If you aren't an OOFer, you're probably wondering what "OOF" means. :) When I was pregnant with William (4 years ago) I joined an online message board. The moms on this board were all due to have their babies within months of William's birth. After our babies were born, we all joined a message board for moms of babies who were about 0-6 months old. After awhile we decided to start our own private message board. This is when OOF was born! We've all been chatting and friends on OOF since September 2007! Some have gone, new members have joined, but overall it's been the same group for almost 4 years!
Two years ago I met one of the moms (Beth) in England as we were over there for Christmas at the same time. Beth's husband is also English. This past summer I met another mom, Linda, while she was visiting Minnesota for her cousin's wedding. It was neat to see Linda and Beth in NYC again last month.
Last month 35 of us met in NYC for a weekend. It was awesome to meet all of these lovely ladies that I've "known" for 3-4 years! It was really surreal to walk into a room of women having met only TWO of them, and know who they were (from pictures). Not only that, but I could name most of their children and tell you at least one thing about each of them. Did I mention there are over 100 of us on OOF?
I'm hoping that someday in the future (hoefully sooner rather than later) we will have another get together and see each other again. I think our NYC trip planted the seed...
Some highlights from the weekend:
1. Flying on an airplane by myself and reading my book with no interruptions.
2. Meeting the first OOFer, Mara, at the airport. It was straight out of the first episode of the Real World. You know...they meet at the airport for the first time.
3. Staying at a hotel right in Times Square.
4. Times Square-you have to see it to believe it.
5. Sex and the City tour-really neat to go around and see NYC.
6. Friday night-this was the first time we were all together in the same room. It was really neat to hang out and talk to everyone.
7. ROCK OF AGES! Oh my gosh, if you ever go to NYC, you have to see a Broadway show. It is so worth the money, and Rock of Ages was awesome! I'm still singing songs from the show. "Here I go again on my own...goin' down the only road I've ever known...like a drifter I was born to alone..." DO you know who sings this song? WHITESNAKE!
8. Seeing the Statue of Liberty. Unfortunately there wasn't enough time to take the ferry to the Statue and out to Ellis Island, but it was still really neat to see it.
9. Visiting Ground Zero. It was very surreal to think about what happened there just over 9 years ago.
10. Coming home to my family!
Kate, Mara, and me in Battery Park.
This is a memorial at the FDNY across the street from Ground Zero. This particular department lost many/most of their firefighters that day.
Looking over Ground Zero where the World Trade Centers once stood.
This is one of the new buildings on the site of the World Trade Centers. It's amazing to think about how long ago 9/11 happened (9 years ago) and how little progress they've made (although I'm sure it's actually a lot of progress compared to what it was like that day).
Times Square-Amazing
All of us OOF girls together
The last two pictures are of Saint Paul's Cathedral right across the street from what was once the WTC. The first pictures shows what it looked like following 9/11. Several feet of debris and papers. The second pictures is what it looked like just recently when I was in NYC.
