Santa sighting, Christmas shopping, and paper writing

It's Christmastime in New York City!

The most wonderful time of the yearrrrr.

The moment it hit December 1st (well, actually, the moment Thanksgiving ended), the trees and lights went up.

You can't walk down the street without running into a "Christmas tree farm" (aka: a whole bunch of trees propped up on the sidewalk).

Our lobby at EHS is festive.

And I even found Santa wandering around Times Square like a little, lost puppy.

It was impossible for me to not get into the Christmas spirit, what with all of the decorations and the fact that the temperature has mostly been below 35 degrees every single day...

Therefore, this past week, I've been doing a lot of Christmas shopping!

They moved the location of the Brooklyn Flea from the water in Williamsburg to this awesome, old bank:

I wandered around this building for probably 2 hours straight. And bought one thing. (For myself. Oops).

Don't worry! I did end up finding things for others, after wandering around all over various areas of New York City.

And I heard some of the most amazing subway musicians this past weekend. I don't know what was going on, but they were all incredible.

Like these guys:

And while in the subway, I also ran across this disturbing scene:

That right there is an entire outfit. I mean, that is a pair of shoes, a pair of slacks, and a black dress shirt. And I believe a wallet somewhere in there, too. An entire outfit. I don't even want to know.

On Saturday, I went to this awesome thing called the Brooklyn Bazaar with a whole slew of Belmont Easters.

I walked around and looked at neat, artsy things created by Brooklynites.

And I sucked down the most delicious raspberry lemonade from Lizzmonade.

(Caught her in the act of makin' my drank).

And we all were serenaded by some fantastic up-and-coming Brooklyn rappers, who taught us that they were "wit it" (with it), and that "drugs are like that". (No idea. Don't ask me).

The rest of the week has been filled with interning, working on Christmas music for a show I have coming up, going to a chili dinner thing put on for all of us here with Belmont East, and a whole lot of this:

SO fun.

I also got a little sickly on Sunday night (thanks to my lovely roommate, Allison, who contracted a little bitty cold). Luckily, I destroyed the cold within twenty four hours thanks to an insane amount of Vitamin C. 

I'm sorry that this was such a whackadoodle post. I didn't even attempt to organize it into anything, so I'll probably look back at this later and realize how confusing it is. Oh well. YOLO.

I'm off to my internship! Then, I believe I will be heading to Mona's tonight to listen to some sweet jazz tunes. 

In exactly one week from tomorrow, I will be packing up and leaving my little room here in Brooklyn forever. I can't even believe it. I really do feel like we all just arrived yesterday. But all is well! I am going to soak up this last week as much as I possibly can. Ah. I just love New York.

<3

Nat

More visitors, the Macy's Parade, an 18-pound turkey, and an 80th birthday!

I don't think it is humanly possible to catch you (whoever "you" might be) up on my life from the last week and a half. 

But have no fear! I am going to try my absolute hardest to reenact every single little thing that has happened into one, concise blog post. (Aka: I'm just going to show you a whole bunch of photos and describe a little bit about each one... if I didn't take a photo of something, I've already forgotten about it).

Bobby came to visit!

(Just look at how handsome he is. And how well his head fits perfectly inside the Washington Square Arch).

And we ate bagels by the water.

And stacked up creamers at Clark's Diner.

And went to Mona's for a fantastic night of jazz music. (I think we left at about 3 a.m... Bobby caught the Mona's disease, too.. he claims he could have sat there all night).

And we drank some delicious bubble tea while walking around 5th Ave.

And at some point, his lovely parents arrived!

And we took a little trip to Sleepy Hollow.

And looked at all of the beautiful Christmas lights.

And ate a delicious lunch at a cool, little bar.

And walked across the Brooklyn Bridge.

(Hey, Garrett).

And saw a WONDERFUL Off-Broadway show (Peter and the Starcatcher).

And ate sandwiches that were literally larger than our own heads.

(That was only HALF of the turkey sandwich).

And at some point, my fabulous mother arrived!

(And we were clearly happy. Or the sun was in our eyes. Or both.)

