at Grimaldi's we decided to make up for it by visiting another well known spot-The Brooklyn Ice Cream Factory. Everyone should have an ice cream cone eaten under the Brooklyn Bridge on a sunshiny blue sky New York afternoon. The best part is you have to walk back so in essence you've earned it, right?

Okay, for those of you who made it through my 'short' weekend recap, here are the questions to this week's Hodgepodge. See you back here tomorrow to share answers!

1. Share something you appreciate (or something you appreciated as you were growing up) about your mother.

2.  A quote most commonly ascribed to Plato reads "Necessity is the mother of invention." When did this last play out in your own experience?

3. Share one of the earliest memories you have from childhood.

4. When did you last 'hit the mother lode'? What was it?

5. What is/was your favorite dish mom made? Do you make that dish for your family/friends now that you're all grown up?

6. Mother May I? was at one time a popular children's game. It required no equipment or parts to play. What was your favorite childhood game where you could just turn up and play-no gear needed?

7. Which TV mom (past or present) is your favorite, and why?

8.  Insert your own random thought here.

Some Kind of Wonderful

All last week the forecasters kept saying the weekend would be lovely. I believe they even used the word 'warm', and I guess when viewed through the lens of the snowiest winter on record, they were sort of right. While temps did hit 50 degrees in the city on Saturday, I still needed a coat, scarf, and gloves, which is not my definition of warm. Warmer, yes but spring has not quite sprung here folks.

Saturday hubs and I had tickets to see the musical Beautiful. When I mentioned that here on Friday a few people thought I was going to see Carole King herself, but no. Beautiful is the Broadway show about her life and music, and it really was 'some kind of wonderful'. 

She wrote that song for those of you reading here scratching your heads. 

Carole King was in fact, a prolific song writer, and she wrote a lot of songs for other performers too, that you may not have realized were hers. She stopped touring and writing a few years ago, but wrote her first number one song, Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow, when she was only 17 years old. So much talent!  

The actress playing Carole King in the show right now (Jessie Mueller) is completely convincing in the role, and is an amazing talent in her own right. The whole cast was phenomenal, and we absolutely loved the show from start to finish. 

Hubs and I saw a matinee which let out around 4:30, and then had an early-ish dinner reservation in Greenwich Village. Early for New York that is, 6 PM. The restaurant was about 30 blocks from the theatre, and while we had every intention of grabbing a cab (30 blocks is about a mile and a half), we started walking and just kept going. It was a nice evening for a walk.  

We dined at Gradisca, which came highly recommended by one of hub's co-workers. I'm sure we didn't need to walk that far to find great Italian food, because I'm not even kidding when I say there are over 10,000 Italian restaurants in the city (Trip Advisor lists over 11,000 on their site). We're all about a great recommendation though, so we walked. This particular work associate is married to an honest to goodness Italian, so we figure they know what they're talking about. 

And they do! Fantastico!  

Gradisca's is known for the owner's mama's pasta recipes, and when she's in town she can sometimes be seen set up at a table, making the pasta herself. I'd read some reviews online too, and everyone  raved about the tiramisu. We had to try it, didn't we? Delizioso!

Our backyard may still look like this...

...but Saturday turned out to be 'one fine day'. 

It's Not Too Late Baby Now for Friday Fragments

I don't know if I have enough for a post today, so it's possible my Friday Fragments will actually be fragments.

Does anybody even read blogs after 3 PM on a Friday?
We'll see.

I've gotten serious this week about recording what I'm eating and it's been enlightening. The biggest surprise is how often I mindlessly start to eat something that doesn't seem like much of anything...a small bite of this or that, mostly when I'm cooking, but when you put it all down on paper (or enter it into the iPad app) those meaningless bites of nothing special add up to honest to goodness calories. Calories I'd rather have used elsewhere.

I've been inspired to try some new recipes, because hubs (the man with the metabolism of a teenager) can only eat so much grilled chicken and steamed broccoli. I made this baked crispy hoisin chicken not long ago, and we both loved it. Very spicy, so if you don't like very spicy you'll want to reduce the amount of red pepper in yours. We like very spicy here.

It seems like one or both of my girls are traveling every.single.weekend. and I think I'm getting used to it.

Sort of.

