New York City, November 12-17

Above: a beautiful Japanese maple at the botanical gardens.

We are behind on our posts, so this will be short. We tried to see everyone we know and love who lives in New York in 5 days. This resulted in eating out a lot, as well as a fair amount of wine-drinking.

Simona fell in love with the delicious happy hippie food at Caravan of Dreams. Try the tofu scramble and the fresh juices. Eli was appalled that he could only accompany his coffee with almond or soy milk. Although it is limited in its range, this vegan restaurant makes for a great pit stop after a yoga session with Patty at Shiva Shala, Simona's favorite place to practice (thanks Jessie!).

We took an excursion to the Bronx to visit the botanical gardens. We hadn't seen fall colors in ages, and the trees seemed wonderfully alive.

New York City Sept. 12-16

We heart NY. Despite Simona's years of defectation, it still is home. Eli is entrenched in the NYC honeymoon phase (having visited the place with a number of native New Yorkers as his guides, but never having lived here).

We've spent the days seeing as many friends as we can and spending time with Simona's mother Cinzia. We enjoyed a number of great meals - the delicious Mexican at Rosa Mexicana in midtown stands out (Eli is a sucker for bourgeois Mexican food). We also had the pleasure of hosting a co-ed baby shower for our friend Jessie, and of sinking our teeth into Cinzia's incredible eggplant parmigiana. And we got to visit the new bar Pacific Standard in Brooklyn, which Eli's college friends recently opened. Check it out.

Catherine's company, Flavorpill, hosted a DJ party in the planetarium at the Museum of Natural History. Judging from the overwhelming number of hipsters in attendance, we were entertained by some amazing semi-live electronica. The setting was pretty awesome. I would be a great place to throw a wedding.