First Trip to Chelsea!

To celebrate our 5th anniversary, Frances and I (along with Ryan) decided to have dinner at Scarpetta, in the "way too trendy for us" Meatpacking District. We were brimming with excitement, as we were finally returning to the world of fine dining after a nearly year-long hiatus - for my last birthday we went to Eleven Madison and for some still unknown reason, the waiter gave 1-year old Ryan a pack of crayons, which he proceded to use to defile the white tablecloth and earn us a self-imposed ban at nice restaurants. I mean, talk about setting a kid up to get in trouble.

This excursion seemed to start off where our last one ended. As we approached the restaurant, I noticed Ryan keep scratching his a--. He said nothing was wrong, but then he kept scratching. Finally, we picked him up and... he'd soiled his pants with a nasty case of diarrhea. On the verge of heading home in defeat, I came through in the clutch and remembered the BuyBuyBaby nearby. 35 minutes later, with a pair of $4.99 sweats on his sore butt, we were seated at our booth.

Dinner was good but unmemorable. Afterwards, we decided to take a walk through Chelsea Market and it was awesome. I picked up some Ventresca at Buon Italia and then we hit People Pops, where Ryan and I shared an apricot / chamomile pop. He absolutely loved it and ate far more than his fair share.

On our way out, we happened on one of the pianos that are part of a really cool art project, Street Pianos NYC:


Ryan immediately hopped on and started banging away on the keys. Pretty soon a small crowd had gathered, as he seemed to play with such poise and determination. With much regret, we finally had to leave, but not before he did a little bow for his adoring fans. To top it all off, as we hit 10th Ave, we bumped into Sunny Anderson, Food Network show host, who asked us whether he was the little boy she'd just seen playing the piano. Admittedly, in the world of NY celebrities, this is a pretty C or D list encounter, but it was still pretty cool.

To top off the evening, we walked up to the High Line park. If you haven't gone up there, it is amazing and one of the more successful urban beautification projects I've ever seen. Ryan went crazy running around the park and climbing the benches and other structures. Finally exhausted, we all went home for some well deserved R&R.

There are days I wish Frances and I had more alone time, but this wasn't one of them. It's a good life to live in NYC and have time to explore with loved ones and I'll miss it someday if I ever move away from here.