Friday Favorites

Happy Friday!

It's been a long week, good but long. 

I'll be traveling for work all next week so I've got a lot to get done this weekend!

I am LOVING these Carrie Bradshaw quotes!

Really enjoyed this article about the moral bucket list. Worth the full read!

"It occurred to me that there were two sets of virtues, the résumé virtues and the eulogy virtues. The résumé virtues are the skills you bring to the marketplace. The eulogy virtues are the ones that are talked about at your funeral — whether you were kind, brave, honest or faithful. Were you capable of deep love?

We all know that the eulogy virtues are more important than the résumé ones. But our culture and our educational systems spend more time teaching the skills and strategies you need for career success than the qualities you need to radiate that sort of inner light. Many of us are clearer on how to build an external career than on how to build inner character."

How tasty do these baked brie, pear & pecan bites look? #notgoodforbikiniseason

Feast - Short Animation by Omigu

The cutest animation ever!

One of my new favorite Zumba dances! Salute!

Isn't this garage apartment adorable? I love the surfboard racks!

Hope your weekend is amazing!

PS - Happy birthday to my dear friend, Jen! 

You are by far my favorite and it's beyond amazing that I get to have you as a friend.

♥

Happy Birthday Loretta!

 Today is Loretta Lynn's 83rd birthday! 

I'm a huge fan of Loretta's and even got to see her play about 1.5 years ago.

She's still so incredible - her voice and stage presence honestly made me tear up when I saw her.

The fact that she taught herself guitar (despite having kids and being poor) and then sang about important women's issues makes her such a remarkable woman.

If you haven't read (or watched) her life story in "Coal Miner's Daughter" you should go do it right now. Seriously, right now. 

Happy birthday Loretta!

♥

Weekend Recap

Hey hey! 

And we're back to another Monday!

This weekend was a good mixture of down time and then social commitments (which is always nice).

Friday night, we made this awesome potato, carrot, and leek soup from Blue Apron. My best friend Kelly sent me a free week's subscription for 3 meals. The big box arrived on Thursday with 3 set recipes and all of the necessary ingredients. I'll be honest, 2 of the 3 meals weren't my favorite, but it was nice to try new recipes and get out of my comfort zone. This soup with a french baguette was by far the fan favorite. If you're looking to try new recipes or cook in more, I'd definitely recommend Blue Apron. Ironically, Kelly also made this exact same Blue Apron meal on Friday night too (great minds)!

We ended the night watching the movie "Unbroken" about Louis Zamperini. I enjoyed it, but it's always so hard to watch war movies and see the ways people dehumanize others during wartime...anyways, that's for another post! :)

On Friday night, when I was leaving the gym, a HUGE storm ripped through Decatur (it even hailed!) and caused a lot of damage. Our yard was all messed up and a few trees fell in the neighborhood. One road was totally blocked off (as seen above) and one tree broke part of the wooden path trail in our neighborhood!

After a long walk, Townes was exhausted and decided that this pavement was the best spot to lay down on in the park. Silly pup.

The rest of Saturday was spent doing yard work (thumbs up for home-ownership) and cleaning up around the house and then on Saturday night, I went shopping with a friend and got a few things at H&M and Express. I hadn't been to a mall like that in years (which is probably a good thing) but it was fun. 

On Sunday, my best friend from high school, Melanie, and her boyfriend, Ryan, came into town from Oakland, CA. Our dear friends Jen and Daniel also came out to lunch. We all went to Krog Street Market to grab some lunch. I finally tried the falafel laffa wrap (say that 3x fast :D) at Yalla. It was super tasty, but huge! It's definitely enough for 2 people.

 YUM.

After lunch, we headed to Ladybird for some drinks alone the Beltline before heading home. It was so nice to hang out with great friends (old and new) and catch up! If only Melanie and Ryan lived closer *wink wink*!

I can never get enough of this lady! She's only 45 minutes away, but it's too far too...

The ladies ♥ My heart was so full!

