New York

I love the black and gold building in the top left photograph. Someday I'd like to go inside and find out what it is. These are from a spontaneous trip to New York with my sisters, dad, aunt, and cousin Wade. The pictures in Bryant park will always make me laugh about a failed attempt to eat at Waffles and Dinges.

We saw Cinderella on Broadway and it was phenomenal. Our prince was also the voice of Hans in Disney's new Frozen so that was a fun detail to know as we were listening to him sing on stage. I'm still amazed by the costume changes a week after the fact and my google searches have not answered the mystery of HOW they were possible. So Occam's razor leads me to believe that they were actually magic. I'm amazed.

The rest of the day included a pit stop at Levain Bakery (obviously) and a trip to The Frick Collection to see Vermeer's Girl with a Pearl Earring. Yes, you read that correctly. It was surreal to see it in person! 

Until next time, New York. I love you.

 

 

i can!

here's how the day went down, february 11th, 2012.

7:16 am: we depart for our big adventure. it's snowing, enough to make everything look beautiful.
9:16: we arrive in the city. there was NO traffic. i've never seen anything like it. still snowing.
9:24: we admire the cutest puppies in the pet store window, along with other real new yorkers. i'm telling you, a yorkie puppie can break anyone.
9:30: mom and i go to sprinkles for cupcakes; vanilla & chocolate frosting for her, snickerdoodle for me.
9:30-11:30: we wander around the upper west for a little while and eat macarons, then head to the theatre district, buy some sheet music, and look at "lee's art shop."
11:30 - 12:30: we eat at a bbq place. it's pretty delicious. {can you tell that i like food yet?}
12:30: we meander our way to the al hirschfeld theatre.

12:55: we're a block away and i hear screaming....
12:56: i start running because there were no more cars
12:57: nick jonas is four feet away from me. on the other side of the barricade. {les mis reference, anyone... the barricade... hahaha}
12:58: he waves at me because i couldn't get a picture and security makes him go in the stage door
12:59: i strategize my plan for after the show...

2:00-4:30: i'm in awe

4:31: i'm in the front row 'at the lonely barricade' {haha i laugh at my own jokes}
4:32: i make friends with the girls behind me and they're ready to take my picture with my favorite little j. pierpont 'f-i-n-c-h' finch!
4:35: the only person who comes out is mr. trumble. because he's a company man. he signs my playbill.
4:40: "I'm sorry, Nick doesn't come out between shows. Bye!"
4:41: </3
4:42: the domino's pizza delivery guy goes in the stage door. injustice!

4:43: i already have a plan for next time. :)

i feel sorry for men who don't knit. they lead empty lives.

i'll write about my day later, but for now, here's some eye candy from our trip to new york.

how embarassing

last night i watched the sound of music instead of the superbowl. i'm not ashamed, either. and that's when i realized my grevious mistake:

dear world, i would like to apologize. for some reason i wasn't thinking, and i refered to rolf as "kurt".

silly me, clearly it was finals week. {image 2, image 1}

also, if the picture on the left doesn't break your heart, you probably don't have one. (just kidding, but really)

less than a month

less than a month and we're going to see this for my birthday! ah! i have a little countdown app and every time i open it, it shows the picture below and plays grand old ivy. 

newsies newsies newsies

most of ALL the time i feel like newsies is the best thing ever. 

REALLY. IT IS. 

newsies is helping me pass ap history. i knew random pop quiz facts on multiple tests. for example, pulitzer's newspaper was the world, not the journal. and scabbers were replacements that worked during strikes. and lots of other random facts. i owe you one, jack kelly. 

we went in october to see newsies in the paper mill and it was fantastic. so, so wonderful. can you just do me a favor and watch all these youtube videos? and then watch them again. then you too will love newsies. i just love it so much. creepy, i know. but really. i do. 

the end of "santa fe" when jeremy jordan sings it gives me goosebumps. 

it is unbelievable. unbelievable.

all the actors were triple threats. the dancing, the singing, the acting. and we were so close. close enough to see davey's spit while he was singing "seize the day".  i'm okay with that. although i might've had the smallest twinge of jealousy when the newspapers thrown out into the audience landed too far away to snag one. also, i was heartbroken when there was no original cast recording. that was a mistake, papermill! sad, sad, sad. 

i might use my paperboy bag all the time. no shame. 

newsies, i love you. and i'm so excited for your new run in the big city!! 

source 1
source 2
source 3
source 4
source 5
source 6

ps, i have the tiniest confession that i do in fact love the stage version a little more than the movie. because i love the stage. and the music was adapted to feature the voices even more. ex: santa fe. oh my gosh. so amazing.

not so perfect timing

a story from my life about bad timing. written in third person for your enjoyment.


once upon a time, there were three sisters and their parents, vacationing in manhattan. one night, they got all dolled up to go see catch me if you can on broadway, a fabulous night on the town. they had been staying in the city for a few days, and were subway aficionados by friday night. the oldest sister had thought to bring her umbrella, but at the last minute took it out of her bag. there had been clear skies all day, after all.

