Out and about in NYC

Sorry for the lack of posts recently. I've had a bunch of visitors over the past few weeks and we've been busy exploring the city. Ahhh New York in the summer, so much fun! Here are some pics from the past few weeks, mostly food related so ignore if you're not here for that sort of thing. I did finally make a trip out to TopShop with my good friend A and I'll post pictures of my purchases soon.

The two people that visited are definite devoted foodies so we managed to hit some of the great NY restaurants: Babbo, Daniel (amazing amazing!), Irving Mill (where we spotted Jill Hennessey from Crossing Jordan at the next table eating ribs), Barney Greengrass (fab gravlox and bagels + as we were walking by two days later on our way to the Popover Cafe next door we saw Lawrence Fishburne exiting with two bags of take-out from BG and a big grin on his face). I think the celebrities may have been stalking us as we also saw Wilson from House in Penn Station, and the guy that plays Twofer on 30 Rock at some random cafe in Green Point on our way to the Brooklyn Flea market. The highlight of our food extravaganza was probably DBGB, Daniel Boulud's latest venture of a French Brasserie crossed with a diner. The food was amazingly well executed and we managed to randomly walk in on their grand opening night so Daniel Boulud was there taking pictures.


Here is one of my outfits:
Dress - Urban Outfitters
Flip Flops - Reef
Sweater - J Crew
Bag - Franco Sarto


As well as the expensive places we also hit a lot of great cheap eats. One of my favorites is Momofuku Milk Bar for cereal milk, amaaaazing pork buns, and sour gummy & fireball soft serve. The Momofuku Noodle Bar is quite good as well.


An upper west side tradition, the popover with strawberry butter from the Popover Cafe is something you have to try. Also the Tres Leches doughnut from doughnut has to be my all time favorite doughnut ever, and the carrot cake, toasted almond and creme brule aren't bad either. We went twice. ;)


A lot of cupcake tasting took place as well: Crumb for giant cupcakes, Baked by Melissa for really good stuffed mini cupcakes (the peanut butter cup was the best by far), and we even managed to randomly stumble upon the cupcake truck (mobile cupcakes who can beat that?).


Rice to Riches dishes out some awesome rice pudding. We also sampled Poutine from Pommes Frites although it was disappointing, the cheese curds still hard and chewy and not melted like they're supposed to be and the gravy way too salty. Next time I'll stick to the 20 different dipping sauces they offer.


Besides all this food we also did some other random touristy things like Guys & Dolls, a tour of the SNL studio at Rockefeller center, a quick stop into St John the Divine.


We also hit up multiple street fairs, farmers markets, and 2 Flea Markets, as well as the Natural History Museum and the Tenement Museum (quite interesting).


A lot of time was just spent wandering and exploring the city.

CDG for H&M

I took a little trip to H&M this morning in the hopes of
checking out the Comme Des Garcons collaboration.
Apparently I should have arrived at 6am! By the time I
dragged my sleepy butt out of bed the merch was pretty
picked over. Not a deconstructed jacket or pair of drop
crotch pants in sight... Sadly the only things left were
some rather standard button downs, expensive and not
super interesting trenches, and a few wool sweaters. I
actually ended up purchasing one of the sweaters which
has some interesting detailing on the sleeves and a nice
cut, but was sad not to be able to try the trousers or
jackets. They probably would have disappointed anyhow
(or at least that's what I'll tell myself). Guess next time
sleep is out and standing in line is in!

Oh and the CDG items are already showing up on ebay at
about twice the original prices. Curse you profiteers!

Rosettes

I've been looking for some fabric rosettes that I can dye in various colors
and attach to plain clothing items to up their cuteness quotient. I thought
about buying these beige organdy rosettes, but i'd like to see them in
person first and $6.50 per rosette seems a little steep especially if i have to
experiment a few times with the dying process to get it right.



This current obsession started sometime last year when I tried on a beautiful
gray silk dress with rosettes all around the collar, but it felt like a little too
much to have them wrapping all the way around the neckline. Besides, even
on someone as thin as Charlotte in Pushing Daisies the rosettes look great
from the front or back, but somehow aren't that flattering when viewed from
the side. So, I think I'll stick to attaching a few here or there as accents.



So, I'm thinking I'm in New York right, there there must be some good ribbon
stores in the city. Upon a mini search of the internet I stumble upon Mokuba,
New York. Wow, just wow! 3500 square feet dedicated solely to ribbon with
43,000 different kinds of ribbon and trim! That is one store I definitely have to
check out. Unbelievable!