Day two of teaching at Beads By Blanche and todays class is all about my Rivoli Roses.

Once again I enjoy seeing all the colour variations emerge with many people choosing to make this reversible piece with one side subtle and the other much more dramatic.

Over the course of the day I manage to fit in a bit of shopping... of course... and choose some crystals and other pieces that I know I can't get at home.

After class I'm sorry to leave, having waited a year to be back here the time has just flown. Blanche and Wendy are a joy and really make me feel at home. Added to that seeing lots of friendly faces for the 3rd year running and I just wish I lived a bit closer. But I head back to Manhattan knowing I'll be back again soon.

First stop in Manhattan is a book shop. I had tried to visit the largest I knew the first day we were here with plans for sitting for hours browsing, but of course it had shut down. So instead I had to bide my time until today and visit a smaller Barnes & Noble at Union Sq. After a bit of browsing and purchasing of a magazine designer for cheese makers (Culture Magazine) and another for food lovers (Lucky Peach) we head off for the few minutes walk to our dinner reservation: Rosa Mexicano.

The restaurant had been recommended to us and we'd been told to go for the guacamole and the pomegranate margaritas. Not ones to turn down a recommendation, we went for both and added plantains, beer cocktails, empanadas and much more. Although we were stuffed by the end we couldn't turn down the option of trying some unusual flavours of ice-cream: sweet potato and rum raisin, sea salt cajeta and prickly pear with blueberries.

After dinner the night was still young and we wanted to go for more drinks. Whilst I was away working my companions had visited The Empire Room, a bar at the Empire State Building. As I lay in bed trying to sleep on Saturday evening they were taunting me with texts about the varied cocktails they were tasting. I refused to be jealous. But when they described the decor and atmosphere as 'faded glory' I knew I had to go and check it out.

So we got into a cab and headed over. What do you know it was shut. This is becoming quite a theme of the trip. The sign said it was closed on Sundays so we laughed, decided to come back another night, and grabbed a cab to another bar I had read about, Amor Y Amargo (the name translates and love and bitters). Unfortunately the bar didn't quite match up to our expectations but whether that was due to the drinks recipes or the clearly very tipsy, and extremely lacksadaisical with the ingredients, bartender we'll never know. But after a couple of drinks here it was time for bed ready to welcome in the new week.