Happy Birthday, Sue!

Mom's Weekend Is Upon Us

Okay Moms, the big kickoff is almost here. We're going with the oldest first, so please report to The Bridge Cafe at 8pm on Thursday with your child in tow. Bridge Cafe is the oldest restaurant in New York City, as you may recall, and hopefully our old friend Adam will be there tending bar and telling stories.

See you there!

Bridge Cafe
279 Water Street
Near the Brooklyn Bridge

So you wanna dress like a New Yorker...

Ok, ladies - it's time to get serious about a very important issue: what to wear in New York. One of the greatest things about the city is its diversity, which translates into a huge variety of eclectic attire, from chic to shabby to shabby-chic and everything in-between. I think the best dressed New Yorkers are the ones who invoke their own personal style and look comfortable in what they're wearing. So perhaps that's a good starting point for packing for the weekend: Don't forget to dress like YOU!

A few more precise pointers:

• There will be some walking to be done during the day, so be sure to throw in a comfortable pair of shoes to trek around the city.
• Our evenings will be spent dining/drinking/partying at hip-yet-informal spots (so you can leave the evening gowns at home and will fit in perfectly in skirts or jeans and heels). When in doubt, I like to err on the dressier side - if for no other reason than because it's fun!
• It might be nice to wear something extra special for the first night, as a great way of kicking off the weekend and announcing your arrival.
• There will be time to change between daytime and evening activities, which means you can save your spiffier, less comfortable footwear for stepping out at night (when we will be doing considerably less walking) - but make sure they're dance-friendly!
• The skate circle is a fashion free-for-all, where personal flair and individuality reign supreme.

If you have any specific questions, feel free to contact Anna or Sarah directly. Afterall, is it really possible to ever tire of discussing what to wear??

Happy packing!

Pamper, Refresh, and Renew: A holistic facial

As if you moms are not already beautiful enough, you will receive a spa treatment to refresh yourself during your time in NYC. A few years ago, I had the great fortune of stumbling upon Adeline, a certified practitioner of Burnham Systems Facial Rejuvenation and a licensed massage therapist/foot reflexologist - and I've never wanted to stray back to a traditional spa again. Fed up with the clinical approach and impersonal atmosphere of most spas, Adeline started her own practice out of her very cool east village apartment (she's been living there since the 80's, and she and her husband have worked over the space in a most innovative way).

The hour-long holistic facial is a truly divine experience. Adeline creates a calming atmosphere with mesmerizing background music, candles, and essential oils. The facial involves a hot towel scrub, facial massage, organic products, and even foot reflexology while your mask is on. (Jean can attest to its euphoria-enducing capabilities, as she received one of Adeline's facials during her visit last May.) Your face will glow, and your insides will feel equally effervescent when she's finished with you!

Check out her website for more info on the treatment and to see what other clients have said about her magic touch.

Anna

Meet the Moms---Sara Levy!

Sara Levy was born in Atlanta Georgia at a hospital with the very Southern name of Crawford Long. She grew up in a small brick house on a small hill in the now fashionable, then unfashionable, neighborhood of Morningside, where she knew all of her neighbors. In fact, in true 1950s fashion, the neighborhood kids separated into gangs, The Medallions and The Blue Devils and had rumbles where they threw sticks and rocks at each other.

Sara’s father owned a woman’s apparel manufacturing company and spent a lot of time working (though he did play baseball with the kids every night when he got home); her mother was, as custom at the time demanded, often getting her hair done. This meant that Sara, her 2 sisters and one brother (who spent most of his childhood waiting to use the bathroom) were raised by a nanny named Minnie who was only a teenager herself.

(While this may sound very Gone With The Wind, it was still the way things worked in Jim Crow Georgia. It has since changed and as the Jerry Springer show so helpfully attests, most Southern children are no longer raised by anyone at all.)

Sara spent her high school years hanging out with football players, going to rock-n-roll clubs and switching clothes with her identical twin sister in order to confuse teachers and boyfriends.

After high school, she became a surgical technician at an Atlanta hospital, which always amazes Darren and his sister since their Mother is averse to blood.

Darren isn’t quite sure how his mother and father met, but he knows that they were married early in 1970. Darren’s father and uncle owned a successful clothing manufacturer, which claims to have been the very first company to use scrubbed denim and the first to make bell bottom blue jeans.

Sara's description of herself during this period is as follows: “In my early years with your father I traveled extensively in the US and Europe and lived the life of a rich, Studio 54 going, jet-setting, spoiled, child-bride ( Probably not for print).”

[Luckily for our readers, the internet is not print.]

In 1970, Darren was born and within a few weeks had started annoying his family with extensive questions about Watergate. In exasperation, his parents, in 1972, gave him a sister, Kailey, to annoy instead.

Late in the 1970s, maybe while listening to the Bee Gees, Sara discovered that she had an incurable muscle disease called Myasthenia Gravis. She was told that it would be dehibilitating and that she would have to start taking it easy and get used to a limited schedule.

Sara promptly started jogging, ran numerous 10K road races and, in 1980, won the silver medal in the Atlanta Masters Race. (So much for the expertise of doctors.) She also started the Atlanta Chapter of the Myasthenia Gravis foundation, which is still going.

Sara and her first husband divorced in 1979. She met her 2nd husband, Pierre, at a Halloween party that same year. He was wearing a Jimmy Carter mask. It’s a good story and one of the 5+ people reading this should ask her to tell it.
Since I should speed this up...in the 80’s she went into the antique business, the hair roller business and made various forays into the food world.

Once her two kids had both gone to college, she and Pierre moved to England where they lived in Surrey and Gloustershire. Though she liked living there, she also missed her family and she and Pierre moved back after a few years.
Back in Georgia, she started working as the kitchen director for Nathalie Dupree and doing freelance food styling jobs, eventually becoming a full-time food stylist. She’s also a food writer doing articles for numerous Atlanta-based Southern regional magazines. She recently had a feature in Flavor’s Magazine about South African cuisine that she also took all the photos for.

She lives in an extensively redone Federal style house built in the early 1900s in Norcross Georgia with X number of dogs (Darren can't quite keep up with how many), her husband Pierre and a room and a half of cookbooks.

Happy Birthday, Sarah!

Nothing better than wine and cupcakes...

Milk & Honey House Rules

House Rules at Milk & Honey (posted within the bar and strictly enforced), where you will soon sip the best cocktails known to man:

1. No name-dropping, no star fucking.

2. No hooting, hollering, shouting or other loud behaviour.

3. No fighting, play fighting, no talking about fighting.

4. Gentlemen will remove their hats. Hooks are provided.

5. Gentlemen will not introduce themselves to ladies. Ladies, feel free to start a conversation or ask the bartender to introduce you. If a man you don't know speaks to you, please lift your chin slightly and ignore him.

6. Do not linger outside the front door.

7. Do not bring anyone unless you would leave that person alone in your home. You are responsible for the behaviour of your guests.

8. Exit the bar briskly and silently. People are trying to sleep across the street. Please make all your travel plans and say all farewells before leaving the bar.