new york, new york

7:52 PM

it seems to me there are two types of people in this world. those who loooove surprises....and those who do not. i might be the ring leader of that first group.

there is nothing i love more than surprises.

to me great surprises equal great memories.

tell me of a time someone surprised you and you don't remember it...you can't think of one, can you? happy surprises just leave a happy imprint on our brains and i love that so much.

while i love receiving surprises...i love planning them so much more. i, however am married to a man who, while he does love a good surprise, he is not always so great at keeping them. he's the type who tells me about my birthday gifts right after he buys them because he is too excited.

isn't he adorable?

thankfully after 15 years together i have made a slight impact on him and his secret-keeping. thank goodness too because we had been planning a big one for a few weeks. there were many times he wanted to blow it...but he stayed strong and boy did it pay off. the look on their faces when we woke these two up early friday morning and told them they weren't going to school that day was priceless!

instead of school....we surprised them with a fun-filled get-away!

(a quick stop in milwaukee)

then we landed here. as taylor swift says....

ahhhh, this city.

i have had the pleasure of walking it's streets a handful of times and i fall in love a little bit more with every visit. this particular visit, however, topped them all. there is nothing like experiencing something new through you kid's eyes. they were in awe the entire weekend.

we landed friday afternoon and hit the ground running...

a little pre-bedtime stroll in their jammies.

saturday was a jam packed day, which started out with an amazing cruise on the hudson. this hour-long ride may have been the highlight of the weekend for me. in all my visits to nyc, i have never seen a lot of the sights we saw that morning. it really was incredible.

(selfie stick wins again)

once we were back on land we caught a quick bit to eat at ryan's new favorite buyer joint...shake shack. thank goodness they are opening one here soon!

then it was on to activity number two of the day....brooooaaaadway!!!!

this was so so fun. i have few words to describe the genie. just phenomenal. the girls loved every minute.

activity number three!

the funny thing about this trip is that i spent more time than i would like to admit researching family friendly restaurants...when at the end of the day all these two wanted was street food! hot dogs, pretzels and ice cream...can't beat that.