Wednesday in New York..

We woke up bright and early Wednesday morning and headed to Rockefeller Plaza...to get in line to ice skate as soon as the rink opened...
While in line, we enjoyed the beautiful gardens...

watching the flags - especially Mississippi's flag - whip in the wind...

As we waited...

we also watched as workers placed lights on the beautiful Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree...

The rink finally opened. We got our skates on and checked our shoes and my purse and finally hit the ice...

Charles did a great job for his first time on ice!

I had so much fun!

It has been years since I last ice skated, but I "quickly" got back into the hang of it and even ventured to skate backwards for a bit and managed a few turn arounds!

Charles and I skated in synch for a bit...

Then Charles decided to call it quits while I took a few more turns around the rink...

While we were skating, Bon Jovi was playing a concert for the Today Show right across the street above us. The rink piped in music, but we did manage to hear a few snippets from several songs!

We headed to the stage after retrieving our shoes and removing our skates, but Bon Jovi was already finished with the concert...

We didn't manage to see Bon Jovi, but we did see many of their fans!

We then took the subway to Brooklyn... where we walked around and caught sight of the Brooklyn Bridge...

and the Manhattan Bridge...We walked to the park on the waterfront and enjoyed some quite time and many beautiful views of the Manhattan skyline, Manhattan Bridge...

Brooklyn Bridge...

We walked along the paved paths...

and stopped for many pictures...

We then walked to Jacques Torres... They had so many delicious looking treats...We finally decided on what we wanted for breakfast along with hot chocolate...and enjoyed it in the store...We then walked back to the park to finish our hot chocolates and then walked around the DUMBO area some more. When we saw this cute little rabbit painted on a door, we just had to take this picture!We passed Grimaldi's - where we planned to have lunch and found out that it did not open until 11:00...So we walked down to the pier and enjoyed some more views of the Manhattan skyline...

We enjoyed watching our little bird friends play...

and land on the posts... and we saw several helicopters fly overhead...
We also saw the Brooklyn Ice Cream Factory - if we come back one summer, we will definitely have to stop in!Charles took a little break from seeing the sights and tried to catch up on some of the sleep I had been making him miss in the mornings!

We then noticed that a line was forming in front of Grimaldi's, so we walked back up and got our spot in the line...

The wait was worth it once we got our seats...We were right in front of the coal oven, and Charles could see the pizza makes making their masterpieces...We had great table mates - a couple from Louisianna - and had a very delicious and enjoyable lunch!

After lunch, we made our way to the Brooklyn Bridge...

and began our walk across it...It was neat to see the pedestrian portion and vehicle portion converge...

Even though it was overcast and misty, we still saw the Manhattan Bridge...and Manhattan skyline...

The consruction of the bridge was amazing...We had to stop once for Charles to act a little silly!

Then we continued our walk across the bridge...

It was such a pleasant walk...

On the other side of the Bridge, we saw an artist sketching...

He was really nice, and we brought home a couple of his drawings. He offered to take our picture and still held his hands out for our camera even after we told him we already had taken our picture with the bridge, so we took another one!

We then walked around the financial district and saw the NYSE...

Federal Hall...

and Trinity Church...

And we walked around the seaport and visited Fraunces Tavern...and saw a copy of the Magna Carta...

and the South Seaport Christmas Tree...

Then we walked to Carnegie Deli...

for dinner

We were one table up from the one we sat at last trip, but I still managed to get a picture of Charles with Dan Marino!!

After splitting a Woody Allen and fries which we still couldn't finish even after splitting it, we headed back to the hotel to get ready for the evening.

We then took the subway back to Central Park West to see the balloons for the Macys Thanksgiving Day Parade get inflated. The crowds were horrible beginning in the subway station and continuing through the balloon inflation route, but it was still neat to see the balloons on the ground.

I was really excited at the first sight of the balloons...

We saw Snoopy and Buzz Lightyear...

The crowds really started to get to me (along with the drizzle, rain, coolness and the part of the sidewalk we walked on which was actually tree planters) until I saw the Smurf balloon...

Things got a lot Smurfier while I had my picture taken with the Smurf...

(by comparing my head and the Smurf's fingers, you get an idea of just how huge these balloons are)

After taking a closer look, and taking in the Pillsbury Doughboy balloon, we were finished with that street of balloons, and I had decided that I had seen enough!

We decided the look at the other balloons from a distance instead of braving the crowds to see them up close...

After leaving the balloons and the crowds, we headed to the theater to see Hair. We had a great time! The cast was wonderful!

After the performance, we walked back to the hotel (despite my repeated requests for a taxi - my feet were tired at that point, I mean I don't know how much walking we had already done during the days and me being in heels both evenings, well, my feet just really needed a break!)and enjoyed the Christmas lights of the city...

We had a wonderful Wednesday in New York!