Chris' 30th Birthday!

There are a handful of birthdays that you look forward to, that you dread, and that you really need to celebrate.  A 30th birthday are all of those things. It's a milestone birthday.  The year you're supposed to leave behind your crazy 20's and look forward to a more mature lifestyle.  In our opinion, this meant there should be a variety of celebrations for this milestone in Chris' life.  

To celebrate leaving behind the crazy 20's, we invited friends to join us at Chris' favorite Irish pub on the Upper East Side: O'Flanagans.  He used to live across the street from this bar in his mid-20's, his first two years in NYC.  They have a band on the weekends and beer pong in the back room.  Perfect way to re-live the 20's. Looking at the pictures, we think our friends had a good time!  We'll only post a few so we don't embarrass anyone with drunk pics.

Chris & Kate taking a birthday shot

Tom, Brittany, Fred, Chris, Brandon, and Kate

Chris and Brandon playing beer pong

Brandon playing beer pong

Brandon, Chris, Kate, Liz, Anu, Bharani, Magoo, Fred, Allison

To celebrate entering the more mature years of Chris' life, we invited a smaller group of friends to one of the best restaurants in the tri-state area.  Blue Hill at Stone Barns is a high-end restaurant located on a farm in NY state, about a 40 minute drive from Manhattan. We had been here once before for dinner but this time we went for Sunday brunch and we took a tour of the farm. Blue Hill is different from other restaurants.  It's a farm-to-table restaurant where the ingredients grown / raised on the farm are the ingredients that make it into your meal.  In fact, the menu is only a list of ingredients.  The chef chooses what dishes to serve you based on what ingredients you dislike or are allergic to and based on how many courses you choose to have.  We're so glad this is the way the restaurant operates. We probably wouldn't think to order some of these courses and the food is beyond amazing.

Courtney, Cesar, Ana, Liz, Chris, Kate, Mikki

Kate loved the beet-infused vodka

The birthday boy and his birthday cake!

Ana, Mikki, Kate, Chris, Courtney, Liz, Cesar - having some wine at the start of our farm tour

The hen houses - for the hens that lay the eggs they use

The greenhouse

Interesting fact: the ewe are marked with colors after they have "been with" a ram.  This allows the farmers to know that everyone has been fertilized within the same time period so that all the lambs are born within the same time period.  

Of course they had pigs!

And hens!  Apparently there's a different breed of chicken for laying eggs, than for eating.

Geese!