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Thanksgiving 2016

thanksgiving-2016

Hi, friends! Happy Tuesday! This post was actually supposed to go live yesterday but unfortunately, my draft mode didn’t work. I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday weekend and were able to enjoy some time with friends and family.  After enjoying five days of relaxation, Monday was  a VERY busy work day. I can’t remember the last time I took five days off of work, blogging and most social media without an actual vacation. This Thanksgiving staycation was exactly what I needed. Now, I get to kick off my favorite month of the year, December, energized and ready to accomplish everything on my personal and professional to-do list between now and the Christmas holidays.

In fact, I disconnected so much that when I went to my iPhone just now, to download images for this post, I realized I took a grand total of six pictures over the past five days.

Wednesday I spent the day relaxing in the city, casually running errands and enjoying a few things I rarely have time to savor and enjoy. I took a mid-day Strength class at Uplift, enjoyed a leisurely lunch at ByChefChloe, got a hair cut and watched a movie.

Thursday I started Thanksgiving with the fun and festive Prospect Park Track Club Turkey Trot 5-miler. This year my sole goal was to enjoy the race and gorgeous weather with my good friend Mary. We chatted the entire five miles, keeping a 9 minute jog/1 minute walk pace since neither of us have run very much lately. If you stay in New York City next year for Thanksgiving, I highly recommend this race. It’s very reasonably priced AND runners get great swag including a winter hat and medal.

pptc-turkey-trot

The rest of Thursday was spent in the kitchen with Bo as we prepared a Thanksgiving feast for six. We kept things simpler this year since we were hosting a smaller group and two of our guests were coming directly from a Thanksgiving lunch. Our menu included: perfect roasted turkey, stuffing, homemade cranberry sauce, green beans, sweet potato casserole, corn bread and pumpkin cheesecake.

thanksgiving-2017

After cleaning up from Thursday night’s festivities, Bo and I spent the rest of Friday and Saturday together enjoying the sights, tastes and sounds of Manhattan and Brooklyn together. We went for a run together, took a special, 60-minute Turkey Burn Flywheel class with our favorite instructor, Josh Arden, tried a few new restaurants and went to see Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. We ended Saturday with a combined birthday and anniversary dinner at Battersby, a wonderful restaurant that has been a neighborhood highlight since it opened in 2011.

We started transitioning from vacation mode to work mode on Sunday, spending much of the day running errands, doing laundry, cleaning the house and finally decorating our home for Christmas with Russell and Meg. The four of us spent Sunday evening decorating, catching up and laughing our way through Die Hard. Somehow, Meg nor I had ever seen the movie and after questioning how it was listed as a holiday classic Bo insisted we watch it.

die-hard

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Weekend Highlights – November 21st, 2016

vermont-snow

What a wonderful weekend we had up in Vermont! As I mentioned on Friday, we made a last minute decision to head up to Manchester Center, Vermont on Friday night to spend a relaxing weekend with my aunt. It’s hard to believe that we were able to enjoy a weekend away without taking a vacation day. Friday and today were long days, driving up to Vermont from 5-9pm on Friday and returning this morning from 5-9 AM. Luckily, the 48 hours in between were filled with rest and relaxation.

Here are a few highlights from our weekend in Vermont.

Snow – The temperatures dropped forty degrees Saturday night as a strong front moved through the region. Much to our delight, we woke up Sunday morning to a winter wonderland. There were more than six inches of wet, heavy, dense snow covering my the yard and surrounding towns. We spent an hour outside playing fetch with my aunt’s Samoyed, making snow angels and enjoying the beautiful scenery.

Ponce Bistro – After a morning of relaxing and shopping, we enjoyed lunch on the front porch of Ponce Bistro. A local favorite, this small bistro serves an eclectic menu for breakfast, lunch and dinner including customer favorites such as the spanish meatloaf sandwich, pumpkin soup, lavender goat cheese salad and an array of refreshing homemade iced teas. Bo ordered the meatloaf sandwich while my aunt and I each shared the pumpkin soup and north country turkey sandwich. I wish we’d saved room for their sweets as the bakery items I saw when I went inside to pay looked delicious – especially their chocolate chip cookies.

Solo Farm & Table – This cozy, farm to table restaurant is tucked on a quiet road in South Londonderry, about 20 minutes from Manchester Center. Within seconds of trying our first bite, we could tell that the numerous James beard nominations their chef has received as well the recognition in Bon Appetit, Food & Wine and the New York Times was beyond justified.  Since my aunt, Bo and I all love to share meals, we ordered two appetizers, a pasta, two entrees, and two desserts to share. This method allowed us to sample far more of the menu than normal, which made for a very tasty and fun evening. Unexpectedly, it was the fresh made bread and smoked butter as well as the homemade potato bisque which stole the show.  After cleaning the bowl with a piece of bread, I requested the recipe from the waitress, in hopes of recreating this rich, yet simple bisque at home.

