documentary: man on wire

yesterday i decided to hone in on two of my nerdiest qualities -- my love for libraries and my love for documentaries. so i walked into the muhlenburg library on my way home from work, got a library card and rented Man on Wire.

this oscar winning documentary tells the story of philippe petit's journey between the twin towers in the early 70's. i would definitely recommend it! it sorta gives you chills. but the story is so sweet you feel as though he was just meant to do it!

"how beautiful a death it would be to die in the exercise of your passion"

-philippe petit

bullseye, baby!

home, sweet home.

my beloved is coming to the big apple. granted, its in harlem, but its coming! a seamless transition of unnecessary but affordable home accents for my new room is in order for july 27th. perfect timing too, im sure by then ill be craving some tastes of texas. leave it to new york to be ingenious and original and have their first designer collaboration be with local talent like isabel toledo and stephen burrows.

let the sunday afternoon boredom shopping begin!

new route!

today is hands down the most beautiful day since being in the city. the weather is unreal. here, look.

and it looks like its here to stay until friday :)

its only noon and today has just been a great day. i woke up early, put on a new sweater and got to walk to the subway with my roomy, ainsley! a NEW subway! well, for me anyways. its a much prettier walk and i get off the subway right in front of my building. maybe its the weather, but i think my new route smells a lot better. it reminded me of summers in colorado and not of sweaty trash and dirty water.

BIG SISSY COMES IN TWO WEEKS!!! TWO!!

im freaking out and planning our time together (just like you, dad!).

our time will include: in the heights, dos feliz, the met, the new museum, meatpacking brunch, the highline, serendipity, central park, governors island, the frying pan, day in brooklyn, and the mates of state concert.

she's married, cool, young, easy going, skinny and the only thing that annoys me about her is that she doesnt have a chubby baby with big blues for me to carry around like its my own. and seriously, that annoys me.

im so smart

i think im a prophet. that or somebody really in to the fashion scene reads my blog for ideas. ill take either. somebody from tory burch obviously saw my post about them and then my post about the highline and decided to combine the two into what is now their 2010 denim campaign ads.

i totally called it :)

intern adventures

kyra and i have yet to come in contact with a project that goes without a hitch. well, yesterday we went and bought some pipes for a photobooth and that went surprisingly well. today we had to go pick up some posters. little did we know the box was huge and would require a handle. too bad it broke five minutes into our walk.

i cant tell you how many people said "gosh, i wish you were african right now! they can balance like 80 pounds on their head". kyra took a few turns too.

but hey, atleast we have fun! here are a few pics that kyra, nur and i have taken the past week or two and sent to eachother over ichat.

thinking about making a run to the cupcake truck before heading to the hudson hotel to set up for tonights party. uh oh.

jokes on us

lets start about by saying that my "boss" isnt really like most bosses. she jokes around with kyra and i constantly, lets us invite our friends to any event, and invites us to her birthday party. do you have inside jokes with your boss? we do.

kyra (appropriately nick named 'crazy pants') and i always think we're soooo funny at the office. we always dish katie some serious 'tude and have a blast doing it. well katie got smart and decided to serve it right back last week. kudos, katie.

heres the scenario: kyra and i work all the concerts at governors island. go here for a full run down but basically, being that bushmills is our client were responsible for bar set-up, presentation, etc. well katie calls us on friday and explains that bushmills has decided to take the branding to a whole new level and we have so graciously been assigned as Bushmills Girls. think redbull girl meets playboy bunny? she goes on to explain that we would walk around like bartenders serving the crowd drinks in little sailor outfits (fitting with the nautical theme of being on an island!) and our bloomers would read AHOY!

thankfully i got the joke quickly and then played it up once crazy pants got to the office. never a dull moment at cornerstone :)

celeb spotting at spunto

tonight for dinner my room mate Marissa and i decided to walk around the neighborhood and find a place we'd never been! after three failed attempts due to nasty menu selections, being closed, and strange people, we settled on Spunto Thin Crust Pizza - my favorite!

we (so smartly) chose to sit outside and guess who our table was right next to? alexis bledel - rory of gilmore girls!

it was my first celebrity sighting and marissa and i were beside ourselves. that is, until they opted to go inside because it was "too hot". i have a feeling that our girlish snickering and absence of conversation (because we were trying to listen in on theirs!) was the reason for their quick escape.

of course, typical hillary fashion the minute they walk outside to leave and we try to follow causally behind them the chain strap of my new purse fell between the cracks of the picnic table and i had to (not so quietly) yank the thing out of there. meanwhile bledel rubbed it in our faces by making out with her ever-so-attractive-boyfriend on the side of the street. foot pop included.

