Sizzling Summer Recap

July 27, 2017

Hello lovely reader. I’m back! It’s been a minute.

Life has taken hold of me and we’ve run off together to do wild, wonderful things. I’ve also just felt truly fulfilled and I am enjoying each moment.

But I’m here now, popping my little blogger head up above the noise and chaos of everything you read and experience. You’ve got A LOT coming at you in life don’t you?

Between jobs, family, friends, laundry, bettering yourself, applying night creams and drinking enough water I’m sure most of you feel like me, a little tuckered out. Perhaps a little over-stimulated.

That’s why I’m excited to press PAUSE and be back in one place.

This Summer, so far, has included some WILDNESS.

I actually just started forming a wickedly genuine grin thinking about everything that has transpired in the last two months.

Isn’t it pure magic when your own brain’s thought can cause a physical reaction in you, like that of a smile? I love it.

Anyway, these past two months have been one hot Summer. I traveled to Gold Coast, Australia for work. It’s crazy because I found out I’d be going about a month before I departed. And several months before that, I precisely recall thinking to myself, you’ll probably never make it to Australia in your lifetime. It’s just too far and too expensive. How will you find the time off?

And then boom, wall-ah! Life takes me by the hand and opens the lid on the little box I was living in.

Do you ever live in a little box? Your thoughts and dreams are confined in that box and you don’t really dare to think of the what-ifs that could exist outside the box?

Maybe it’s money or maybe it’s your own lack of self-confidence. There are a lot of reasons we stay in that box.

I’m so grateful life decided to take the lid off what I thought could and couldn’t be. And I’m so glad I had faith and BELIEVED in the goodness life has to offer.

So yes, I traveled farther than I ever have before and worked my tail off and met a baby koala.

Then I shot off to Milwaukee to visit one of my very best friends who is pregnant with her FIRST!

I have this amazing group of women who I went through acne, prom, college, and all manner of life with. They’re my tribe, my rocks in life (more like enchanted gems really, each uniquely radiant and powerful).

They keep me straight. They keep me uplifted. They’re the real deal.

We all gathered in the green soaked land of Milwaukee, just a quick walk from the lake (which really looks more like an ocean lapping at the shore.)

From Milwaukee I darted down to Fort Morgan, Alabama where the sand is white and the air thick and heavy as the accents that occupy the area. I love humidity. I know that sounds ridiculous, but it’s one thing I long for now that I live in San Diego.

I love strolling about in a sundress at 9pm and feeling like I’m waltzing through a warm bath. I love how much the humidity opens up your pores and (I swear) lets the sun in more and gives you that deep, vacation tan people comment on when you come back to the office.

My aunt caught crab for us with her crab cage she had set out in the Atlantic and we carried them back and cooked them and ate them within the hour.

(I actually did nothing of the sort, but did play spectator extraordinaire during the entire process. And yes, ate the crab)

Dinners were spent out on the deck, watching the pinks and purples of the sun’s falling hands grace the sky and shadow the beautiful water before us, more and more until evening set in and the mosquitos came out and we were forced to take cover inside.

After three days back in the office, I took off for Jersey for another work event. I had my head down and rarely had a meal outside of the hotel bar.

I made new friends, loved on old ones, and contributed to an amazing human experience for over 12,000 people.

I flew my little sister out to meet me and we took two days after my work was over to explore New York (just a train ride away from where we were in Jersey).

New YOOOOOORK.

New York is AMAZING. I’m sure you’re rolling your eyes and saying, yea yea, if you’re a local. But it truly is! You can literally get anything you want at any time of day or night. Every kind of food you can think of resides on that island. And every kind of human being too.

And the walkability is a treasure.

San Diego traffic depletes me enough so it was an absolute treat to be able to walk everywhere. Our local grocery store was just across the street. Countless coffee shops, bars, and restaurants lined every corner of our little Lower East Side neighborhood.

And I mean countless.

Restaurants crammed in alleyways, candlelit bars shoved in basements, look-down-for-a-second-and-you’ll-miss-it kind of countless. So. many. places.

The best part is that I spent the trip with my sister. We enjoyed languid conversations in the bright and airy studio Airbnb we rented and enjoyed slightly more enthused conversations over classy libations out on the town.

We navigated the bowels of the city subway.

We got lost.

We even traveled to the famed Ladurée bakery for their precious macarons. These macarons are available in two places in the world, Paris herself and New York.

I have to tell you, strolling the bustling streets with chai lattes in hand and toting mint green Ladurée bags full of macarons seemed like something out of a movie.

I felt like Holly Golightly and Blair Waldorf rolled into one fabulous woman-about-town!

Too many plane rides and too many American Airlines cookies later and I’m back in my tiny condo in San Diego trying to recover from jet lag. I’m sipping mint tea and coconut water and I’ve hauled my salt rock lamp to the kitchen table where the light is best.