I'm going to New York!

This past Sunday my mom called me on the phone, (I live 2 hours away from all my family). She always calls me on Sunday but this time she sounded really weird. She called, I picked up and then she said, "let me call you back". I'm like, "um okay..." 10 minutes later she calls again, "hold on AnnMarie, let me put you on speaker phone". Now I'm really weird-ed out. I'm thinking in my head, "what is going on, is everything okay, did they win the lottery?" Then mom says, "okay everyone is here", I can hear my sister and my 2 sister in laws in the background. Mom announces to us, "I'm sending you girls to New York!" WHAT!!!!!!!!, OH MY GOODNESS!, ARE YOU SERIOUS?????  My husband is half listening to my reaction and he asks me, "what is going on?", I'm still in shock and I exclaim, "I'M GOING TO NEW YORK!" Whoot whoot!!!!!!

This is such an amazing thing my mom is doing for us! Those of you who know me, know that I have been dreaming of going to New York for years! In fact, my husband had a free trip planned for me on my 30th birthday this year (his work was sending him for a conference) but it got cancelled because of Hurricane Sandy. I was heartbroken, we don't have the extra funds right now to actually pay for a trip like that, so I had to put that dream on the back burner. So you can just imagine how excited I am that mom surprised us with this trip. My mom has been twice, but non of us girls have ever been. We are all very excited!

So now we are all scrambling, trying to pick a date to go (which is pretty difficult for 4 moms to do), figuring out what we should do when we get there and how we should get there as well. I'm so excited to start the planning process.
I know I want to do the central park bike tour, see the statue of liberty, check out Chelsea Market, hopefully see a broadway show, shop at Century 21 and find a Trader Joe's. I hear so much about that store, I need to find out what all the fuss is about.  Is there something else I'm missing?

Have any of you been, what was your favourite part about NYC?