And we watched the hazmat teams blow up the balloons for the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. 

And Spiderman was by far the coolest one.

And Bobby, Mom, and I had 2-for-1 martinis at Pazza Notte with Theodore Roosevelt.

And then it was an early morning! We woke up at about 6 a.m. to make our way to our seats for the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. (Bobby's wonderful father gave us all tickets!).

Bobby was excited.

And I was, too.

And so were all of those people.

And the parade began! We were literally at the VERY front... so all of the people in the parade had tons of high energy and weren't frozen to the bone yet. It was so fantastic.

And we saw Kermit.

And Carly Rae Jepsen.

And a very sad-looking Spongebob Squarepants balloon.

And a really fuzzy Whoopi Goldberg dressed up as a pirate. (I know.. what?)

And the FAB FIVE WOMEN'S OLYMPIC GYMNASTICS TEAM. (Can you tell I got really excited about seeing them?)

And possibly the showstoppers of the entire parade....

Tap-dancing Christmas trees, of course! 

(They had some of the best high kicks I've ever seen).

And to finish off the wonderful parade...

...SANTA. (I swear he's looking right at me in the picture).

And then we all split up until Thanksgiving dinner later on.

And at some point, my awesome brother arrived!

And for the first time in four months, the family was together again.

(Don't be surprised if this ends up being the Christmas card you receive from the Royal family this year).

And we went to Central Park to watch the ice skaters.

And we ran across THE creepiest Elmo character. (We're pretty sure he got lost on his way to Times Square and somehow ended up in Central Park. He had leaves all down his back and a bag in his hand that read, "TIPS, PLEASE". Needless to say, parents were nervously steering their children as far from him as possible).

And I showed my brother my favorite place in Central Park.

And we were entertained by some of the most interesting music I've ever heard. I still can't decide if I loved it or if I absolutely hated it.

And then it was off to Carmine's for a lovely Thanksgiving dinner with Bobby's family!

The place was jumpin'.

And this is only HALF of the food that was on our table. (That back there is an 18-pound turkey. Insanity.)

It was SO incredibly delicious. I believe we were all so stuffed, we thought we would explode. That's a successful Thanksgiving in my opinion.

And we finished off the wonderful evening by exploring the roof of their hotel... which had views of the Chrysler building and the Empire State Building.

And the next morning, my mom, brother, and I all hopped on the train to Glens Falls to visit my wonderful grandparents!

And we had our usual salad and pizza supper at Harvest House. Because it was her birthday the next day, Grammy decided she deserved a sundae for dinner.

And we visited the free library and all checked out books.

And on Saturday morning, we celebrated Grammy's 80th birthday with a delicious breakfast!

And Grammy took a photo of me taking a photo of her.

And Grammy took a photo of her own birthday cake.

And then I took a photo of her with her birthday cake.

And then she asked me to take a photo of JUST her birthday cake. So I did.

And finally, after all of that, she blew out the candles. (It may have taken a couple of tries, but she was eventually successful).

Sidenote: We only ate cake immediately after breakfast, because my brother had to hop on a plane to fly back to Charlotte. Otherwise, we would have waited until after dinner or something.. like normal people.

And after Mike left, we all explored Barnes and Noble and had a delicious, little lunch there.

The next day, we ventured into Bolton for a breakfast at Hometown Diner. Then, we walked around the Sagamore, which was beautiful as ever and decorated for Christmas!

And we "ooed" and "ahhed" over Lake George.

And ventured around in the car to get different views.

And then it was time for mom and I to bid "Adieu" to them! We took another train back to Penn Station in New York City.

Whew.

That was the last week and half in a nutshell. Or several nutshells.

I hope that everyone had a fantastic Thanksgiving! I have to say that this was definitely a Thanksgiving to remember. I couldn't feel more blessed than I do to have such wonderful, loving family and friends. This is a big "thank you" to all of you for making me feel like the luckiest gal in the world.

Now, I'm off to go write a million papers. It's technically finals week here, but I also technically only have about 15 days left in New York City... I must make the most of these next two weeks!

Love you all.

<3

Nat