Quick trip to the big city!
It’s hard to believe, but my little girl, who is 24 years old, is moving to New York City! I have always dreamed of living there and have been taking her since she was 5. She loved it then and apparently, loves it enough now that she wants to move there! Lord help me!
We took a quick trip to meet a few potential roommates, check out several Pilates studios, and just get the feeling of living there. We had just over 48 hours in the city and somehow we packed in a lot and found time to rest. Well, I got in some rest 🤭
I thought it would be fun to share what we did in a short amount of time so you can see NYC through our lens. We decided to stay in the West Village so we could walk everywhere that she might live/work/play. It’s a much different feeling in lower Manhattan than midtown where we usually go during the holidays or for an event. It almost felt like a completely different place. We loved it!
We checked in early at the Courtyard by Marriott and hit the ground running. We had a pilates class at Avea at 2:30 and wanted to walk there so we could eat, browse, and well, walk! We stopped by our favorite, Buvette, in the West Village where we only had to wait about 5 minutes for a table. Their website is Ilovebuvette.com - couldn’t have picked a better one! The menu is small, but you will not be disappointed in anything you order including a chocolate croissant. My mouth is watering just thinking about it!
We took to the streets of the West Village where you can find a lot of our favorites, Buck Mason, Billy Reid, SET Active, Isalis, and everything from small boutiques to bougie bookstores! Heading up and over toward Avea, we stopped in C.O. Bigelow Pharmacy, the oldest apothecary in America, to grab a couple of things we’d not packed. We actually did the least shopping you could imagine being in NYC! It wasn’t a priority and we were trying to pretend we lived there. Shopping isn’t in the budget! Bigelow is so cute and you can find name-brand things there as well as their own lines of products. The outside of the store is as cute as the inside!
Emma had plans for the evening with a few girls for cocktails and drinks and I ventured up to The Whitney for Free Friday Nights and enjoyed the Harold Cohen: Aaron Exhibit. This exhibition traces the evolution of Harold Cohen’s AARON, the earliest artificial intelligence (AI) program for artmaking. Leaving behind his practice as an established painter in London, Cohen (1928–2016) conceived the software in the late 1960s at the University of California, San Diego, and named it AARON in the early 1970s. - The Whitney Museum Website
After enjoying the exhibit, I grabbed a table at Frenchette Bakery in the museum and had a delicious meal of bread, pasta, and pastries! Then I walked it off back to the hotel. Emma came in soon after and told me all about her new friends and the pizza she had, she loves a good pizza! She had drinks at Due West and Dinner at Emmet’s On Grove. We stopped by Due West for a drink on Saturday night! I give it 5 stars!
Saturday morning was rainy but we wanted a bagel and had two pilates classes to get to and tour another facility. We took off with our umbrella and had a great bagel at BK Bagel in Greenwich Village before our first class at New York Pilates and then made our way to SOHO to wander and waste time before our next class at Good Day Pilates. Both were so fun and so different! I can say I did something at both that I’d never done before. I think that’s what I love most about Pilates on the reformer, there are so many variations!
We were so tired, almost dragging our feet through the puddles around the streets of SOHO all day. We decided to take a break at Fanelli Cafe for a much-needed late lunch. Our spread was just perfect - a juicy burger, a crisp beet salad, and some tasty fries. Feeling refreshed but a bit damp from the rain, we headed back to our hotel to freshen up and get ready for dinner later.
48 Hours of Food
We didn’t have reservations and Saturday night seems to be a lot busier in the West Village than Friday. We grabbed a table at Serafina, a tried and true Italian that never disappoints! Emma met friends and I went back to the hotel and worked in my art journal!
Sunday morning we met another new friend who teaches pilates at one of the studios for breakfast and coffee at Maman and she filled us in on every detail we could ever imagine. She answered questions we didn’t know we had! It was great and then she walked us to the subway to make our way to Brooklyn for our last Pilates class of the weekend. If you are counting, that’s 4! The studio was very small but the teacher was similar to how I’m used to taking class. We walked around Brooklyn, did I mention the sun was shining? It was a gorgeous day! We had lunch at a taco truck and then got back on the subway to get back to Manhattan. We decided to walk along the river with the rest of the population and grabbed one more meal before we got into a car for the airport!
The trip was a whirlwind and we covered a lot of ground. I know she is going to love it and I will love visiting! I would love to know your favorite places to eat, drink, shop, and do Pilates! I’ll be back in June!
48 Hours of Pilates
48 Hours of Shopping
48 Hours of Sights of the City
