As Promised…

I’m so sad this weekend is over!  I can’t begin to tell you how much fun the party was yesterday, and how lucky and loved I am by family and friends. 

Andrew and I with our good friends Billy and Laura.  We are the executive board members of The Wine & Couch Club.  That means we drink wine and sit on couches, and we also take weekend retreats (read: vacations) together every year.  Laura and Billy are getting married this coming March!  I asked Laura to be one of my bridesmaids yesterday, and I’m so happy she said yes!

I bought a million balloons in our colors for the wedding.  We’re doing mostly teal and white with little a few red accents.

This is Jessica and her boyfriend Rob.  I also asked Jessica to be one of my bridesmaid’s and she also said yes.  Jessica was the photographer for the day, thanks Jess!!  (You may remember them from the camping trip a few weeks ago!)

This isn’t the best picture, but my parents gave us champagne flutes to use for our toast on our wedding day.  They look exactly like the ones that they used, there’s a little dove at the stem.  I absolutely love them!!

We got so many great cards from everyone, clearly this is my “aw” face, I might have teared up a few times.

Our cake, I didn’t eat any (since I don’t like cake,) but I definitely took a few licks of the frosting.

 

 

We had a mini photo shoot in front of the cake, I felt like I was on a red carpet with all the cameras flashing.

 

Laura told us this is the pose you have to do in front of your engagement cake.  Not sure I believe her, but we did it.

Bailey has a new best friend!

Andrew ruins pictures.

I couldn’t have asked for a better day!  I can’t believe how fast it all went!    Well I’m off to bed, I’m exhausted from all the fun!  I’ll be back to regular food blogging tomorrow!

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Busy Busy!

I can’t believe I’ve neglected the blog for so long!   I haven’t had a day where after work I could just come home and relax in over 2 weeks.

I love the summertime and I’ve been making the most of it.  I went to see 2 movies (Bruno and Harry Potter) with friends. Andrew and I went to a Bridal show with my friend whose getting married in March.  We had some major shopping to do when my friend, that I’ve known since I was 2, had a baby boy!  Unfortunately she lives in Ohio, so I won’t be able to see her for a while, but I’ve stared at his picture for hours on end.

Doesn’t he look perfect? 

We also have our engagement party tomorrow night.  So we’ve had to do a lot of shopping, finding a caterer, and other miscellaneous tasks to get everything ready.  In fact I’m going to my mom’s house (where we’re having the party) to cook some things, and to help clean up.  We have family coming tonight, so I better get going but I just wanted to check in.  I’m not sure I’ll have time to post tomorrow, but I’ll definitely be posting tons of pictures from the party on Sunday!

I haven’t been commenting, but I’ve been reading! 

Keep your fingers crossed that tomorrow goes smoothly, and that everyone gets along!

A Rushed Post

Good Morning!  Sorry I didn’t post last night I had a terrible sinus head ache and went right to sleep as soon as I got home from work!  I have to run out so this post is going to be a quick one.

For breakfast yesterday I had another Peach Chobani but remembered some Kashi Island Vanilla cereal to mix in.

I love the vanilla cereal in the peach yogurt, so good!

Between breakfast and lunch I snacked on some Cherry Semolina Dr. Krackers.  10 of them to be exact.

Lunch was Harborside leftovers.

And I even snuck a roll out from the restaurant in my to go bag.

So like I said I came home yesterday with a horrible sinus headache, it’s been so long since I’ve had one it hit me out of nowhere!  I came home got right into bed, and slept until 8, when I woke up my headache was still there so I jumped in a hot shower hoping the steam would help.  No such luck.  Finally I took some nighttime cold and cough medicine and that knocked the headache out and I was finally feeling well enough to eat at around 10.  I just had a sandwich thin with pb.

Well I have to run now, I’ll be back tonight!

An Al Fresco Dinner

What a day!  I woke up thinking it was Thursday and thought that until I was on my way to work.  Since we don’t work Fridays anymore Thursday is our dress down day so I went to work wearing jeans and everything.  It was obvious to everyone at work I had mixed up what day I thought it was.  Ugh.  But oh well I was comfortable all day at least.

