Five on Friday

Happy Friday! It's been a bit of a rough week for me at work and I'm so happy it's Friday. Tonight we are celebrating a friend's birthday and hoping to soak up some of the warm weather tomorrow. 

With another chance of snow expected on Tuesday, here are five things I'm looking forward to this spring:

//1// Celebrating a friends wedding on Kiawah Island next weekend!

//2// Spending another year at the Sweetlife Festival listening to some of our favorite bands.

//3// Going for runs outside. While I do enjoy a good treadmill run, there's nothing better than running down to the National Mall on a spring day.

//4// Along those same lines, checking out DC's famed cherry blossoms. They will likely bloom later this year due to our extremely cold winter, but they are always breathtaking.

//5// And of course, celebrating our one year wedding anniversary next month!

Cherry blossoms blooming outside of our church a few days before our wedding

Hello, Spring?

Like most people I am welcoming today's first day of spring with wide open arms. I am ready for sunnier and warmer days. I can't wait to hang up my winter coat and tuck away my gloves and winter hats. Unfortunately it looks like I will have to keep them out a little longer as there is a 60% chance for snow next Tuesday.

Our Weekend

Happy St. Patrick's Day! It's hard to believe that this time last year we were waking up to a flooded apartment and moving into a hotel for 10 days.

We had a great weekend even though we went form experiencing beautiful sunshine to being thrown back into winter's cold despair. We got to see lots of our favorite friends, enjoy the 70-degree weather with Calvin on Saturday, get some much needed chores done and binge on House of Cards (I am officially hooked).

Here are two of my favorite pictures from Saturday:

A nice, long walk with two of my favorite guys

Enjoying the sunshine and beverages at Saint-Ex

Here's to a good week!

Five on Friday

Jumping right in to my five today.....

1. Happy Pi Day! After work I'm heading to a Pi Day Happy Hour and made P's grandmother's derby pie recipe. It is always a crowd favorite!

2. Last night I finished reading the Paris Letters by Janice MacLeod. While it was a fun read and had me dreaming of Paris every night this week, it was also inspiring. I have no plans of selling off all of our things, quitting our jobs and traveling Europe for a year (although that would be amazing), but I do feel inspired by her simple living and taking the time to figure out what makes you happy.

3. I am going to start watching House of Cards this weekend. I have heard nothing but good things about the Netflix show and after seeing a small clip from one of the second season's first episodes I am more than intrigued. P already watched season 1 but is willing to rewatch with me so we can jump into season 2 together.

4. I have been loving these tops from Jcrew. I picked up two of them (in haven blue and flannel) during a recent sale before going to San Francisco and they are so soft and comfortable. They can be dressed up with a statement necklace or scarf for work or dressed down with jeans and flats on the weekend.

5. Mother nature is been pretty bipolar this week. We enjoyed two warm, beautiful days earlier this week and we even got to sit outside for dinner one night. Yesterday we were back down to the 30s and crazy wind. Tomorrow we're back up to the mid-60s and by Monday we'll be back to the 30s with a chance of snow. Crazy!


Hope everyone has a great weekend!

San Francisco Part 2

Here is the rest of the recap of our great trip!

Sunday
We started the day with a yummy brunch at Pinecrest Diner on the same block as our hotel (P's team had eaten there a few times before). Then we walked to Alamo to pick up our Chevy Impala and made our way to Napa Valley. It was a beautiful and easy drive.

Crossing the Golden Gate Bridge on our way to Napa Valley!

Two of the partners at P's firm mentioned how much they loved Hall wines and had ordered it at a team dinner earlier in the week so we knew we would start there and we're so glad we did! I'm not a huge red wine drinker but I loved the Cabernet Sauvignon at Hall. They had recently opened a new facility that was very modern and set up so that visitors could enjoy the best views of the vineyards while enjoying a tasting (and we did!).

Our tasting menu. We did not buy the $125 bottle but the tasting was amazing!

Overcast view of the vineyard from the tasting room.

After buying a bottle of the cab we headed up the road to Beauvieu Vineyard which got high reviews from Food & Wine magazine and is one of the oldest vineyards in the area. We had the BEST time during this testing. Our guide, Brad, was so knowledgeable and made us feel so welcome. He snuck in some additional tastings and made the whole experience so fun. In fact he was so good at his job that we joined a wine of the month club with the vineyard! We are not wine snobs by any means but we are excited to try some of Napa's finest over the next year. I'll keep you posted on how that goes. By the time we were done with the tasting we were in need of some food and walked over to Rutherford restaurant for some much needed food....and another glass of wine. We took our time eating and drinking lots of water before heading back to San Francisco.

P passed the ultimate the driving test by navigating through Lombard Street on our way to the car rental return. He was a champ!

At the top of Lombard Street

Thumbs up after making our way down!

As I'm sure you can guess, more naps were needed before another dinner in North Beach (we loved this neighborhood). We had some of the best thin crust pizza I've ever had.

Monday
While our family and friends were getting slammed with snow and ice back east, we had one more day to enjoy San Francisco. One of the things at the top of "must do" list was Alcatraz. We were too late getting tickets for Friday so when our trip was extended we immediately pre-bought tickets for a tour on Monday. Our trip to the island started at 11am. I highly recommend the audio guided tour (it's included in the ticket price). We didn't take any pictures of the inside of the prison (I felt weird about it) but the island has beautiful views of San Francisco and the Golden Gate Bridge.

