the weather was perfect for our church yard sale this past weekend. after a lot of donations, we ended up with a pretty good variety of things, including a kitchen sink! we had a great turn out and it was fun being able to meet people from the neighborhood.

interesting neighbors.

thanks team!

okay… one more post on our new york trip! we definitely had our share of good eats. here’s a bit more in addition to food i’ve already blogged about. shortly after arriving, pam introduced us to yogurt… and we had our first red mango.

our first day was especially memorable since we had two dinners. our first stop was for korean fried chicken, which led us to an unmarked door, with this awkward little sign outside the elevator:

needless to say, we were quite surprised to go upstairs and find this:

mad for chicken.

after a bit more sightseeing, we built up our appetites for part two: more korean food at tofu house. there was so much kimchi, including an entire fried fish for each person! i don’t know how, but somehow we finished everything.

here’s a close up on that pizza we had at “grimaldi’s”. famous new york style pizza.

we didn’t eat out every single meal… here we are in trader joe’s picking up food for lunch the next day. pam mentioned it was the only one in manhattan; the line-up snaked around the ENTIRE store.

cool restaurant called “citrus”. food was just ok, but i like the decor.

burgers with dan at “gus & gabriel” in the upper west side.

then more conversation over dessert at cafe lalo.

our last dinner was at “oh! taisho”, a casual and cramped but authentic japanese place in the east village. not a sushi place, but a lot of other food like grilled skewers and kimchi noodles and more. oh yum!

and then one more dessert: yogurt at “sixteen handles”.

finished!

we had such a great time in new york! pam was an amazing hostess, and we were glad to be able to see a bit of her life in nyc. eventhough we feel like we saw a lot, there was still so much left to do… hopefully we’ll have a chance to return one day. and of course the food… we ate so much (stay tuned for more blogging on nyc food)!! however, we still found the time and room in our stomachs for one more meal; before going back on the road for chicago, we had brunch at “Kitchenette”, a cute little restaurant in the morningside heights neighborhood.

after a delicious brunch, we took a walk through the neighborhood and briefly visited columbia university nearby. then it was time to go.

a six hour drive took us to grove city, pennsylvania, where we were able to visit and stay with the mccatherns. after dinner, evening entertainment consisted of playing ‘rock band’ (of course!).

the next morning, we drove the remaining distance and arrived back home in chicago safe and sound. what a great roadtrip!

on our last day in new york city, we returned to some neighborhoods like soho and did a bit more (window) shopping. look carefully, the building on the left is actually a trompe l’oeil. the flatiron building is on the right.

for lunch, we treated ourselves to “mesa grill” near the flatiron district, one of bobby flay’s restaurants. food was good and quite reasonably priced.

afterwards, we took the train to 42nd street, stopped by grand central terminal, and then walked to the united nations, where we went on a guided tour.

finally, before heading back to pam’s apartment, we walked a bit more through harlem and saw the apollo theatre and other harlem sights.

pam’s street. apollo theatre.

we spent the morning (into the early afternoon) at the metropolitan museum of art. their egyptian collection was quite impressive, and i liked how they would create spaces reminiscent of the artifacts’ original locations. the temple of dendur:

i thought this painting by salvador dali was very interesting. up close, the painting consisted of white dots. how many images can you see?

and we couldn’t miss the near eastern gallery, although it was on the small side.

by the time we finished at the museum, it was already early afternoon, and we were starving! conveniently, the museum is right at the edge of central park, so we found an empty bench and had a picnic lunch. then we strolled around the park, watching people in their boats. it was really pretty with the buildings in the background.

.

we walked through the park and came out at the southern edge, so we headed down fifth avenue towards rockefeller center.

it was time for a hot dog.

then we checked out bryant park, which was undergoing a bit of construction in preparation for fashion week in september. there was an area called “the reading room” with free books for people to read and enjoy.

view of buildings around bryant park.

finally it was time for our broadway show! we saw “in the heights”, which is a newer musical, based on the neighborhood of washington heights, on the northern part of manhattan. it won the tony award for best musical in 2008. we had great seats, and really enjoyed the show!

on our third day in nyc, we planned to visit the statue of liberty and ellis island. fortunately the line-up onto the ferry was pretty quick, but even with a reserved ticket, we still had to wait a really long time to get into the pedestal and museum on liberty island, but i think it was still worth it.

the original torch. actual size of the statue’s face.

it was a beautiful day with great views of the nyc skyline.

statue of liberty snowglobes.

from liberty island, we took the ferry to ellis island, where the immigration museum was originally the building that processed millions of immigrants in the first half of the 1900’s.

by the time we took the ferry back to manhattan, it was already in the middle of the afternoon. we walked through the financial district, visiting ground zero, the new york stock exchange and wall street. really tall buildings.

with a bit of time left before dinner, we went to check out chelsea market, which is where the food network is located. we saw michael symon (newest iron chef) outside the building, had some hazelnut icecream, and saw a 5kg jar of nutella.

for dinner, we met up with dan, an old friend from vancouver we hadn’t seen for many years.