the family got off the subway at their stop, groaning inwardly as they saw rain pounding so hard it was coming somewhat down the stairs that led to the station. then they heard the thunder. emily, the sister who is accused of having selective hearing quite often, ironically was the first to hear their mother offer an extra raincoat, and she snatched that offer up right away. liz and lauren decided that she had given up any right to complain about getting wet when she borrowed the coat. steeling themselves for the pounding rain, the girls decided that they were going to make a run sprint for the theatre, which was four blocks away. they really didn't want to miss the show.

after being led a block in the wrong direction by a sister who will remain anonymous for her own protection, the sisters sprinted the now five blocks to the theatre.

did they mention that liz and lauren were soaked through every. single. layer. of. clothing. before they had finished running up the subway station stairs? their hair was more wet than when one gets out of the shower.

was it mentioned that lauren was wearing flip flops, so she had to take them off and run through the streets of new york city (now comparable to the gutter, considering that the streets were filled FILLED with rushing water) barefoot?

was it mentioned that lauren could not remember a time when she had ever been in heavier rain?

also, there was violent thunder and lighting within a dangerous proximity...
also, everyone was standing in doorways trying to wait out the rain...
also, there was this HUGE group of tourists that had matching bright yellow ponchos.
also, this might sound exaggerated, but i promise, it really isn't.
also, i would pinky promise that this is all true.
also, i felt like i was in a movie.

the rain stopped approximately five minutes after the girls were waiting under the eaves of the theatre. the sisters probably each squeezed about a gallon of water out of their hair alone.
lauren went to the bathroom and wrung the water out of her jersey knit skirt (bad choice, girl) into the toilet. it wasn't very effective.

also, the bathroom attendants could not have been less helpful.
also, apparently this is the only bathroom in america that doesn't have a hand blow dryer when you need one.
also, paper towels don't really work that well.
also, every layer of me was soaked.
also, i stupidly wore a shirt that i learned doesn't stay all the way opaque when it gets wet.

also, look i have proof.
also, liz and i didn't let emily complain as much as us, seeing as her shirt, underwear, and top 1/4 of her pants were dry once she took off that coat (to the left).

also, this is a pretty great memory. thanks liz, for documenting it. 

also, catch me if you can was fantastic. even if i was shivering through the entire thing.

 xoxo

feast your eyes

expect a full-blown delightful newsies post soon, but in the meantime, take a minute and share my joy. oh and instead of doing that math homework, here's an equation you can actually use in real life.

newsies > everything else

what? psh, no i never exaggerate. really, though.

couldn't be happier (wicked, anyone?)

for vacation this summer we rented an apartment in soho for a week. and were lucky enough to see four broadway shows: WICKED (!!!!!!!), how to succeed in business without really trying (fantastic!), catch me if you can (ahh so good), and spiderman (impressed with this one; i'm happy to report that it's no longer the joke of broadway).

in case you didn't know, i have and intense love of wicked. more than anyone else i know. 

• i probably drive my family crazy because i always have the soundtrack playing when i am cleaning. even if i'm cleaning alll day. 
• i might do the fiyero secret handshake all the time. yeah i kind of memorized it as they did it onstage. 
• there's just no way to explain how much i love it!!!
• in my world: wicked = joy

i've loved it since i was in FOURTH grade, SEVEN years ago. so imagine my joy when i found out we were going to see it this summer, in row r. needless to say, it was better than my wildest dreams. and the wait definitely made the experience even sweeter. (don't tell mom and dad that! just kidding.... mostly.)

it didn't hurt that we had a very dreamy fiyero or a phenomenal glinda and teal wicks that could belt just as well as idina menzel. i was nervous because i was so used to the original cast recording, and we obviously weren't going to be seeing the original cast. don't tell, but i love our cast even more! ahh i'm smiling as i type this like some kind of insaniac. in case you didn't get the message i'm trying to get across here, it's that I JUST LOVE WICKED SO SO SO MUCH.

i wouldn't mind if i could just live in the gershwin. creepy, i know.

so so happy.

oops, flash.

times sq, among other things

this is the view from our apartent. right by bleecker st, and waverly place, also right by the apartment. 

i hoped, but didn't think it would work to take an instax at night. the billboards are famous times square ones, that i love, so i tried. the actual billboards are the background in the photo below, though. if you look really hard you can see daniel radcliffe's hair and the outline of glinda. i'll take what i can get.

if i start talking about "how to succeed", you'll be reading for 20 minutes, so i'll spare you from all my gushing. you should know three things though. first, that daniel radcliffe is AMAZING. amazing, amazing, amazing. he can sing, dance, and act just as well as the broadway veterans on the stage beside him. he definitely EARNED this role. second, this is such a clever musical. there are moments that you won't catch if you don't pay attention, but then again that's why i love wit. and thirdly, i was LITERALLY (row j!) ten. rows. away. from harry potter. my bucket list is complete, i've seen hp in the flesh.