My birthday and 1st Anniversary happened last weekend and Jon and I celebrated by hiking. Our honeymoon we were planning on a lot of hikes, but it rained so much we really didn’t get a chance. It made sense to walk up a mountain a year later to make up for it. Sadly there aren’t too many mountains in South Jersey. We had to drive up two hours to climb Mount Minsi in Pennsylvania.
I first heard of the trail from a list of best hikes in New Jersey. Although the mountain in Pennsylvania, it is only a 3-5 minute drive to trail once you cross the border. When you reach the top you get a beautiful view of New Jersey. Yeah that lump in the photo on top- it’s New Jersey.
This is my first wedding anniversary. I am pretty excited,, and I am celebrating with the hubby with lots of hiking (which will be posted later this week). I had worked 12 days in a row right up until this anniversary and felt pretty burned out. It is quite surreal to think that it has already been an entire year. And looking back, I have so many fond memories. I know my wedding was featured on A Practical Wedding, but I figured I should share more details and photos for my readers.
Giving you guys a heads up- this will be pretty image heavy….
Shirt: Esley | Skirt: My Story via Modcloth | Shoes: Chelsea Crew via Zulily | Hairbow: Flair | Necklace: KidViskous (closed?)
I am so excited about today. It is the last day of work before my mini four day weekend. This Saturday it is my birthday, and Sunday is my first wedding anniversary. I will hopefully put together a small post about my wedding, because well, I LOVE sharing the photos from it. Yup. I’m bragging about it. I am also hoping to post something about our hiking day trips, with a packing guide.
And just as I get all excited about that, I realize that my CSA will be giving out their first share in two or three more weeks. I am hoping that it will give me a huge push for this site. I’ve been in a semi-culinary-rut. All the same food that has been sitting on a shelf. Now I will have a ticking time bomb of produce that I need to eat before it gets bad. I will be quite busy on this blog!
But back to my outfit. I am a little disappointed by how little is available for my outfit! The style of shoe by Chelsea Crew seems to still be available in different colors. The skirt was being sold through Modcloth for a long time, but now I can’t find it. And the business that made my necklace seems to close down. Ugg! Super bummer!
First off – yes, I definitely missed last week’s Tea Time Tuesday!! Shame on me! Moving on though, this week’s review is about one of the new teas that Rook Coffee Roasters has to offer, just in time for summer!
I just want to start off by talking about Rook as a company. They are based in Monmouth County, NJ with shops set up in Oakhurst, Long Branch and Little Silver. The company was started by two childhood friends (Holly Migliaccio and Shawn Kingsley) who have a passion for specialty coffee. The brews that they make in shop range from fair trade, organic and water processed (a chemical-free way of decaffeinating their coffee).
I usually frequent the one in the Little Silver Train Station as it is on the way to dropping Mr. Ian off at work. The location for it is great, and the staff are really wonderful people! They always make you feel welcome when you walk in the door, and if you are not used to their different roasts they will happily explain them to you.
I decided to try the Berry Tea this week, I have had the Black Tea that they offer and it wasn’t really what I expected. It was just more of a regular “Iced Tea” than an “English Breakfast” blend.
The Berry tea was extremely refreshing! It wasn’t too sweet, and not very bitter. Just perfectly tart after you finish taking a sip. The flavor tastes like there are a few different berries in the blend – raspberry being the most notable (to me anyway…I can’t say for sure what’s in it). I would definitely recommend it on a hot day if you are not feeling like grabbing coffee, but need a little pick-me-up.
Dress: Freeway via Modcloth | Cardigan: Target | Tights: Target | Shoes: Breakelle’s via Modcloth
Ugg what a crazy week. I have to work 12 days in a row, some days can be 10 hours of work! Eek! But I am halfway done and by Friday I get a 4 day weekend celebrating my birthday and my first wedding anniversary. But now that the weather is warming up it is forcing me out of my comfort zone. Time to bid leggings goodbye and hello to skirts and short.
This dress was one of Modcloth’s Stylish Surprises. It isn’t a dress I would normally get on my own, as I have bad luck with jersey knit dresses. As Alexa mentioned before, they always pill. This one has held up, except one spot on the bottom. No seriously, it is like one butt cheek pilled, the rest is fine. I’ve actually worn this dress before, but I just put a warm fuzzy sweater over it.
I just wish it wasn’t so rainy out, the picture quality is pretty terrible. But I gotta work with what I get. There’s lots of fun new posts coming up, even though I am completely swamped. So keep coming back!
Mr. Ian was being very clever by taking this photo at an angle! (“Off-centered ales”)
Dress: via Modcloth | Cardigan: Old Navy | Shoes: Rampage | Headband: Flair
This post is coming out a tad bit late – but better late than never…eh?
On the weekend of April 25th a bunch of my friends and I took a weekend-long trip down to Rehoboth, Delaware to visit the Dogfish Head Brewery! Dogfish Head is actually in Milton, Delaware…but the house we rented was in Rehoboth. It was a weekend-long birthday celebration for my friend Keith (seen below), he’s an old man now.