On Sunday night, we celebrated my sweet niece, Brittany's, 21st birthday! Man, makes me feel old! We celebrated at the restaurant where she works, Eclipse di Luna. They had great tapas and had a whole side of the menu dedicated to vegetarian tapas so that was greatly appreciated! Hopefully she had a great birthday since she was surrounded by so much love. Her smile and energy is so contagious! I'm so lucky to be her aunt (and that she lives closer to me now)! Love you, Brit!

The whole gang (minus Jackie, who was missed greatly)!

 Another ladies shot :)

 The birthday girl and me! ♥

 

Thumbs up to a solid weekend! Now back to the grind with rain slated on the forecast all week...

How was your weekend?

♥

Friday Favorites

Happy happy weekend (well...almost)!
Dreamy. It may be due to my heritage but I love turquoise rings!

Need some immediate ways to feel happy? I enjoy all of these things (especially taking walks and catching up with loved ones)! 

A video from the duo at NPR's Invisibilia podcast (check out more on the podcast here) about the best way  to get around on 2 legs. Is it just me or do you want to bring skipping back now?

 I love seeing more articles with meatless recipes. I know being vegetarian isn't for everyone, but it's never bad to have some meatless meals...just sayin'!

A great reminder. No matter how you look, you take yourself with you.

 Experiences are better investments than material items (not that I needed proof):
“Our experiences are a bigger part of ourselves than our material goods. You can really like your material stuff. You can even think that part of your identity is connected to those things, but nonetheless they remain separate from you. In contrast, your experiences really are part of you. We are the sum total of our experiences.”

Hope you have an incredible weekend! 
I am hoping for sunshine and looking forward to catching up with old friends (my dear friend from high school will be in town!) and celebrating my niece's 21st birthday!
What's on your weekend agenda?
xo

Beach Babe Wishlist

Although the southeast is still making up it's mind about the weather (sunshine and rain vary daily) and we're in the midst of pollen season, I'm dreaming about the beach. We've got our annual work conference coming up and it's beachside in Boca, but there's never anytime for enjoying the locale since there are back-to-back meetings! Regardless, I've put together this beach wishlist!

The Hawaiian Tropic sunscreen is my favorite, because it smells like coconut and the beach. I also really would love to invest in a nice beach blanket that could also work for picnics! I love the "surf all day dance all night" message, but could possibly make my own shirt!

What's on your summer/ beach wishlist?
xo

Wise Words Wednesday: Amy Poehler

I finally finished the Amy Poehler book "Yes Please" a few weekends ago and I wanted to share some of my favorite quotes. It's such a great book filled with funny stories, emotional insights, and inspirational ideas.
Here are some of my favorite quotes:

“People are their most beautiful when they are laughing, crying, dancing, playing, telling the truth, and being chased in a fun way.” 

“I want to be around people that do things. I don’t want to be around people anymore that judge or talk about what people do. I want to be around people that dream and support and do things.” 

“Telling me to relax or smile when I’m angry is like bringing a birthday cake into an ape sanctuary. You’re just asking to get your nose and genitals bitten off.”

“I think we should stop asking people in their twenties what they “want to do” and start asking them what they don’t want to do.” 

“Hopefully as you get older, you start to learn how to live with your demon. It’s hard at first. Some people give their demon so much room that there is no space in their head or bed for love. They feed their demon and it gets really strong and then it makes them stay in abusive relationships or starve their beautiful bodies. But sometimes, you get a little older and get a little bored of the demon. Through good therapy and friends and self-love you can practice treating the demon like a hacky, annoying cousin. Maybe a day even comes when you are getting dressed for a fancy event and it whispers, “You aren’t pretty,” and you go, “I know, I know, now let me find my earrings.” Sometimes you say, “Demon, I promise you I will let you remind me of my ugliness, but right now I am having hot sex so I will check in later.” 

“Change is the only constant. Your ability to navigate and tolerate change and its painful uncomfortableness directly correlates to your happiness and general well-being. See what I just did there? I saved you thousands of dollars on self-help books. If you can surf your life rather than plant your feet, you will be happier. Maybe I should have called this book Surf Your Life. The cover could feature a picture of me on a giant wave wearing a wizard hat. I wonder if it’s too late. I’ll make a call.” 