see you around the village, rory. or not.

the texans are coming, the texans are coming!

three of my good friends from school are in new york until monday! i tried meeting up with them after my bosses bday but after an hour and 45 minutes of waiting for subways, walking, taking cabs, and dead cell phones, i opted to simply meet them for brunch in the morning.

i met them + tyler at Pastis the next morning in meetpacking and enjoyed a lovely brunch of corn soup, yummy bread, and a few bites of BGs french toast :) it was so fun talking about things going on back in cs and getting to tell them about nyc!

we walked down to chelsea markets after brunch and spotted a bunch of moustaches! pictures soon ensued.

chelsea markets is seriously such an incredible place to shop, eat, or just walk around. the space itself is finished out so incredible. and all the stores and restaurants are very unique -- always something cool to find!

brittany has a cousin that lives here in the city and he suggested we all meet up for dinner. we met up with him later that night at the Blue Fin in the W hotel in times square. the appetizers, entrees, sushi rolls, drinks, breads and desserts just kept coming! we had so much fun getting to know brittanys cousin, shaun, and definitely had a few laughs with our waiter, Mark (far left). the Blue Fin definitely served me the best food ive had since ive been in the city -- salmon and sushi? yes, please!

we ordered three large desserts and rotated every minute or two so everybody could have a bite. looking back we should have just ordered three of the smores because they were THE best. definitely taking big sissy there when she comes in...its a perfect spot to get dessert after a broadway!

the crew had already bought tickets for rock of ages and i decided to see if they were sold out yet -- 30 seconds before the show started i ran into the theater, grabbed my seat (four rows back, dead center!), and enjoyed the show. IT WAS INCREDIBLE! its basically an 80s sing-a-long...and it definitely made me miss my roomys considering we occasionally jam out to Journey before a big night (okay, so its from the Glee soundtrack). but seriously, for the rest of the night you'd catch one of the six of us dancing or singing some pat benatar.

from there, the great host himself, shaun, took us to some fun restaurants and bars in the west village -- including tortilla flats! which has been on my to-do list since i heard about it. chips and queso, woohoo!

i cant tell you what a fun night this was! next to having my family here it was probably my favorite night in nyc so far. thanks to shaun for being such an incredible host to five poor college kids trying to leave the dream in the big apple...you made our year!

rooftop birthday

my bosses birthday was thursday, but since she had a party to throw in boston she opted to celebrate the next day on her rooftop! i met up with kyra after taking the subway to brooklyn, found katie's apartment only to discover that this is the view she has to suffer with -

i know its out of focus, but you get the idea...incredible view of manhattan! kyra and i had a great time chatting with people from the office, drinking champagne in katie's honor, and meeting a nice gentleman from kentucky ;) and the weather was beautiful!

happy birthday to the greatest boss ever!

U-S-A!!!!

all thanks goes to my dad for sending me this awesome video! its a collaboration of reactions to landon donovans last minute goal vs. algeria with music and it'll make you tear up! :)

check out the shot of the day's on fifa.com, too!

rooftop pictures

roomys kelley and marissa came to the event that i worked on tuesday at the rivington hotel. super fun, 3-story pent house with a rooftop view to boot!

and hey, time out new york even got an interview out of us interns!

new forever 21

tomorrow is the grand opening of the forever 21 - times square. for those of you not interested enough to read the hysterical paragraph written by the cut, let me just give you some stats.

-121 changing rooms

-4 floors

-90,000 square feet

i definitely want to go, but i think im gonna give it a few weeks and let the masses die down (okay, they probably wont) until i step foot in that place. for interesting facts' sake, this store will be larger than all 3 of manhattan's existing forever 21's combined. they've hyped it up by placing a countdown in times square for the past week or two. smart marketing tactic if you ask me!

okay, so i may mistakingly take the uptown bound train home after work tomorrow.

ps. little sissy, this answers our question of "where is the virgin records sign?" we posed on our vacay...forever 21 has officially taken over!

42nd and 5th ave

yesterday i went to the new york public library after work to get a library card and check out where carrie almost got married in the first sex and the city movie.

i left without a library card, but lots of new information about andy warhol! as i was walking around the beautiful building i saw a sign for a discussion by the authors of one of andy warhols autobiographies and it was just about to start. so i found the auditorium and plopped down in next to an eccentric, older crowd.

i sat next to a 70-year-old man with an edie sedgwick tshirt on and a woman who remembered aloud everything the authors commentated on. it was definitely an interesting crowd, and warhol an interesting subject.

i left a couple minutes early to beat the elevator crowd (we were sort of in a basement), walked home, and spent the evening with my roomys.

look, ma! no diet coke!