It was a great time!
My birthday is coming around the corner and I have been thinking about what I want. I know it seems weird (or maybe not?) thinking long and hard about what you want and what to tell people to get for you. Maybe it is because I try to ask for things I NEED. Seems simple enough, but considering I don’t go shopping often, I forget about what I need. Then I go to use it, realize I need it, then forget again. So anytime my birthday or christmas comes along I try REALLY hard to remember what I need.
So I put together a semi-lame birthday wishlist. I mean I can easily say that I want cute jewelry and lots of dresses because I always want that stuff. But this my list that is half “in my dreams” and half “so lame no one would get it for me.” See, I’m not getting ANY of this stuff for my birthday.
1 lip balm + lip stick
I’ve been reading a bunch smarty pants online memes about how people should get an award for using a whole tube of lipbalm. I do. In fact I am the last little bits of balm in 3 different tubes. Yikes! I have only one tube left. I also want to dabble in more lipsticks. I’ve heard great things about Lime Crime, vegan and quality wise. It is a little pricey, but I can always hope right?
2 tiny socks + small socks + tights
I think socks and tights are always on my wishlist- every year. I don’t know why everyone ignores it. I always get holes and runs in my stockings or I just simply loose half of the sock pair. Come on guise! Help me out! I even buy socks every time I buy a pair of shoes from DSW. I mean I haven’t been in over a year, which might be why I am extra desperate.
3 cardigans + sweaters
I’ve been complaining a lot on this blog about how cold I am at work. Or maybe I don’t and just delete that paragraph before publishing articles. But my bosses have been keeping the workspace fairly cool. I’ve been wearing the same three sweaters over and over again, and I need more. I also feel my cardigans getting a little ratty.
4 cookbooks isa does it + vegan eats world + rawsome vegan baking
I ALWAYS want more cookbooks. At this moment I would like these. I’ve been reading This Rawsome Vegan Life pretty often. Her writing style is great and her recipes look yummy. So I think Rawsome Vegan Baking would be a great dessert book to add. I also would love the most recent Isa Chandra Moskowitz and Terry Hope Romero. They never seem to fail me.
5 canon rebel t5i digital slr camera
Being a little too hopeful huh? Yup, I want a really nice SLR camera. I always wanted one and was thinking about getting an analog one in college. It never fleshed out since I know film itself is pricey. But this camera is for big plans for this site. Videos and super sexy food. My current camera is SOO old, that iphones usually take better photos. Yikes. I’ve been saving all my tip money in hopes of buying the camera, but I am still pretty far behind. I am inching towards $300 saved up.
I was so excited about this new recipes I posted it RIGHT AWAY. Yup no tweaking, nothing. I had to post it as soon as I could. I pretty much only eat raw foods for breakfast. I don’t like heavy foods in the morning, especially since I don’t have much time to digest before exercising. I’ve been getting bored of smoothies and chia pudding, so I wanted to go back to classic cereal.
I’ve seen a few raw recipes for buckwheat cereal, so I figured I would give it a try. But as most people know, raw foods can be expensive. I always hate tossing the almond pulp from making almond milk. So I figured I would try and make it a binding agent for the cereal. It worked really well.
Dress: Sunny Girl | Cardigan: H&M | Tights: Hand Me Down | Shoes: H&M
Dress: Sunny Girl | Cardigan: Timing via SIX on east | Clutch: Vintage via Unbred Vintage | Shoes: Pink Studio
My jobs seem to be less and less fashion friendly lately. I’ve been very busy over at my restaurant job, which entails wearing grease stained clothing. My framing job has been FREEZING! I am constantly just wearing pants and a cuddly sweater. Add on top of that my work has been keeping me really busy.
But I wanted to share two recent outfits with one of my favorite dresses. I got it from Modcloth about a year and half ago and it is very versatile. I usually wear it to work at the frame shop since it works so well with a cardigan and tights. But I recently found out that you can dress it up. I got this sequined jacket for a wedding, but the skirt I was going to pair it with did not fully mix. But it worked perfectly this dress. I was going to take a photo of the outfit at the wedding, but the lighting was very weird, and afterwards I had too much to drink to care.
Can I also point out how big my calves are? Holy crap right? I guess they are the results from running with five finger shoes. I love my body but it makes me a little sad about if I will be ever able to wear my skinny jeans again. They are so hard to squeeze over my calves, and if I size up it will be too big for the waist. Oh well.
It’s Tuesday! Do you know what that means? … no? Well hold onto your butts boys and girls, because I am here to kick off a new segment that I would like to call Tea Time Tuesdays. It’s quite exciting!
I would consider myself relatively new to the “tea scene”, I still only have a few types that I stick to for the most part. Luckily for me (and for all of you lovely readers out there) the world is filled with different types of tea. Or even just different ways to drink each type of tea. That is what I am going to look into in each of these blog posts. Each entry could range from a different type of tea each week, exploring different tea flavors within the same brand, or different ways to prepare and enjoy certain types of tea.
Without further ado, let me introduce –
– the Green Tea Frappuccino from Starbucks!
