New York!!

Once we knew we were coming out here to DC, we also got way excited about all the weekend trips we could do.  We wanted to go to Philadelphia, Boston, Maine, and of course New York!  But as we got busier and busier we looked forward to using our weekends for mostly sight seeing around here and a little relaxing.  So time got away from us and we didn't go to any of those places...except New York!  It had to happen.  I was not leaving DC until we saw New York.  So we finally went last weekend!  It was a BLAST!

I can't decide if I like New York or not...well of course I had tons of fun being there for a weekend but it was just so so dirty and old and run down and CROWDED.  I don't know if I could ever live there...but it was so perfect for a visit.  A couple months ago a couple came to our ward that we knew from Provo!  Well, Billy knew Brent (the husband) through a friend, so we had seen them a few times in Provo.  But anyways they came to our ward (such a coincidence!) and told us they are living in Manhattan and that we could come stay with them whenever we wanted!  Soooo nice!  So we took them up on their offer this weekend which saved us big $$$$$$!!

On Friday we rode a bus from Union Station to downtown NY.  It took like 5 1/2 hours because of the awful traffic.  As we were driving in we were getting so excited and kept quoting Elf.  "I passed through the seven levels of the Candy Cane forest, through the sea of swirly twirly gumdrops, then I walked through the Lincoln Tunnel."

Here is a horrible picture of us driving through the Lincoln Tunnel...this is where Elf walked.

Here is our first view of the Empire State Building (it's the really tall one in the back...)

Once we got off the bus Brent and Hannah were waiting for us to pick up our stuff!!  What?!?! They are so great.  They picked up our stuff so we could walk around and see some sights that night.  They also gave us their metro cards so we could get back to their house.

So we walked around and found Times Square!  It was just like I imagined!  Big, bright, busy, loud, and awesome!

We saw Sonic and Buzz

We also saw the naked cowboy a little later that night...I guess he is famous for just being almost naked and playing a guitar.  Pretty weird

We walked past a big screen that had us on it!!  Coolio huh?

We were pretty hungry so we went and had apparently famous Ray's pizza.  It tasted like normal pizza.

Then we went and explored the Rockefeller center and the NBC studio store right under the studio!  Super cool!

They had so much stuff from all of our favorite shows!  They had all this stuff from the show Parks and Recreation!  Pawnee "first in friendship, fourth in obesity" haha

Treat yo self!

This is where the Rockefeller center ice skating rink is supposed to be but it wasn't there!  Very sad.  The center was a LOT smaller than I thought.  Fun to see it though!

NBC building

We got cupcakes from Magnolia bakery for dessert...yummy!! 

 
Then we ate them by this water feature.

Me in the big city...

We walked around a bit more then headed to Brent and Hannah's for the night.  They were so nice and stayed up talking with us until way late!  It was so fun!

Saturday we woke up early and Brent and Hannah drove us to a brunch place that they love.  I got banana walnut pancakes...yummmmm!

We had to eat in the car because the wait for sitting and eating was 2 1/2 hours...sooo we got the food to go and ate it in the car.  So funny.

Then they dropped us off by the 9/11 memorial.  That was awesome.  I was a little grumpy because we had to wait in line forever but it ended up being all worth it!  It was freezing outside all day though...ugh.  And all we brought were our teeny jackets!  We didn't know it was going to be cold.  So we were freezing all day.

This is the new World Trade Center under construction

Look at how awesome this is!  There are two of these where the old towers used to be.  Amazing.

 

Sorry this post is going to be super long.  Next, we went to see the Statue of Liberty.  There is a free ferry out to the island with the statue but we didn't want to take the time to do it...so we observed the statue from afar.

Very far away...

Then we pulled out our big lens and got some close ups

After we went to see the bull statue

Tried to get a picture in front of it but look how many people were trying also...ugh

Sorry for this one...but it's pretty funny.  Poop-needling the bull (it's a Korean thing) (I kept this pic a little smaller haha)

Then we headed to Wall street!

Trinity church (I think it's called)

Tall building...

We saw this graffiti...pretty funny/weird

Wall street and William street

After seeing some cool buildings on Wall street we headed to the Brooklyn bridge!

It's the bridge Spiderman saved all those cars on!

 

 

The Brooklyn bridge was probably my favorite thing.  Beautiful views!  In Brooklyn we tried to go to the famous pizza place Grimaldi's but the line was out the door so we just went to a little ghetto looking pizza place...and it was pretty good!  It felt good to sit down too!

After that we walked back across the bridge and to Chinatown.

Wing Fat Mansion...what?!

Chinese McDonald's!

We also saw little Italy, which was very small.  Then we headed on the Subway to Grand Central Station.

 

Eagle!

We also saw the Crystler building and Empire State building up close.

New York Public Library

 
Empire State Building!

Then Korea town which Billy was very excited about!

Korea Way and Broadway

After that we went to eat at Hard Rock Cafe in the middle of Times Square!  So fun!  Then we called it a day...big day of sight seeing and we were exhausted!  After stopping for another cupcake...uhhh oops it was almost my birthday okay!

Alright just a few more pictures!  We can make it!  On Sunday we got up early and headed down to Central Park!  We got a little lost on the way there so it took a while to get there.

 Me casually posed by a Central Park tree...(I think my eyes are closed oops)

 Billy had to prove to me that he could do this...

Pretty awesome, right?

 

I spy a turtle!

We wanted to spend more time there but we also thought we were close to the temple so we went to find that...but it wasn't even close to where we were.  So by that time we had to head to Times Square to put our names in for the lottery for tickets for the Broadway "Newsies".  After putting our names in we were pretty hungry and cold so we went to Starbucks to warm up!  So fun.

Then we headed back to the Newsies theater to see if we won and GUESS WHAT!  BILLY WON!  YAYYY!  They were pulling lots of names, but not all the names so Billy was lucky!  I, of course, didn't get chosen because I never ever win anything ever no matter what.  So he won and we got 2 tickets!  Yay!  We only had a little over an hour before we had to be back so we tried again to find the temple and see it!  We rode the Subway every which way and couldn't get there in time haha so sad.  So we headed back, grabbed some quick lunch, and got in line for the musical!

Only $30 for each ticket!  Way better than the $80 tickets online!!

I got in trouble for taking this picture hehe

The musical was AWESOME!  Just ask Billy...he really really loved it :)  So did I...I can't stop listening to the music now! 

After the show we had an hour before we had to be at the bus stop.  So we tried again to see the temple...and we did it!!  Barely...we were running to make it in time!  It is so random in the middle of the city, we almost rushed right past it!  Cool that its so blended in...but also really weird!  I'm glad we got to see it.

Also saw Julliard on the other side of the street!  We wish we spent more time around this part of the city...it was way cool!

After that, we rushed back to where our bus was going to pick us up.  Brent and Hannah were so so amazingly nice and met us there with all our stuff.  They are the best!

It was such a fun fun fun fun fun weekend!!!!!!  It was awesome...we got to see everything we wanted to (almost) and also a little extra with the musical!  Woo hoo!