And they've
resigned themselves accepted the mom drill, which is-text me when you're at the airport, text me when you board, text me when you land, and then do it all again on the day of your return flight.

I bet there are times when even Generation Y hates technology.

In other news, the weather forecasters say temps in NYC will reach 50 degrees on Saturday. I do hope this isn't one of those times when they're wrong.

Hubs and I have tickets to see Beautiful: The Carole King Musical, this weekend. I am a huge fan of her music and am really excited to see the show.  Almost as excited as I am about the 50 degree forecast. I mentioned to someone today that we were going to the show, and she hadn't heard of it. When I said it's the Carole King Story, she said, 'Who?'

People!! Come on!! Do 'youngsters' only 15 years younger than me really not know Carole King?

And on that note I'll leave you with one of my all time favorites, and wishes for a happy weekend wherever you are.

O Christmas Tree

We have college friends living on the other side of the country, who are spending a few days in the Big Apple this week.  He and hubs are fraternity brothers, and last night we trekked in to meet up for dinner.

Traffic! Bah humbug!

Actually, not bah humbug. Even ridunkulous traffic cannot dampen my Christmas spirit when I'm en route to New York City.

Well, maybe a little, but not completely. And you people who commute in and out of here every.single.day, well bless your hearts.

We met at a restaurant near Madison Square Garden called Pennsylvania 6.  It was hopping!  Our friends have a son living in the city so he joined us too, for a fun night of gabbing and celebrating his mom's birthday.

Their 30th wedding anniversary is also this weekend, and I think we can all agree NYC is a grand place for marking and celebrating life's milestones.

After dinner we walked about 20 blocks in the icy cold air, but hey it's New York at Christmastime, and we needed to see the tree.  Plus hubs and I never leave the city without a stop in Times Square, since that's the law.

Our law, but one we never break.

We got down to the tree about 11 PM, and here's a helpful tip for all you tourists...visit the tree at 11 PM in 30 degree temps, and you'll find it's not wall to wall people at that hour or degree.

It's not no-people, but definitely a smaller crowd.
The tree is just beautiful.

Rockefeller Plaza in December is one of my favorite places on earth.
Positively magical.

I can see how people fall in love in New York City at Christmastime.

Fall Fragments

Is the sky bright blue where you are, because wow our sky is super gorgeous today.  I love an October sky.

Actually I love pretty much everything about this season of the year, and while I'm always a little bit sad to see summer go, the color that gets splashed across my backyard definitely helps ease the transition.

God shows off with every turn of the calendar page, but never more so than in the month of October.

Do you see that ginormous hornets nest at the top of this very tall tree? There's no way to remove it, and I suppose when winter hits it will drop, but I pointed it out to hubs, and he thought maybe he could take it down with his air gun.

Have you ever heard that expression, "Madder than a hornet's nest"?
I think I know how it originated.  Ha!

I spent a couple of days at my moms this week, and on Wednesday I went with her to vote.  Her voting station is in my old elementary school, and I hadn't been inside the building since 1972. The polls were set up in the 'all-purpose' room, and it looked pretty much the same as it did forty years ago.

Forty?

That can't be right, can it?

I think schools now prefer the term multi-purpose or cafetorinasium or something similar, but I don't  hear them called all-purpose anymore. This truly was an all-purpose room. We had PE in there on rainy days, the lunch kids ate lunch there, and it was the place for programs and PTA.  Lots of things have changed in the elementary school I attended (you have to be buzzed in for one), but I was secretly happy to see this room looked exactly as I remembered.

My mom's washing machine wasn't working (it's always something isn't it?), and the repairman couldn't seem to figure out why, so I took her to the laundromat while I was in town. I haven't done laundry in a laundromat since college, and I remembered how much I dislike the whole experience. There were a couple of young moms in there doing laundry and my heart went out to them.  Plus, we're a long way from a quarter a load. Just sayin'.

I have two repairmen here this morning trying to fix my lower oven. It conveniently quit working when I had 35 people in my house for brunch last month. I don't need two ovens when its just the hubs and I eating here (I barely need one!), but the holidays are approaching, and I'm hosting Christmas so it needed to be fixed.  They're trying to get it back in the wall right now, and I think I heard a naughty word. I hope they know what they're doing.

Did I mention these are Friday Fragments?
Well they are.

