Category Archives: Life

The Top 13 Things I Ate in 2020

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2020 kicked off as an amazing food year. From oysters in the Outer Banks to tasty specials in the Big Apple, I was all set to have many new and exciting food experiences. 2020 had other ideas. Enter: pandemic, rolling shut downs, and border closures. Despite these insane challenges, I still managed to find delicious new bites as well as concoct creative dishes at home. Now in its FOURTH year, I present to you the 2020 version of the top things I ate this year (and here are 2017, 2018, and 2019). Continue reading →

My Birthday Weekend in the North Georgia Mountains

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When Sean and I first started dating, we went to the mountains for my birthday and did that for the next four years. The tradition kind of died out as we started taking bigger trips around Thanksgiving, like our 2017 trip to Japan. For my birthday this year, my mom offered to stay for awhile on her way back to the Outer Banks after dropping off my grandma in Florida. Sean and I jumped at the chance for an adults-only weekend celebration.  Continue reading →

Colorado Road Trip: Gunnison, Royal Gorge & Denver

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It’s taken me so long to write this but better late than never, right?

The last part of our trip consisted of A LOT of driving. But we saw some pretty incredible things that made it very worth it. We also made our way back to Denver and the instant we were on the other side of the Front Range, I felt the change – far more people, traffic, etc. But Denver is a great city and we found lots of fun things to do and eat. 🙂 Here’s the recap of our last few days in the beautiful state of Colorado. Continue reading →

Harrison’s 2nd Birthday Party!

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This little guy had quite a birthday celebration this past weekend! I know for many, this year has been somewhat disappointing as far as kids’ birthdays go but for us it was going to be small no matter what. Sean’s mom flew in from Florida and we had our wonderful Salvadorians neighbors over – Valery is Harrison’s best friend, after all. He had an absolute blast as the center of attention, getting to eat some of his favorite foods, blow out his candles, and dig into some cake – all before tearing happily into amazing gifts from our friends and family. We even managed to get a group photo! Continue reading →

Happy Second Birthday to Happy, Helpful & Handsome Harrison!

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My beautiful baby boy is TWO years old! This past year with him has been filled with laughter, joy, fun, love…and sometimes frustration (on all sides!). In all seriousness, Harrison is a truly amazing little boy – smart, curious, sweet, thoughtful, playful and funny. Every day my heart grows with love for him and I find myself excited for all the little things. A few weeks ago, I woke up at 5am on a Saturday and couldn’t really fall back to sleep because I was so excited to take him to the park to see the turtles (his favorite). I’ve put together a little monthly recap from the past year to capture some sweet memories and show how he’s grown. Continue reading →

Colorado Road Trip: Rocky Mountain National Park and Colorado National Monument

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With the onset of the pandemic, our initial plans to celebrate Sean’s 40th birthday in Spain were hopelessly dashed. I was determined to make it special, though, and we started looking at a trip out West where there would be plenty of space, fewer people, and killer views. Colorado fit the bill for us and we seemed to have planned the trip at the perfect time during this first year of COVID-19 – states had just started reopening and had low numbers. (A few weeks after returning home, cases would spike again and some states imposed strict closures yet again.) Everything was open when we traveled, but nothing was crowded. This was also me and Sean’s first time away from Harrison overnight, together!! Continue reading →