I started out the day with something I haven’t had in so long, unfortunately in my hurry this morning I forgot my camera but I do have some pretty bad blackberry photos to share.

Peach Chobani!  In addition to forgetting my camera I also forgot some cereal for mixing into the yogurt.  But it was still amazingly delicious, it’s been to long Peach Chobani!

Without the cereal though this didn’t do a great job of holding me over for lunch.  I wound up getting hungry around 10 and snacked on some Dr. Kracker’s Cherry Semolina crisps.  These are absolutely delicious!

The serving size is 8 but I probably had about 12, they are so delicious.

Lunch today was an old favorite, rice pilaf, green beans, and broccoli all mixed together.

What a horrible picture of one of my favorite flavor combos.  I can’t get enough of it I crave this at least once a week. 

After work Andrew and I decided to go out to eat.  It’s been a while since we went out just the 2 of us for dinner so we went to our favorite local restaurant, Harborside Bar and Grill.  It was a beautiful day so we got to enjoy being outside on the patio.  To start I had a house salad with balsamic dressing on the side.

I used about a 1/4 of the dressing with my fork dips before almost every bite.  It’s amazing but before I would have easily used 1/2 of it or more, dipping the fork in is just as flavorful and definitely a calorie saver.

Then our waitress brought out some fabulous rolls.  I of course had one.

Warm and doughy, it was perfect.

For dinner I had the Rigatoni Pomadora, a fresh tomato basil sauce, with rigatoni and fresh mozzarella balls throughout.

This sauce is the freshest tasting sauce ever, I don’t think I could make it even 1/2 as good as they do.  I would love to be able to buy a jar of this sauce.  I have about 1/2 of this left for tomorrows lunch.

After dinner we stopped by to visit my sister and parents since she’s been bugging me for the past 3 days to come over.  It was a nice night hanging out on their patio enjoying the weather.  After it rained for almost all of May and June, it’s definitely made me appreciate the past 2 weeks, we’ve had the most beautiful sunny, warm days lately, and I’m definitely grateful for them!

Life Got In The Way

 

I can’t believe I disappeared for so long.  Usually this is where I would apologize and give excuses as to why I wasn’t blogging.  But I have no excuse, Andrew and I both had last week off, and it’s the only time we’ll have extended time together for the rest of the summer, so we made the most of it.  This is a monster post!
We went camping, went to a graduation party, went to the beach, hung out with friends, watched the fireworks, ate burgers, went out for brunches, watched fireworks, shopped, booked a wedding venue and put a deposit down, sleeping late,  and spent lots of time with our families.  I wouldn’t change a thing about last week, (except of course make it longer).  I missed blogging though and I’m excited to get back to a normal schedule, but it was kind of liberating eating without taking pictures, at first it felt weird but by the end I enjoyed it, but I’ve seen so many creative things out there in blogland while catching up yesterday that I can’t wait to try.  (Hello Banana Soft Serve!)
Camping was so much fun!  I still can’t believe how much I loved it.  I knew with the people I would be with it was going to be a good time, the actual camping part worried me.  I’m kind of a girl who likes electricity, showering, and knowing what time it is.  By the middle of Saturday I was just enjoying the time and relaxing with my closest friends.  We went with 2 of my best friends Michelle, and Jessica.  I know I’m extremely lucky to have those girls in my life.  I’ve known Michelle since we were about 3 (although we didn’t become super close until Middle School).  And Jessica was always close with Michelle so she was always a friend, but it was only a couple years ago where we grew as close as we are now.  Their  boyfriends are both really great people as well, so we had a great group with the 6 of us.  There was lots of hanging out around the campfire talking, lots of walking down to the river, and perhaps the other 2 girls are more adventurous then I am and tried to float on inner tubes down the Delaware river.

I was so happy to be on our way!

Yayyy!

 

Michelle and I cooking up so camp food!

