(December, 2011)
No matter your religious affiliation, Christmas time in New York City is pretty spectacular. It’s one of my favorite times to be a resident of the Big Apple. It’s a time to celebrate your friends, your family, and the year you’ve shared together. It’s a time of hot cocoa and strings of bright, shining lights, of festive colors decorating every accessible pole, post, and window, of bundling up in hats and scarves and browsing the pop-up holiday markets, of cheerful and contagious carols being sung everywhere you turn, and of contemplative evenings with the ones you love.
Now, if you’re a Grinch or Ebenezer Scrooge type, this would sound absolutely appalling, but for me, it’s my favorite time of year, and the 1100 holiday songs on my iPod will prove it.
The holiday season has it’s official kick-off at the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade when Santa and Mrs. Claus pull in. At that point I feel it’s free reign to listen to the holiday music and put up the decorations.
I don’t get to travel home for the holidays very often these days, as it’s usually very expensive and I can’t get time off from work before December 24th, so I’ve started my own traditions. This year, Miriam’s parents came in for the holiday, so I got to share my traditions with them.
Tradition #1: Sending out our annual holiday letter (or novella...as I always find a LOT to write about) and picture montage. With so many friends and family members far away, it’s always nice to reach out and share our year with them all.
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| "And I know all I need along is a path and a pal and a song, so I'm singing and I'm palling with you." - Shrek, the Musical |
Tradition #2: Baking lots and lots of holiday goodness. I love to bake, and I love to share it with people who appreciate it. I’ve found plenty of people near and far who definitely appreciate it!
Tradition #3: Visiting the outdoor ice skating rinks, and, if I’m brave, actually going for a skate. In Manhattan, there are three very popular skating rinks: Rockefeller Center, Wollman Rink in Central Park, and Bryant Park. Of the three, Bryant Park is my favorite. Rockefeller Center is pretty expensive and very popular, so you are restricted on how long you can skate, while the entire tourist population of New York City stands above you and watches as you fall on your butt. Wollman Rink is a beautiful location, but there is a cost to skate there, as well, and the two separate times I attempted to go skating there, it was closed for a private event.
The reason I like Bryant Park so much is because it’s a central location (a couple blocks east of Times Square), it’s free to skate, and you can skate for as long as you want, although they do have periodic ice cleanings where everyone vacates the ice so the zamboni machine can come in, but you can simply wait off to the side. If you have your own skates, awesome. If you don’t, you can rent them.
Last year, I was on skates for the first time since childhood. It was an interesting and slightly frightening experience, but I survived! All I could think about was falling tragically and breaking something, so I probably didn’t look very graceful, but I had fun, nonetheless. Technically, you can’t have a camera on the ice, but we were able to sneak in a couple pictures.
This year, with Miriam’s parents, we stopped by the rink and pretended to skate on Christmas Eve. It was a pretty happening spot to be!
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| Ice skating last year |
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| Miriam and her mom pretending to skate |
Tradition #4: Visiting the holiday pop-up markets. There are various holiday markets throughout the city but my favorites are at Union Square and Bryant Park (but if you want to stay warm, head to the Grand Central holiday market, as those lucky vendors get to set up indoors). Vendors from all over come in for the month of December, selling almost anything you can think of out of their stalls, from spices to handmade jewelry, from toasty warm food items to toasty, fun winter hats, from hand-carved woodwork to souvenirs from Asia, Africa, and Europe. The markets are fascinating and fun places to visit. In the past I’ve purchased and/or received as gifts handmade scarves and hats, necklaces of real leaves dipped in gold, silver, or copper, a meditation ring containing elephants on parade, handcrafted items from Africa, lovely bath salt scrubs, ornaments, and plenty of food consumed as I browsed.
I heard someone in passing saying that the market in Union Square feels very similar to the markets in Germany. I can’t wait to compare that myself some day!
Tradition #5: Seeing all the decorated store windows. All the big department stores try to outdo each other during the holidays on getting the most creative and eye-popping store windows. You’ve got Bloomingdales, Bergdorff Goodman, Saks Fifth Avenue, Lord & Taylor, and the quintessential windows: Macy’s. I’m sure there are many more, but those are the ones I always try to see.
A little tip we figured out this year: If you want to see the windows with as few people as possible, try to go in the morning, specifically Christmas Eve morning. We ventured out to do last minute sight-seeing and shopping on Christmas Eve, and there was nary a soul out and about. Even the inside of Macy’s was calm!
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| Miriam's mom, Doris, at the Lord & Taylor windows |
This year, we managed to see the windows of Saks, Lord & Taylor, and Macy’s. The Saks Fifth Avenue windows looked really cool from across the street, but up close, they left much to be desired. But Lord & Taylor’s and Macy’s windows were really fun. I must admit, though, that I was a little surprised at the windows on Macy’s 34th Street side. Their main windows are along 7th Avenue and change every year. The 34th Street side has always seemed to be images of A Miracle on 34th Street, but this year they decided to change it to Yes, Virginia, using a lot of the stuff from last year’s main windows.
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| The beautiful puppets in Macy's windows |
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| The interactive portion of the window display-- make your own digital ornament |
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| Avenue of the Americas decorations |
Tradition #6: Visiting Rockefeller Center. Now, when I say Rockefeller Center, I’m including Radio City Music Hall. I usually start at Radio City Music Hall and take in all the fun decorations along Avenue of the Americas before culminating at the Rock Center Christmas tree. For me, I NEED to visit the tree by Christmas Eve. Earlier in December I was able to stop by there during the day, but, seriously, there is nothing like seeing the tree at night all lit up. I like to start out where the Today Show films, off to the side of the tree, and then I work my way over to 5th Avenue so I can see the tree with all the beautiful angels leading up to it (Saks Fifth Avenue is directly across the street). After I’ve taken a few pictures at the very beginning of the angels, I walk down a ways were there’s a great open spot amidst the angels where you can get a closer shot of the tree. Then it’s a must to head all the way down, to see the statue of the Titan Prometheus under the tree and overlooking the skating rink.
It really is a beautiful sight to behold, but be warned, it does get very crowded unless you go very late at night. And, if you’re standing at the 5th Avenue spot by the angels you may just catch the sound and light show that happens along the Saks building.
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| The tree from the side view |
This year, we had one of the warmest Decembers in history, so we had a good time going out and doing all the sight-seeing. It was nice to have my extended family in town (Miriam’s folks) to celebrate with us.
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| Miriam and her parents in Times Square |
As I prepare to shut off the Christmas lights for the season and pack everything up again until next year, I’m thankful for all the friends and family who brought the holiday season to life for me.
Here’s hoping you and yours had a magical holiday season!
Merry Christmahanukwanzikah!