It’s A Wonderful Life – As soon as the snow started, we found ourselves in the Christmas mood. Our typical rules of saving Christmas movies and music until after Thanksgiving were replaced with an afternoon of Christmas music followed by watching It’s A Wonderful Life that evening. When my aunt discovered that Bo nor I had seen this 1946 classic, she insisted that we watch it over dinner. I can see why this wonderful, touching and emotional film became one of the most acclaimed fils ever made and has received so much recognition over the years from AFI.

With that I’m off to enjoy the evening with Bo as we celebrate our seven year wedding anniversary. It’s hard to believe that seven years have passed since we danced the night away with our closest friends and family members in Savannah, Georgia.

dancing-with-bo

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Weekend Highlights – October 31st, 2016

brooklyn-bridge-park

Happy Halloween! While I am not dressing up this year, I can’t wait for this evening’s Halloween festivities. Our neighborhood, Carroll Gardens, takes Halloween very seriously! Last year we had over 500 kids come by our house. This year, our entire building is going to hang out on the front stoop for an evening of Fall fun while giving out candy. Once we’re done handing out candy my sister-in-law, Meg, is going to hang out while we cook dinner and watch Hocus Pocus together. Since I’m not in an office setting this year, it’s easier to resist the Halloween candy but I am looking forward to a few handfuls of my favorite candy tonight – Reese’s Cups, Candy Corn and Twix! What is your favorite candy? 

Unfortunately, this morning I slept through my alarm. I evidently turned it off at 5:45 when it went off but have no recollection of this. Oops.  Clearly my body needed more sleep after an exhausting work week and an equally exhausting, but fun weekend.

Speaking of the weekend, here are a few highlights from our busy weekend.

Ten Over Ten– By the end of last week, my nails were in horrible condition. I knew I wanted to get a manicure before the wedding festivities started Friday evening but didn’t know when I could squeeze it into the schedule since my meetings ended on Friday just before my hair appointment. Luckily, I found out from a friend that Ten Over Ten Financial District location opens at 8 AM on weekdays. I was able to enjoy a 20-minute manicure including their more natural nail polish lines, TenOverTen and RGB.

Drybar Boerum Hill – You may have seen that I had a less than stellar experience at Drybar Greenwich Village on Friday night. I didn’t get seated until an hour after my appointment and ended up running late for the rehearsal dinner. Since the wedding on Saturday night was black tie, I wanted to have my hair blown out. After exchanging emails with the Drybar team, I gave their new Brooklyn location a try on Saturday. Luckily, Saturday’s experience at Drybar Brooklyn was wonderful! I was seated exactly at my appointment time and my stylist was able to bring my vision to life in just 45-minutes. The new space is bright, airy and as cute and fun as the rest of their locations.

Rent the Runway Success – After years of buying dresses for cocktail and black tie events, I’ve switched to exclusively using RTR for these events. This weekend I rented a knee length, black and gold Shoshanna dress for the rehearsal dinner and then a floor length, black and blue one shoulder Slate & Willow gown for the wedding.  The black and gold dress required a stick on bra which was less than ideal, but I still loved the dress and the fun details. I paired it with nude hose and my favorite black heels.  The floor length gown was one of the most comfortable gowns I’ve worn complete with pockets, side zipper and boning that helped it maintain shape.

rent the runway greta-dress slate-willow-gown

Wedding Festivities – We were lucky to celebrate our friends Scott and Liz this weekend during their rehearsal dinner at Saxon+Parole and then the wedding at La Sirena at the Maritime Hotel. Even though we’ve lived in New York for years, this was actually our first local NYC wedding. After a long work week I was thankful that we didn’t have to travel for the wedding and it was fun to try two new restaurants as part of the celebration. The food at both locations exceeded our expectations! I especially loved La Sirena as a wedding venue since the split room allowed for the ceremony and cocktail hour to take place in one area before the group moved to the family style reception and dancing. They didn’t forget a single detail including a fun photo booth, oyster shucking hostesses during cocktail hour, great music for hours of dancing and even masks and props to transition the party from wedding to Halloween theme at midnight!  It was a glamorous affair as you can tell from these few pictures – such a fun night!

scott-and-liz me-and-bo guys-in-tux

Long Walk through Brooklyn Bridge Park – Even though I slept nine hours Saturday night, I woke up yesterday feeling less than stellar after the wedding festivities. I was craving a run or other sweaty workout, but I knew that due to the humid weather and a nagging hamstring, I should choose another workout or rest. Instead of skipping my workout, I decided to head out for a long walk to enjoy the gorgeous 70 degree NYC weather. I listened to two podcasts while power walking through Brooklyn Heights and through Brooklyn Bridge Park.  I was wearing a giddy smile on my face the entire time. While I wished I could have been running, similar to the other people who were out completing their final long run before the marathon but due to the gorgeous weather and podcast, I still found myself enjoying the power walk.

How was your weekend? 

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