I'm trying to go through my blog reader and clean it out, which essentially means marking as read. I hate to do it, but there is no way I can read the more than 500 posts sitting there. I haven't been a very good blog friend when it comes to visiting and commenting this month, but I guess there are seasons in everything, right?

If you ever make a trip to NYC and end up in Rockefeller Plaza, do yourself a favor and step inside here-

Teuscher's Chocolates. World's best. I'm not even kidding. Imported weekly from Zurich and so delicious. I bought a small sample of their biggest seller (champagne truffles) along with one delicious limoncello dark chocolate. Swoon!

Did I mention I love a fall day?

Enjoy your weekend everyone, and if you have fragments that need a place to land, hop over to Half-Past Kissin' Time and join the party.

New Old Friends

If you're looking for the Hodgepodge Questions you'll find them here. 

Will I ever catch up here?  I feel like my blog is just out of reach and if I had about three days to do nothing I'd catch up. Course there are not three days of nothing on my calendar anytime soon so I will have to settle for blog a little, live a lot.

So this was the weekend the strangers came to stay.  They didn't feel like strangers, in fact they felt like old friends, which in a sense I guess they were. When I started my blog back in 2009 I didn't have a clue, and for me blogging has definitely been a learn as you go proposition.  The first real blog I ever read and followed was Beth Moore's Living Proof.  Somehow through a comment I left there I got connected to a fellow blogger who I'll just call Friend1.

Separately she and I each connected with another blogger who I'll call Friend2.  We're all moms to young adult children, and we've spent these past four years emailing one another, communicating via facebook, and sending little gifts now and then through the US Mail.  We always talked about meeting in person, and this year made plans to do just that.  It was time.

Last Thursday Friend1 boarded a plane in Oklahoma, and Friend2 boarded a plane in North Carolina, and by lunchtime we were face to face in the Newark airport.  I teased them I was going to have a sign like the limo drivers carry saying-"Strangers I met on the Internet", but instead I wore my orange coat so I'd be easy to find.

We commenced gabbing like we'd known each other for years, and were still gabbing when we returned to Newark to say goodbye on Sunday night. It seemed like everywhere we went someone asked where they were from, and Friend1 would say Oklahoma and Friend2 would say North Carolina, and I'd have to resist adding, 'And we met on the Internet'.

Not everybody gets it.

Truth be told, if my girls told me they were doing something similar I'd have heart palpitations and probably try my best to talk them out of it.

We packed a lot into a little over the course of four days. We spent two days here at home in the lovely NJ countryside, then trekked into the city for a two day stay in The Big Apple. The sun shone in spite of the weather forecast and we really couldn't have asked for nicer temperatures. Y'all know the weather matters, right?

On Friday I drove them over hill and dale, to see the highest point in NJ.  They took 10,000 pictures (that might not be an overstatement), and then we went to a nearby little town for lunch and shopping.

Hubs was a sport, and grilled out for us Thursday and Friday night both.  He also washed dishes, made a fire in the backyard firepit, and drove us in and out of the city so yay hubs!  

Friend2 had arranged through one of her hometown friends for us to have a tour of The Plaza Hotel.  I've been in The Plaza many times, but this was the first time I got a peek inside their $40,000/night suite.  Yowza!

We thoroughly enjoyed meandering through the Todd English Food Hall in the lower level and we indulged in the most amazing cake because you just do when you're in the city on a gorgeous fall weekend.   

We also got to wander through the Plaza's Eloise shop made famous by the children's book of the same name.  It is the absolute sweetest, pinkest, girliest little spot on the planet, and I need to bring my own daughters here to see it for themselves.  Yes they're in their 20's, but you're never too old to appreciate the stories of your childhood brought to life.  

We logged some miles around Central Park, had a fantastico! Italian dinner at Bucca di Beppo, then swam through a sea of people in Times Square to get to our seats for The Lion King. I'd seen the show in London about 9 years ago, and it is still so awesome.

On Sunday we made our way to Rockefeller Plaza, and then all the way to The Top of the Rock for just a few more pictures. Ha! If my friends are reading here I know they're smiling.

The elevator takes you to the 67th floor in 43 seconds, and there are escalators taking you up another couple of floors to the various viewing platforms.  It was a little hazy, but you still get some pretty incredible views of the city from up here.

