Friday, November 4, 2016

NYC Girl's Trip!!

Now I'm like a full year behind! One step forward, two steps back, right?
I know it's been a year because this Girl's Trip I went on with Monica and Jeni was last November!!
Jeni & Monica started talking about how they wanted to see Billy Joel in concert in Madison Square Garden (since he doesn't tour much anymore, but sells out every concert at MSG) and asked if I liked Billy Joel and the trip planning began!!  Kevin, who travels A LOT, gave us his travel miles because Monica wanted us all to be on the same flight sitting by each other!  Brad took us to the airport and snapped this picture as we headed to NYC!
 We talked the WHOLE flight! I'm sure we were driving people who sat by us CRAZY!  We were so excited!!  I don't even remember all the details (hence the problem with blogging a year later), but I do remember we ran around the city, checked into our hotel in the garden district (see the sidewalk) and finally, Jeni and I asked Monica if we could eat!  Mon wasn't feeling well and didn't even think about food, but it was well past dinner time by the time we found Shake Shack and downed hamburgers and fries (yum!) and chatted until we saw a few mice darting in and out of the bushes and we high-tailed it outta there!  ha ha!  We hadn't eaten since like 6am....we still joke about that!  Jeni and I felt like little kids asking our mom if we could stop for some food! :) ha ha ha!


 See the lights and windows at Lord & Taylor....stop for some selfies to send the kiddos!




 We got tickets to the Jimmy Fallon rehearsal! It was a blast!  We were front row! Less than 100 people in the theater.  We sat with the writers and helped them decide (by our reactions and laughing) which jokes to put in that night's show!  We had a great time even though the 'stars' like Jimmy, The Roots, #Panda didn't really interact with the crowd.  Still so cool to see.  It's a smallish theater and small stage.  Things always look bigger on tv.  So much fun!!
 And then the concert! Our seats were AWESOME!  It was an AMAZING concert! He would ask the crowd to tell him what to play next and would offer 2 or 3 options.  The applause got him to play the song.  We could have stayed all night!


 It was fun to see a concert here since the year before Amanda and I had toured this building.

 So much fun!  And you know what one of the things I was thinking after...you didn't have to worry about drunk drivers leaving the concert like you do at home and driving on the freeway with them, because everyone walked back to their hotels!! ")  I know...pretty random.
 We walked across the Brooklyn Bridge and were on a mission to find a pizza place....the name escapes me now....Grimaldi Bros? Maybe?  Anyway, here is a view of the new World Trade building from Brooklyn...funny story about this was the Monica was guiding the way, but couldn't exactly find the restaurant even though she was using google maps.  We walked like 6 miles that day (as proven by our phones tracking steps) trying to find this place! Finally, I stopped a local and asked....so funny!!  The thing was, we walked in a circle by turning right when if we turned left, we would have walked right into the building!! ha ha ha!  Such great memories!  By the time we got there, we were STARVING again and the pizza tasted so good!
 We saw the church's new Christmas promotion out in the middle of Times Square.  It was SO huge!
 We went to Juniors one night.  We walked down by Seaport Village and got tickets to see....oh crap....can't remember that either! I'll ask my friends......But it was the funniest show!  Afterward, we went to Ellen's Stardust Diner for dinner...where they have the singing servers.  The first 10 minutes were awesome and then it went boring!  There weren't a lot of people that night so I think the servers just mellowed out.  Disappointing as it was Monica's first time, but she'll be back.  (She's been to NYC several times, but never to the Stardust Diner.)

 Here we are at the show.....Such great friends...love them so much!  We decided after this trip, that we couldn't go one week without getting together to chat (and we call it therapy), so each week we head to the local frozen yogurt place for their $1 Diet Coke's and we sit for a couple of hours and chat!  The owner's of the shop loves us and even text Monica (her son is friends with their son) when we don't show up. I think for the past year, we've only missed 2 weeks....and it's only because one of us is out of town for the week.  If we can't make an afternoon therapy, we do a breakfast at Kneaders :)  I'm very lucky to have these gals in my life!  We are  the mama's of the 3 families that go to Lake Powell together and affectionally call ourselves the Wilgenseths...which is a mash-up our our last names which seems cheesy, but it makes it easier than saying to the kids....'we are getting together with Jergensens and Wilsons tonight.....' we just say, it's a Wilgenseth party tonight! ha ha ha!  The Wilgenseth Women want to do another girl's trip, but we just haven't made plans yet.  All three families have a high school senior this year and it's been very busy.

Monday, October 3, 2016

Professional pics

But first.....this cute kid! We had a fun lunch that day and Brandon couldn't stop laughing!  Love days like this....
 The rest of these pictures are from Brenda....