I live in the Big Apple. Everything in the Big Apple is bigger. The buildings, the voices, the honking horns, the rent. . . New York does it big. It should come as no surprise then, that putting on Super Bowl XLVIII (48) was going to be big.

It started on Sunday, one week before the big game. Tents were being erected, sponsors began to pour in, streets began to close. From 34 St. Herald Square to 44 St just above Time Square there was walking room only – this was Super Bowl Boulevard. There was ESPN, CNN, Fox Sports and CBS Sports. There was GMC, XBox and Papa John’s. There were field goals to kick and toboggans to slide. It was quite the site to see! Macy’s has an entire floor dedicated to everything Super Bowl and NFL, with some crazy auction items to boot (did you know football players once-upon-a-time wore onesies!?).

Then I got to MetLife stadium. 

Security was intense (a little over-the-top), and the crowd was split down the middle in blue and green or blue and orange. Each seat had a ‘goodie-bag’ of sorts waiting for their occupants. A seat pad with a pouch attached that included gloves, a hat, hand warmers, a two-way radio, even the hand-warming pouch you see the quarterbacks wear! Everything was a big production (with the millions that go into it I guess it should be). And I’m fairly certain there were as many camera men there as there were players on the field!

The game got off to not the best start if you ask me (however my husband would say it was ‘amazing’), and it didn’t seem to get any better. But as the good sport that I am, I sucked it up for a couple minutes and even put on a Seahawks jersey (that’s what you get when you marry into a Washington family I guess).

The creation of the halftime show happened incredibly quickly. No sooner were the players off the field, there before us sat a stage. A beautiful children’s choir led way to a very impressive performance by Bruno Mars. The Red Hot Chili Peppers made a short appearance ( I remembered them being much better in times past), and a shout-out from our troops with Bruno Mars serenading us all with, ‘Just the Way You Are’ almost ended the half-hour performance perfectly. I say ‘almost’ only because there were the fireworks. Boy did they do well with the fireworks.

The second half held nothing exciting, just more beating. Three buckets of water doused Pete Caroll, the team rushed the field, and confetti blasted out, creating the perfect surface for confetti angels. We cheered and screamed for the champions of the USA in football as they were handed the Vince Lombardi trophy and, eventually, we made it home (let’s not go into details, that’s a whole blog in itself).

Our walk home revealed that New York had fully embraced the west coast winner. From every angle you could see a building with lights of blue and green shooting into the sky.

The Emerald City had come to New York, if only for the day. The memories made, however, will certainly last far, far longer.