“Treat your career like a bad boyfriend. Here's the thing. Your career won't take care of you. It won't call you back or introduce you to its parents.Your career will openly flirt with other people while you are around. It will forget you birthday and wreck your car. Your career will blow you off if you call it too much. It's never going to leave its wife.Your career is fucking other people and everyone knows but you. Your career will never marry you. (...) If your career is a bad boyfriend, it is healthy to remember you can always leave and go sleep with somebody else” 

Do yourself a favor and read this book NOW. You will enjoy every second of it, I promise! I'm sure you'll be like me and wish that Amy was your best friend after this and feel like she would agree if only you got to meet her...a girl can dream! ;)

xo

Weekly Tiny Home: Netherlands Cottage

How awesome would it be to live in this cottage? It’s a 581 sq. ft. vacation cottage in the Netherlands’ sand dunes. Yes, you read that right - it's in the sand dunes!

 I love how everything is totally open in the main living space and that the walls basically disappear to bring the outside in. So dreamy!

 I could die over the view of the dunes. However, hopefully it's not too windy there! :)

 As you can see from the layout below, there are 2 small bedrooms in the cottage. Most people only use the bedrooms to sleep anyways at the beach!

If you want to read more about this cottage, go here.

I know what I'll be dreaming about tonight...

♥

Weekend Recap: Easter Edition

 Hey y'all!

This past weekend was a whirlwind...although most weekends are these days!

On Friday, I had back-to-back calls for work and then went to Zumba to dance off some of the work week's stress. As soon as I got home, I hurried to get showered for dinner with our wonderful neighbors, Marge + Russ. Thankfully we just had to walk across the street to join them. 

We had the best time and they made a great veggie lasagna (with no noodles and lots of eggplant and swiss chard) with a nice salad. For dessert, we had panna cotta with homemade raspberry sauce. They sure know how to host! We ended up staying from 7 PM - 11:45 PM! Lots of cordials may have been involved. :) 

On Saturday morning, we did the standard neighborhood walk down to the old waterworks and enjoyed some of the new graffiti. I really enjoyed the sunshine, as always! Poor Townes had his teeth cleaned last week and they ended up having to pull 2 teeth due to an infection and they found a tumor on his leg and have sent the sample to UGA...hopefully it's benign! His mouth was so swollen.

 Afterwards, we headed to Tribble Mill Park to meet up with J's folks and sister (who is in town from Florida). We went on a nice hike around the park, but sadly had to keep Townes out of the water because of the stitches on his leg and we have to make sure it doesn't get infected. Poor guy!

 After the park, we headed to a local farm-to-table restaurant called Graft and had the best meal! 

They were super accommodating with allowing us to bring Townes and the food and service was top-notch. The restaurant is in an old house with a great patio and amazing interior. They even had corn-hole to play and a fire pit. 

We all shared this awesome cheese plate (it wouldn't be the south without pimento cheese, am I right?) and then I had a great veggie plate and J had a veggie pasta. They even do tours of the local Darby Farm where they get a lot of their produce and meats.

We all shared the dessert plate at the end. The chocolate bread pudding was incredible! Overall, it was a great meal and dining experience - I would totally go back!

On Easter Sunday, we headed to my cousin's house to see my mom's side of the family. As always, we didn't get enough time to see everyone since we had to hustle to J's family's Easter, but I am so thankful for the time we had. The sunshine, great family, good food, and setting was really nice.

I am so grateful for my mom and my sister. Aren't they the cutest?

We had a lot of fun exploring the property and old barn. Apparently there are ponds on the property, but we didn't go too far since we were on a limited time clock. 

 Then we headed back to Tribble Mill to the Oak Pavillion and got to spend time with the other side of the family. It's always so much driving on the holidays, but at least the weather cooperated!

 Then we headed back to Tribble Mill (yes...again) to the Oak Pavilion and got to spend time with the other side of the family. It's always so much driving on the holidays, but at least the weather cooperated! It was so nice being able to see everyone and catch up. Not a bad view from the pavilion, right?

We even got a group cousin shot at the park, but sadly we were missing a few! There's always next year.

Hope you all had a peaceful weekend and had lots of great food and egg hunts! :)

xo