New York, New York

Abe and I spent an extended weekend in New York City as part of a get-together with Abe's sister, brother-in-law and their friends. This was my (Allison)'s second time in New York City, and once again I realized that New York City is like Chicago on crack. Going to NYC always makes me so much more appreciative for Chicago's smaller scale.



We spent one day at a Yankees game where we saw A-Rod entering the stadium. (He is so built!) There was a game-winning home run in the bottom of the ninth, so that was very exciting. We also had an interesting experience trying to avoid the birds that were circling the upper deck (we were three rows from the top). That day we also had dinner with our good friend, Pam, who's in NYC for the summer with Campus Crusade for Christ.



We also spent another day doing just sight-seeing in the city. Our favorite place was Central Park. I thought it would be like Lincoln Park in Chicago, which is an awesome urban park, but I was truly blown away by Central Park. We saw the settings for so many movies and TV shows like the Mall (grove of trees) and the lake where people rent boats. There were really good street musicians playing in the park, so I felt like we were in our own romantic movie!



We spent another day at the beach in Connecticut, where we were staying with our brother-in-law's dad. I had never been to Connecticut before (wahoo for visiting a new state!). It's essentially just forest with winding roads between the towns -- absolutely gorgeous. We had a lot of fun out on the beach and on a speedboat.



Unfortunately, we had quite an ordeal getting home. We had a connection through DC on the way back, but storms in Chicago caused our flight from DC to Chicago to be canceled. Thankfully, we were able to make our way back very late at night, but we were originally re-booked for the next day. It's never fun when you're considering whether you should sleep in the airport or get a hotel room. Abe made good use of the time studying, as you can see from the picture above.

So, we had a great time, but we're really thankful to be home. We got more of an overview of NYC, so we're excited to go back sometime later and visit more in-depth.