No, I'm not referring to the baby, who still has a good 11 weeks before making his or her appearance. I'm referring to the fact that Scott and I escaped to NYC this weekend for our first overnight trip without children since Gabe was a year old. Gabe is now almost 6. That's a looooooong time without a child-free trip!
We aren't going to start making a habit of it, but I think from here on in, we are going to try to make it happen a bit more frequently than once every 5 and a half years, because it was pretty awesome. It's going to get trickier, of course, now that we're going to have yet another child to be babysat, but we'll figure something out so that we can have another escape in the not-so-distant future.
This time we were getting away to celebrate our 10-year anniversary, which was last month, so we went all out and spent the night in NYC. We didn't stay in a fancy expensive hotel, because we prefer to spend our money on fine food. The hotel we stayed in was fine, though - small room, but perfectly nice, and - these are the key words - quiet and peaceful.
The dinner, though, was out of this world. We ate here, and it was every bit as good as we expected it to be. The food was phenomenal - handmade spinach tortellini that I could eat every night; little morsels for tasting in between courses; venison and winter vegetables with a scrumptious sauce; and an incredible chocolate caramel dessert, followed by a basket of fresh-from-the-oven, still warm madelines and a tray of mini petit-fours.
Just as good as the food was the service. We used to go into the city once (and sometimes even twice) a year for a few years before we had kids, and our trips always included a fancy dinner, and we've eaten at some of the greatest restaurants in the city, and this place is absolutely included in that category. It's so incredible to receive the level of service these places offer - you feel so ridiculously pampered - a new set of silverware for every course; a sommelier who stopped at the table after every course; several different waitstaff attending to our every need. They even had a tiny little footstool next to the table for me to rest my purse on, so I didn't have to hang it on the chair or put it on the floor!
Of course, you pay for all that pampering, and boy, did we pay! It was by far the most expensive dinner we have ever eaten in our lives, but neither of us regret it. It was more than a meal - it was an experience. And when you're celebrating your 10th anniversary, you deserve to really live it up - which can sometimes mean ordering a $23 glass of wine (yes, $23 a GLASS!).
A dinner we won't soon forget, that's for sure. And one of the best parts was that we got there at 6:15, and didn't leave until 8:45. The whole meal was so relaxed, and we never felt like we were waiting too long for anything, but never felt rushed, either. It was wonderful to sit and relax and savor everything.
Aside from that, our time in the city was pretty uneventful. We spent much of our time lounging around the hotel room, enjoying the fact that we had absolutely nothing we had to do, and nobody we had to take care of. It was quite a treat. The worst thing, though, was that even though we could have slept in as late as we wanted on Sunday morning, we were both awake at 6am. But we didn't have to actually get up for any reason, so it was better than being woken up at 6am and having to go make someone breakfast!
The boys, meanwhile, had a pretty fabulous time themselves at their first-ever sleepover. And in their minds, they probably had just as great a gastronomic experience as we did, seeing as how they got lots of special Grammy and Grampy treats, like Fluffernutters, Mac and Cheese, M&Ms, and Munchkins.
They were so distracted and so busy playing when we were leaving to catch the train Saturday, they weren't the least bit upset, and according to the reports we got, they didn't seem terribly concerned with us not being there. So all went well, and they slept ok, too.
Gabe had such a great time that he told us on the way home that he wants to live at Grammy and Grampy's. I asked him wouldn't he be sad not to see Mommy and Daddy every day, and he said that Grammy and Grampy could be his Mommy and Daddy. So, clearly, everyone had a great weekend.
A busy weekend, though, seeing as how we stayed for dinner with everyone last night and then didn't get home until almost 9:30. The boys slept most of the ride home, though, and slept in until after 7am this morning, so we're all rested up now, and have a relatively quiet week ahead, which is good, because the Halloween festivities commence on Friday night, so we're in for another busy weekend!
Happy anniversary you guys! That's the way to celebrate in style. I think for my 15th, I had a 3 lb lobster :-)
Posted by: Wes | October 27, 2009 at 10:17 AM