my first week alone here in the city i went through a 12-pack of diet coke in about five days. disgusting, i know, but looking back im going to blame it on subconscious insecurities of being without texas and all that comes with it for 2 months.

back in cs it is rare to see me walk into class without a large styrofoam fountain diet coke from the endearing man, Asit, at the shell station next to my house. that was the old me -- THIS is the new me. no diet coke! after glancing through a few pages of this book on my room mates shelf, i decided that diet coke was no longer for me. i always justified the fact that i was fine because it has no calories...wrong! mom, i officially give you the right to say "i told you so". the book literally says something like "and for those people who think that they're fine for drinking diet coke because it has no calories? its even worse for you!" blah blah blah and they go on and say that it can cause cancer, etc.

enter: $.99 unsweetened iced tea from dunkin donuts.

dunkin donuts really grosses me out, but the big 99¢ sign totally suckered me in. even though the book says anything caffeine is from the devil, tea is water-based (unlike diet coke) and i take my unsweeted. so, there! iced tea always reminds me of texas way more than diet coke. reminds me of mom, too!

america might, but texas sure doesnt so who knows what ill be carrying into class this fall.

one kings lane

ive never really been one to dream about what i want my wedding to look like. i know what i like and what i dont like, and when the time comes ill have so much fun planning it all, but my future HOME on the other hand is something ive always loved planning and mapping out.

last summer i lived in austin and spent my 2 and half months there working, interning and planning/buying things for my room for my first college house. it turned out exactly as i imagined and i had such a fun time designing the whole thing. thanks to my mommy who gave me her strong love for interior decorating and design!

ive always loved online sample sales. never really been one to buy from them but when i read my emails in the morning and see that i could get a marc jacobs dress at 70% off i get really excited... therein lies my most recent discovery.

just like gilt groupe and thetopsecret, one kings lane discounts designer items -- only this time its designer decor, furniture, accessories, and gifts! may the interior decorating fantasies begin!

umbrellas and fridges

after our night at the jane, my room mates and i headed back to room 310 and decided to have a photo shoot with ainsleys rainbow umbrella and our spare refrigerator awkwardly placed outside my bedroom door.

never a dull moment with my university of delawareans.

here's the plan

i've decided to make a plan for my weeks here in new york. i dont want to miss anything super fun so a girls gotta do what a girls gotta do! i work every day from about 11-6 so that leaves the mornings open for some reading spots and the evenings open for some funzy.

today! tonight i am working an event here. ifellow interns kyra and grant will be there and we always seem to find a good time together. see?

and my room mates and tyler are coming to the party too. the event is only from 6-9 so maybe after that we can go sit somewhere and have fun together. im trying to save my sheckles for when brittany/big sister are here.

tomorrow is wednesday. im going to go towards my office early and work on finishing the great gatsby in madison square park across from the flatiron building. i love the book so far and really want to finish it up so i can start reading eat, pray, love. after that im going to work and working really hard and then going to the new york public library where sex and the city was filmed. im going to get a library card which totally reminds me of elementary school when we used to take a day off school and go to the library. thanks for making me read when i was little, mom.

basically thats all i have planned out right now...only through tomorrow. but who knows! maybe ill meet kate hudson at the library tomorrow and she'll ask me to babysit ryder on thursday. dont want to make too strict of plans now, do we?

madewell

you can now shop one of my favorite stores online! i discovered the beauty of madewell last summer when i was living in austin - thank god! their white pencil leg jeans are perfection. along with everything else they sell.

mates of state

for those of you who dont know mates of state already -- youre missing out completely. my friend turned me on to MoS in junior high and ive been listening off and on since. my sister and i went to one of their shows in houston my freshman year in high school. they are a husband/wife duet and seeing them live makes hearing their music coming out of a computer so much more special. i remember us leaving that show and thinking we had never seen a couple as in love in our lives. funny thing...theyre playing here at the bowery ballroom while sister is here visiting me. we may just have to go!

check out the fun collaboration they did with ABC for their new music video.

governors island

yesterday me, 2 other interns, and a photographer worked a concert with 'the morning benders' on governors island. we were put in charge of making sure the bar-setup was up to parr and manning the studiobooth by providing the props and recruiting the concert-goers to take advantage of our free pictures (like the b&w ones here)!

grant and i took a ferry over to g.i. with all the props and then sat near the beach and ate corn on the cob and french fries. it made me miss the texas state fair!

we were there repping bushmills in the VIP areas and backstage but the concert series (there's one every week!) was put on by converse. see that stage? i went up there to announce the free photo booth. not sure how i did that.

beautiful view of manhattan as the sun was setting.

its so fun watching the bands from back/side stage and chatting with them before they go up. i so wish my little sissy could have been there! she would have loved it.

