My Aunt Laura, Uncle Pete and cousin Katie live in New Jersey about an hour outside of the city. We haven’t been up to visit them at their place in years, so instead of only talking about how we needed to make a trip happen…we actually made a trip happen! It was the first only siblings road trip and we had a blast just the three of us – its something we’ve decided we need to do more as the years go on. The three of us have always been close but life gets in the way and now that we don’t live together anymore, we just don’t get to connect like we should. So spending 4 uninterrupted hours alone in the car together was really great! We drove up on Jersey on a Friday afternoon, stopped for lunch and got to the house around 5pm.

We enjoyed a scrumptious dinner cooked by Aunt Laura and followed it up with some delicious dessert! If you haven’t heard of it, or are scared to try it, Delighted by Hummus, is nothing short of incredible!! Aunt Laura served the brownie batter hummus with strawberries and pretzels. I mean can you get any better than fresh strawberries dipped in chocolate – yes you can when the chocolate is healthy!!!

Saturday was a day for the city!! We headed to Grand Central Terminal first. While there I met up with a client of mine, who you’ll be seeing a lot of in a few weeks. I’m photographing their wedding in NYC at the end of the month. The three of us finally met in person and checked out the spots they would like to hit for their wedding day portraits.

I’ve never been to Grand Central Terminal but oh my gosh this place is gorgeous!!

Eataly. If you’re in the city – get there now. Fresh Italian bread, fresh mozzarella, tomato and basil for lunch. Yes yes yes. Follow that up with some chocolate gelato and this Italian loving girl was in heaven!

After lunch, it was day of exploration! Madison Square Park, The Oculus, World Trade Center. Good fun exploration and sightseeing.

We stopped to see the Charging Bull. It was raining and once we got the look we wanted, we then couldn’t decide where to go next. So we stood on a set of stairs underneath of an overhang. We glanced in through the windows on the door and saw this room. The doorman came over a few minutes later to unlock the doors and as he walked away, Kayleigh said outloud, “can we come in?” He stopped, turned around and said, “I’m sorry?”. Kay asked again and he so warmly said yes of course come see it.

There are no words for the vast exquisite beauty of this room! Just gorgeous. It’s the Cipriani and now I want to photograph a wedding here…so if anyone is interested! Let me know!! 😀

We headed for the State of Liberty. Not to go visit her but to see her from across the bay. It was raining at a decent rate by now and we walked by a gentleman selling ponchos. Of course he tried to sell them to us, Aunt Laura stopped and said, “I have 6 people and 6 bucks. Do we have a deal?”

There’s this cool new carousel in Battery Park, Seaglass. It was a good time 😀

We ended our evening with cocktails, steak dinner, Aunt Laura’s famous chocolate chip cookies and a game of Cards Against Humanity.

We headed home on Sunday after a great breakfast. It was a perfect weekend!! Can’t wait for the next one.