new york...(part 1)

oh new york. i really like you.

(cue alicia keys singing...)

i flew back last thursday to meet up with matt in new york city. he was back working for the week and then we spent the weekend together. i took baby ruby along with me, and matt's mom came up for the long weekend to stay with little m.

as we waited to board the plane, my normally mellow ruby started screaming. i was trying to balance my coffee in one hand & my yogurt in the other without dropping either on ruby-who i was wearing, my carry on and laptop. i totally looked like crazy bag lady mom i'm sure. miraculously (or maybe because whoever was supposed to sit next to me fled in fear after they heard ruby's lung capacity), on a jam packed flight with no empty seats? the seat next to me was the only empty one on our plane. ruby promptly calmed down & long story short (with some amazing mom move's thrown in over the next 6 hours) we survived the flight.

we got off the plane to absolutely beautiful fall-ish weather. it was a perfect & warm evening, and my husband was waiting for me. we were staying in the lower east side, so we headed to the apartment we rented through airbnb and once we decided the street wasn't as sketchy as we originally thought we grabbed a couple of slices (yum) and crashed early.

first thing friday morning, after sleeping super soundly, we began exploring...

we passed magnolia bakery & decided to stop.

who says you can't have a cupcake at 10 a.m.?

matt had a s'mores cupcake & i had a caramel cupcake.

i think my friend renetta makes way better cupcakes 

(perhaps more humble in appearance but more delicious in taste), 

although the frosting was amazing & glorious, and really- isn't a cupcake just a vehicle for frosting?

ruby was crashed out while i savored every bite.

cupcakes-breakfast of champions, my friends.

i am a total sucker for cakestands & cute bakery displays.

we headed to moma (museum of modern art) to soak up some art...

ruby decided to wake up
(she's very culturally aware, my 5 month old)

there was some pretty amazing work there by yoko ono

(here matt watches a piece by her from the 70's)

i love looking at art. it made me want to rush home and paint all day and night. so many ideas and thinkers and makers in one place-it is pretty incredible to get to see it all in the space of a few hours.

do you recognize this popsicle mold? 

if this was facebook i'd tag my mom in this photo. 

there was an exhibit of the evolution of the modern kitchen 

and this was one of the pieces included in a display. 

hello, 1982. this tupperware mold instantly brought back lots of memories. (remember sticking your tongue through the holes of the stick? well, maybe you don't, but both matt & i did...)

a view from one of the rooms in moma.

ruby was all about it. (see her intently taking in this painting?)

she especially (and rightly so) loved the abstract expressionist show that is up right now. 

it was a fantastic show, and so great to see so much work from mid-century artists all together. 

loved it. did my soul good.

yoko ono's wish tree where you can write a wish/hope/prayer and hang it from the tree. 

(what would you write?)

post moma we were starving so we went to the hotel le parker meridien, where a burger joint is hidden inside the lobby. oh my deliciousness.

exhibit a

exhibit b

does this look like it's inside a swanky hotel? 

oh, but it is. just follow the teensy neon sign of a burger back in the corner of the lobby.

just like her sister, ruby does not pose.

what should you do after eating cupcakes, burgers and fries?
why, eat treats of course.

i promise we were walking for hours and hours in between all of these eating adventures
(but it wouldn't be a trip with matt without eating adventures, right?)

we went to momofuku's milk bar.
now, don't get confused. i, myself, am not a fan of milk.
nope. never have, never will like it.
(sidebar: don't try to convince me how awesome cold milk is with a cookie-it is about as futile as trying to convince me that smoothies with a bit of banana hidden inside don't taste like banana.)
milk bar should actually be called treat heaven.

this is the cake my daughter would eat if she was choosing: it has rainbow sprinkles all over it.

apple pie cake? yes please... but actually, that isn't what i picked. so many treats, so little time.

treats packed up we headed on another lengthy walk to find a spot in central park to lounge around, soak up the amazing weather, and eat our sweets.

ruby was feeling quite cosmopolitan as she hit the streets of new york. (doesn't she look streetwise?)

you'll have to wait for my next post for pics of the aforementioned treat...let's just say it was called candy bar pie. (how can you go wrong with a name like that?)

for now, i'm off to snuggle into bed before it's time for ruby to wake up for a midnight snack.