Amy's Bridal Shower

My friend Amy is getting married in August, and she asked her three best friends to be in her bridal party. Her friend Billy lives out of the country, so the other maid of honor, Alyson, and I took it upon ourselves to throw Amy a bridal shower, with lots of help from her family. We decided to have it at her house, and asked her mom to take her out and distract her while a few of us decorated the backyard for the shower. What ensued was something "very Pinterest-worthy"... as we were told by a few people at the shower!




Alyson is the queen of DIY and made all of the decorations herself! With her crafting skills and my kitchen skills, we threw a heck of a party! We went with a wine & cheese theme, and a teal/pink/gold color scheme. She spray painted wine and beer bottles white and dipped the bottoms in gold glitter, then we tossed some pink peonies in them. She also made a bride-to-be banner out of burlap and paint, and made a wooden A & E sign in the color scheme, with the date of their wedding on it. (That's now sitting on Amy and Eric's mantel!)








As far as food goes, we opted for light fare since it was outside mid-afternoon on a warm spring day. Alyson made a southwest-inspired quinoa salad and a watermelon mojito salad. I picked up a few different cheeses, some prosciutto, soppressata and crackers, and made caprese skewers, triple lemon cupcakes for dessert, along with nutella brownie muffins, and I purchased some macarons from a local French bakery. We also had some fruit and vegetables out with hummus. Her parents brought the wine - an assortment of reds and whites, though I think most of the guests stuck with white, myself included. Alyson also made a delicious ginger mint punch that didn't last long!






For favors, Alyson made oatmeal lavender bars of soap with a little wrapper that read "From Amy's shower to yours!" (Like I said, she is the queen of DIY!) For the game prizes we gave out small bottles of wine that she decorated with burlap and ribbon to fit the color scheme. When I was out shopping for shower supplies, I came across fun cutouts of glasses, lips, and crowns that Alyson and I glued to long skewers to use as photo booth props! We used my polaroid camera to snap silly photos of each of the guests, and then they used washi tape to stick them onto a colorful page and write a piece of advice for the bride. We put all of those pages, along with some other fun photos snapped throughout the party, into a small scrapbook for Amy. Alyson glued the shower invitation onto the front of the scrapbook, and now Amy has a tangible reminder of the special party we threw just for her!






This is the second bridal shower I've thrown (also the second wedding I've been in!) and it was so much fun to plan! I was a novice for the first shower I co-hosted, but for this one I had some experience under my belt, and lots of help. Alyson and I started planning months ago and it was difficult not mentioning any part of the process here, because I know Amy reads the blog... but now that the shower has happened, I'm excited to share the details here. Alyson and I had a private pinterest board where we exchanged ideas about what to do/make. It was fun putting our own little twist on everything. And I'm not ashamed to say that I definitely used the shower as an excuse to buy that polaroid camera ;) The shower was supposed to be a surprise, but Amy figured it all out the week beforehand. Oh well! It was still a blast for everyone that came, and we couldn't have asked for more cooperative weather. Just an awesome day all around!

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Picking Pumpkins at Milky Way Farm

When my friend invited me to go pumpkin picking on Sunday, I thought about how long it has been since I last went pumpkin picking... definitely over ten years! So of course the answer was yes! She drove us to a farm owned by the family of her elementary school teacher; she goes there every year to pick up a few pumpkins for her front stoop and to help support a local farm (all good things in my book!). The whole place was definitely set up for children (and there were plenty of them around); the pumpkins had been pre-picked and placed out in the field, and there were lots of farm animals, including a three week old baby cow! Of course, we're both big children so we appreciated it all just the same.

And then we saw this sign and couldn't help ourselves...
especially since the farmhouse/whole property reminded us of season two of The Walking Dead.






Pumpkin picking was fun! I brought home a few small ones, along with some funky gourds and some corn. The farm also has a creamery next door where they serve all sorts of delicious ice cream flavors named after their cows. We were definitely all up in that place! Can you say banana chocolate chunk and vanilla cookie dough ice creams five times fast? Doesn't matter, as long as you can eat it! Shawn was upset that I didn't bring home one of their take-home quarts... oh well, looks like we'll have to make another visit to Milky Way Farms...

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Pennsylvania Renaissance Faire

Last weekend a big group of us went to the Renaissance Faire in Manheim, Pennsylvania. Our first ren faire experience was two years ago, when our friends Christine and Sean introduced us to all the fun to be had at the one in Tuxedo Park, New York. Between weddings and moves, none of us had a chance to go last year. But we had such a great time in 2012 that Shawn and I decided to go all out this year and we made our own costumes! One of the best parts of the ren faire is not knowing who's an actor and who is just a guest in costume - everyone loves to interact with you, whether they work for the faire or not, so we figured we'd have more fun in costumes. We went as pirates, kind of. Shawn was a pirate and I was an archer, although most of the actors just lumped us both into the pirate category.