happy fathers day

to THE greatest dad in the world.

that bottom left picture was taken when i was 11 when i was leaving for camp :)

i know a ton of people say "my dad is the greatest" blah blah blah. but i actually believe that my dad is THE best dad in the entire world. he is hands down the wisest and most humble person i know...two things that dont normally sit hand-in-hand.

my dad is the most sacrificial person i know. he consistently puts aside his time for others. i had a friend last year who was going through a really hard time and whenever i called him to talk, or to ask if he could meet with my friend he would. he knew it was important to me and because of the time my dad spent with him, my friend is a new person.

my dad is a "cool dad". people always tell me how funny he is, and its not strange to have one of my guy friends come up to me and say "hey, i just had lunch with your dad!". he loves my friends and loves getting to know them. thanks for being a college station dad to so many of my friends, pop.

my dad understand when value can be gained in an experience or situation. my parents went out on a big limb letting me come to new york, but they understood the experience far outweighs the cost and for that i am so thankful. it has put a little bug in my ear not to waste my time here sitting in bed all day or going out every night -- but to really experience the city.

thanks for the little tiny things: father/daughter chi-o bowling, taking lana and i to corner bar for our first beers, playing guitar, loving the west wing, playing horseshoes with me at the farm, yelling for me when i first broke a minute on my 100 freestyle, and asking me if i went to church.

i love you!

thanks for everything daddy. i miss you so much today, and wish i could be with everybody back home!

the anchor

last night my room mates + some of their friends from the university of delaware decided to go out to a bar called The Anchor. it was walking distance from our apartment which is always a plus.

and look! another Chi O! the first one ive met while being in new york!

the highline

after hearing the 5-star reviews from my parents and grandparents i decided to take a trip to the highline. tyler came along! the highline is an elevated/abandoned railroad that has been turned into a park. it stretches along the west side of manhattan in the meatpacking district!

since im only a few blocks from meatpacking we walked from my apartment. the northern end of the west village + meatpacking district are some of my favorite areas in the city.

the views from the highline were incredible. we were only about a block from the hudson river!

only one section is opened right now but in the next year or so it will stretch all the way up to the hell's kitchen. the landscape/architecture of the site is incredible.

after walking the highline we grabbed some ice cream at a gourmet ice cream truck and then walked throughout meatpacking. if you plan on coming to new york you must go to chelsea markets! its an old warehouse/industrial space that has been turned into retail space. the finish-out is incredibly rugged and raw with exposed pipes, old brick, and concrete floors.

we finished off the day at the standard grill. some of the best friend fries ever :)

way to go, lakers!

i wouldnt so much call myself a lakers fan, at all actually. but given that i have family in the LA area, that it was the finals, and that the majority of people in nyc were going for the celtics...my room mate marissa and i decided to play devils advocate and cheer on the purple and gold!

the room mates and i went to the perfect pint on the east side and watched the game with a big bowl of sweet potato fries.

poor kelley.

missin my girls

these first few weeks being in new york i spent my time settling in, seeing the sights, hanging out with my family and getting to know my new room mates.

now that im all settled into my eastern time zone routine, ive realized how much i miss my girl friends back in texas. im blessed beyond belief by the room mates i have here in new york, and its not even that i wish i was back in college station (well, sometimes). i just wish we were all together...somewhere!

yesterday i talked to eight of my close girls and man oh man did it make me miss that crazy bunch! some people think its impossible to have more than one best friends...i beg to differ.

i love you all and i cant wait for our reunion!

tory burch

whats the deal with this years' resort lines? theyre unbelievable.

*somebody from The Cut must have read my blog. check out the headline i read first thing this morning.

spotted: kelly cutrone

as i said before, bryant park is officially my favorite park in new york city. i love that its small, simple, quiet and includes something called the bryant park reading room. its not an actual room, but a small section of the park with shelves of books for people to browse through on their lunch break and the occasional Q&A with an author. i was privileged enough to enjoy the latter.

while shes more well-known for starting people's revolution -- a pr, branding and marketing firm -- kelly cutrone published a book titled 'if you have to cry go outside'. i havent read it yet but grabbed a copy of it at barnes and noble on my way home today. maybe ill start it on friday (day off!).

anyways. today i sat and listened with 150 other girls while she answered our questions, gave us industry advice and cracked a few jokes (one at stephanie pratt). while her character on Kell on Earth is pretty accurate, she does have a side that wants to help people get into the industry. just don't say "like", facebook message her about a job, or say that you have a "passion for fashion".

her advice was great, i even took some notes! but the celeb factor plus texting my sissy about it the whole time made it worth it :)