View of Alcatraz from the ferry ride over.

Listening to the tour and taking in the view.

View of the Golden Gate Bridge from Alcatraz.

By the time we got the ferry back to pier it was about 2:30pm and we were starving. P loves In-N-Out burgers (who doesn't?!) so we agreed that would be the perfect last lunch on the west coast. After lunch we took the trolley car back to our hotel for....you guessed it, a nap! After doing a little packing and changing, we headed out for a later dinner at Foreign Cinema in Mission District. This restaurant was recommended to us by multiple people and it did not disappoint! We sat in the covered patio where a film is projected on the back wall. Both P and I enjoyed our dinners (steak for him, risotto for me) but I honestly loved the romantic setting more. We capped the night off with one last drink in the hotel bar before finishing packing.

The perfect spot for a romantic dinner to end our trip.

This was one of the best vacations we have ever had. It was the perfect balance of relaxation and exploration. What made it even better was that I got to bring P home with me! I can't wait for our next adventure!

San Francisco Part 1

I absolutely loved San Francisco! I knew from the start that this would be an amazing trip since I would be reunited with P after 3.5 long weeks apart. What made the trip even better is it went from a 2.5 day vacation to 4 full days thanks to a delay on my flight out that led to us extending the trip and then flight cancellations due to winter weather in DC. Here's a recap of the first two days of our amazing vacation/reunion!

Thursday
I arrived at the hotel around 6pm (about 5 hours later than planned). I have never been so happy to see my husband but boy did he look exhausted! We went to dinner at a Spanish restaurant two blocks from the hotel and then had one more drink at the hotel bar.

This was about 20 minutes before he passed out.

Within 10 minutes of going back upstairs my poor, exhausted husband passed out (remote in hand of course). He slept for 12+ hours and he needed it!

Friday
I was up super early on Friday due to the time difference and excitement. I did some reading, went to the drugstore to replenish hubby's toiletries and picked up Starbucks. Once he was up and ready we headed out for the day with umbrellas in hand. While it was a little chillier than we were hoping, it was still 30 degrees warmer than the east coast so I couldn't complain. We had a very rainy walk through Chinatown on our way to Fishermen's Wharf.

We had a delicious lunch of cioppino (tomato-based seafood stew) and a couple of drinks hoping the rain would pass. It eventually did and we continued to explore Fishermen's Wharf and then made our way to Ghiradelli Square. We split (but we all know who ate the most) a Salted Caramel Sundae and picked up some goodies from the store.

After a little more exploring we took the trolley car back to the area where our hotel was.

On the trolley!

Because it was a little chillier than I thought we stopped in one of the many stores at Union Square so I could pick up something warmer to wear. Other than New York City, I have never seen a shopping scene quite like this downtown in a major city. Afterward we stopped for drinks at a great bar called Urban where P was able to have local craft beers and I had two delicious Moscow Mules. After getting our rental car set up for a future day trip we headed back to the hotel for naps. P took a very long nap (I don't think he realized just how tired he was) so we had a late dinner at the hotel bar and called it a night.

Saturday
I had been looking forward to this day since I booked the tour a few weeks prior. A tour bus picked us up from our hotel to take us to Muir Woods and Sausalito. It was a beautiful, sunny morning and perfect for lots of outdoor time. The tour bus stopped at scenic look-out on the other side of the Golden Gate Bridge for some photo ops.

Then we drove on to Muir Woods and had about 1.5 hours for walking and exploring. P and I took a nice long walk through woods. This was probably one of my favorite memories of the trip. It was just amazing to walk through the redwoods and have good, quality chats with my husband. I was a happy lady.

We then went on to Sausalito where we planned to eat lunch. We found a spot called Scoma's right on the water where I enjoyed clam chowder in a sourdough bowl and P had fish tacos - both were delicious!

View of Sausalito from the ferry. We ate at the restaurant in the blue building.

The tour company had circled the wrong ferry times back to San Francisco so as soon as we realized the error we had to toss cash on the table and run to catch one of the last ferrys. Once we got back to San Francisco we took a cab up to the Painted Ladies and took the obligatory pictures in front of everyone's favorite Full House scene.

Whatever happened to predictability?

As we were walking through Haights Ashbury we got notifications that our Monday flights were cancelled. So we headed back to the hotel bar for drinks and to reschedule our flights for Tuesday. More naps followed before a delicious dinner at Sotto's in North Beach. We shared cioppino again and agreed that we would have to find a recipe to recreate it on our own!

Waiting for our table (the lobster was our pager)

Delicious!

Stay tuned for Part 2 tomorrow!

Five on Friday

Today's Five on Friday will highlight my top five favorite things from my trip to San Francisco! More detailed recap posts will come next week!

1. Reuniting with my husband. It was seriously the best part of the trip!

2. Cioppino. We could not eat enough of this stuff.

3. Ghiradelli. Enough said.

4. The Golden Gate Bridge. I never got tired of seeing it.

5. Napa Valley. This was a spontaneous day trip for us and absolutely amazing.

This weekend we're looking forward to getting Calvin from my mom's, making our own cioppino, and continuing to adjust to being back home. Have a great weekend!