Most of Shawn's costume was made from things found at a thrift store, and mine was mostly made from things I already owned. I got a chance to put my sewing skills to good use and made us a few fun accessories as well! The rest of our group didn't dress up, and there was a slight communication mishap with two members of our group who ended up at the NY Renaissance Faire instead... (oops!) but we all had a really great time regardless. I wish I had thought to take a group photo! Instead, I'll leave you with a few photos of Shawn and I, and some of the fruits of my sewing labor.

I made myself a quiver for my arrows, a pouch for my belt that would be large enough to fit my phone, a small medicine sack for aesthetics, and a wristlet, complete with grommets. I also took in Shawn's shirt (we found a 3X size dress that we turned into his top), and made him a cross body knapsack to keep his things in, along with a smaller drawstring sack for his phone. I also made my own arrows! I couldn't find a proper stick to fashion a bow out of (they were all too dry), so I went without one.








Shawn and I are thinking about going back to the faire one of these weekends, just to experience it more. It's really tough to take it all in when you're trying to keep track of five other people, so we feel like there are some vendors and fun things that we missed the first time. I also didn't want to keep pulling out my camera and focused instead on having a good time, so if Shawn and I return to the faire, you can expect some more proper photos! This time around was more about enjoying the company of others, and getting a feel for the grounds. At least now if we go back, we'll know where all the good food and vendors are. If you haven't been to a renaissance faire yet, I highly recommend going! We were both skeptical at first, but look at us now!

P.S. That's a wig I'm wearing, in case you couldn't tell! Wait, no, I lied... my hair actually grows super fast! Seriously though, I love that wig. I want to wear it out and about for more 'normal' experiences. It makes me more anxious for my hair to grow!

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Road Trip, Part 2: Miami

(If you missed part one of the Miami road trip photos, it's right over here.)








Sam's mom lives within walking distance of a historic bar. You wouldn't even know there's a bar there unless you look really really hard. The history is all over the walls and it's still owned and run by the same family that opened it, so we got to hear the whole story from the bartender. I made a feline friend outside, too.








We had breakfast by the marina (pineapple juice and eggs benedict!) and then ventured into downtown Miami. Apparently, i-95 ends and turns into Rt 1! Crazy. I don't really think about roads ending (other than dead ends).










Sam showed me a cluster of artists' studios where they work and display their art (here's a peek) and you can come in and chat with them if they're around. I loved the mosaic entryway! There were some pretty neat artists in there, but most of them were on lunch break, so we just peeked into all the studios.






And that concludes the road trip photos! It was amazing, although I miss my friend dearly now that she's so far away (!) but I can't wait to go down there again - hopefully with Shawn next time, if I can convince him to fly ;)

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Road Trip, Part 1: Savannah

If you've been following this blog for longer than a week, you'll recall that I recently went on a girly road trip with my friend Sam. She made a (semi) last-minute decision to move back to her hometown of Miami and asked me if I'd like to accompany her for the ride. Not wanting to miss out on what may very well be the only girly road trip opportunity that will ever arise in my life, I made arrangements at work and told her very excitingly that I'd be able to come along for the ride!

We had about two weeks to plan the trip, and three days to actually do it. We left Philadelphia at 10am on a Saturday morning and were in Miami by 6pm on Sunday. That left us with all of Monday for her to show me around and then I flew back home early Tuesday morning. We drove about 12 hours on Saturday to make it to Savannah, Georgia (with a few quick stops in between), and then left Savannah around 11am on Sunday to drive the rest of the way. Here's a taste of the first half of our trip. (A few of these photos were taken by Sam, too!)

We saw a few interesting things while on the road. Shawn had also told us to keep an eye out for signs for South of the Border, so of course we had to make a quick stop there too.

Sunday morning we had two or so hours to kill before wanting to get back on the road, so we decided to explore the city of Savannah. Unfortunately for us, most shops in Savannah (or Slow-vannah as a local lovingly called it) don't open until noon on Sundays. So we wandered around along the water and then stopped into a few places that were open. We did manage to buy some jewelry from a fair trade shop and some spices and tea from a neat little spice shop. It's also worth noting that we stepped out of 55 degree weather and into 89 degree weather...















We even made a canine friend and I found places for Shawn and I to work if we ever move down there.... believe me, it's very tempting. That southern hospitality is such a change from the tri-state attitude I've grown up with and am accustomed to. What a beautiful change of pace. I had actually visited Savannah College of Art and Design when I was in high school, but I found it too old and slow at the time... hm, apparently my attitude has changed since then.















I wish we could have spent a little more time exploring Savannah, but we were trying to get down to Miami at a decent hour. More motivation to pay the little city another visit though! I'd love to bring Shawn next time and explore some of the old cemeteries, look at all the old houses, and stop into all the local shops that were closed on Sunday. Savannah, we'll be back one day, you can count on that!

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