Andrew and Jessica’s boyfriend Rob and me being creepy in the background.

Since it was Andrew’s birthday I brought cupcakes, unfortunately they melted in the car on the way there.  They looked gross but no one complained about the taste, and I even ate a 1/4 of one.

Me and the Birthday Boy!

Me and the ladies standing by the fire.

And another one.

Here’s Michelle and Jessica getting ready to float down the Delaware.

Meanwhile I was fishing with some friends I made.  Or tried to make, they apparently didn’t like my idea of me taking pictures with their fish so I could pretend that I caught it.  It’s not like we know the same people, geez kids!

 

That blue tent on the right was where Andrew and I slept, the orange one is Michelle and her boyfriend Scout’s tent.

We’re planning on going camping again really soon so Andrew and I went out to buy our own tent, so we wouldn’t have to borrow one again.  After we bought it we set it up in my parents backyard just to see how big it was and make sure everything was right so we didn’t get out in the woods and realize we were missing an important pole or something.  I can’t wait to use this tent!

 

Hopefully sometime in August we’ll be back out in the woods somewhere.   If your someone who thinks they’d hate camping give it a try, I guarantee the time away from computers, cell phones,  and civilization in general will leave you feeling refreshed and ready for anything once you return.
I didn’t take any pictures of things I ate while camping, except one.

But that’s an obvious choice, right?

I somehow didn’t take any pictures while at the beach on Monday but we were there and it was an absolutely beautiful day.  Sun, sand, and the sounds of the ocean! Although the Jersey Shore doesn’t have the most beautiful beaches in the world, they are really nice, and after living within 10 minutes of the beach my entire life (and being able to see the bay from my apartment) it has spoiled me and whenever Andrew and I talk about moving out of NJ because it’s so outta control expensive, my only requirement is we have to move to a town on the coast, don’t care where, but it’s got to be within 20 minutes of a beach.   I did do a google image search for where we went though.

That’s where we parked.

And that’s pretty much exactly where we set up our towels and soaked up the sun.

And probably the most exciting thing that happened!  A few weeks ago we found a location for our wedding that we absolutely fell in love with, it’s not the beach wedding I always dreamed of (just more proof I’m obsessed with the beach!), the only places on the beach we saw were crazy expensive,  kind of run down, couldn’t hold the amount we needed, or wanted us to guarantee many more people then we were comfortable paying for.  The second I walked into this last place I fell in love, it’s a yacht club and right on the river, the views from the ballroom are beautiful, the centerpieces they would provide are perfect, and I just saw us having a fantastic time there.  So before we left 2 Friday’s ago for camping we took a trip down with both of our mom’s who also loved the location.  We put our date on hold, and then this past Friday we put our deposit down and signed the contract.  Now that it’s official, I’m happy to share some pictures of our location!

The gazebo and river.

The ballroom.

The patio for use during cocktail hour.

The center pieces we will most likely use.

A pretty cake, and another view of the river.
Our date is still over 2 years away but we wanted to lock in for the date we wanted, and also guarantee the low prices, since most places do go up each year.  We picked a date that apparently is going to be pretty popular.  We didn’t think it would be because it’s so far out, but apparently at least 2 other couples have the same idea as us because our venue is completely booked for the day now as well, all 3 time slots and ball rooms are taken.

We also picked a place for our ceremony.  About 10 miles from the venue there is an historic park with a chapel.  It’s a great place for pictures and the chapel is so charming.

Not the best pictures but I pulled them off the website.

So now I’m done with any and all planning for this year, I have my cousin’s wedding in September and my friend Laura’s in March so I’m going to focus on being great bridesmaids to both of them, plus I really do have plenty of time.  The date we picked is September 10, 2011.  Or 9-10-11 which is why it’s going to be popular.

 

If you stuck through to the end, thank you, this was a very long post and very picture heavy, I’ll be back to regular blogging tomorrow!  Enjoy the rest of your evening!  I’ll leave you with some more pictures of the fireworks we saw from our deck last Thursday.