That's Lady Liberty out in the harbor, and in the photo below you can see Central Park.

I actually prefer Top of the Rock to the Empire State Building so if you're visiting NYC, check it out.

We wrapped up the afternoon with a lovely lunch eaten outdoors at Del Frisco's Grille, right in Rockefeller Plaza.

I'm pretty sure not everybody is who they say they are on the Internet, but these girls were exactly the people I imagined them to be, the people they were in their notes and cards and emails and facebook posts and pictures.  It felt a little bit like having long time pen pals come to stay.

We met some nice people on Top of the Rock, and asked them to take our picture.  There are still nice people everywhere you go in this world, but in the era of 24/7 bad news we sometimes forget that.

Online connections are great...

Real life is better.

I Hear A Symphony

...and dogs barking, horns honking, and people speaking en francais.

That sentence pretty much sums up my weekend, and what a fabulous weekend it was. You know I must first mention the weather, right?  Absolutely gorgeous! It's really starting to look and feel like fall here, and I'm just going to pretend I don't see that high of 82 predicted for Wednesday, because now that fall is here I'm ready for cooler temps.

We had sunny bright blue skies all weekend long, and spent as much time out of doors as we could.  Friday night a business friend of the hubs invited us to be his guests at the opening night gala of the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra. We actually know several people connected to the symphony as trustees and supporters, but we'd never been to a performance here.

The venue is stunning and the acoustics are amazing. Musicians say this particular venue has some of the best they've ever experienced, and I'd definitely love to see more. The symphony performs in the NJ PAC (Performing Arts Center) located in the Ironbound section of downtown Newark. I've written before about all the wonderful restaurants in that area, but the gala event included a cocktail hour, the performance itself, and then a late night supper after the show so we had dinner in the PAC. Everything was so lovely, truly, whoever organized the event gave it just the right touch.

Hubs and I like to dress up, and doesn't going to the symphony sound like a grown up thing to do? The music was fabulous (yes, I know I'm overdoing it with the adjectives, but really-it was fabulous) and the dinner afterwards was delicious. I sat beside the percussionist and enjoyed hearing more about how the symphony works, and how he got involved with it. Plus, here is my dessert-

I didn't take a lot of photos because it felt a little bit obnoxious, but this dessert was so good I didn't think anyone would mind.

Saturday was another blue sky kind of day so hubs did some yard work and I did some fun things like wash the bathroom rugs, and then we went into town and had a lovely al fresco lunch. Hubs wanted to take the MG, but I had a new haircut that was still feeling new so I said we had to go in a car with a lid.  Convertibles + hair =convertible hair.  'Nuff said.

Sunday was yet another beautiful day and we had plans to trek into the city to check out an event at the Javits Center.  Super cool building!  The Javits Center is home to some of the biggest events in NYC, and hubs has been to a couple of work related convention type things there, but this was my first time inside. We were there for an event called 'Meet the Breed' aka puppy time!

There were hundreds of dog and cat breeds represented, but sadly no Gordon Setter breeders. We really want another Gordon, but hubs has also always wanted an Irish Setter and I've always said no way, because do you know any Irish Setters? They're crazy. Fun crazy, but still a little too high energy for me. Except maybe this one-

What a love, and so mild mannered. Her owner is going to breed her later this fall and we took his contact information, and now hubs will start the process of trying to convince me we need an Irish Setter.  We do have some Gordon contacts, so right now I'm still holding out for another Gordon.

After we'd wandered around the dog show we headed out of doors, because quite honestly there are few things better than a sunny fall day in The Big Apple.  We walked all the way to Bryant Park and had a lovely lunch on the patio at The Bryant Park Grill. I highly recommend.

As it happens there was a French festival going on in the park all weekend long, so we wandered through that and dreamed of trips to the French countryside while savoring dessert-a French cheese plate.  Si délicieux!

We thoroughly enjoyed the weekend.  When you live in the Northeast you need to take advantage of the gorgeous autumn, because we all know what comes next.  Hopefully not a foot and a half of snow in October, but hey, it's happened the last two years before so not as crazy as it sounds.

Soaking up the sunny mild days of fall makes the coming winter a little easier to bear.
A trip to France wouldn't hurt either.