Spring Break

I work in infectious disease outbreak management and due to several high-profile outbreaks in my area in the last few weeks, I have been working 10-12 hour days for nearly the past month. Feeling thoroughly burned out on work and desperately in need of time away from my job, I took yesterday and today off and N and I went on a little mini-spring break to St. Louis. I didn't appreciate how good vacations, even small ones, feel when you've worked your ass off leading up to them. College finals have had nothing on my level of stress this past month. I want to share a little of our fun break with you all, but first, an outfit post!

Dress: JC Penney;
Cardigan: The Limited;
Boots:Payless;
We didn't have a lot of time and had a lot of things we wanted to do, so we tried to pack in each day with as much as we could. The first night, we stopped by the Schlafly Tap Room. Schafly is a St. Louis-based brewery, and they make one of my all-time favorite pumpkin beers. Of course, we weren't there to try beers we already liked, so between the two of us, we got flights of all their drafts and casked beers and made a go of it! Their Tasmanian IPA and casked Coffee Stout were definitely my two favorites.
The next day, we had packed the City Museum, the Arch, and the City Garden into our day's plans. The City Museum is a discovery center/museum playground type location, came highly recommended from a few friends, and did not disappoint. I would highly recommend it if you're ever planning a trip to St. Louis and make sure to pack some sneakers! We walked to most of our destinations since our hotel was relatively close, but this day, I hit a personal high of almost 23,000 steps!
The last day we went to the famed Forest Park. Larger than Central Park in NY, this park houses the Science Museum, History Museum, Art Museum, the grounds of the 1904 World's Fair, the Municipal Theatre, and a ton of other cool attractions. We only had time to explore the science museum and history museums and do a little walking around the park before we had to leave, but I think you could make a day of this place and it would be well worth it. We enjoyed this amazing sunset while leaving and came home exhausted but feeling twice as relaxed as when we started.

Scenes From a Fall Wedding

Since it's the middle of dreaded winter, I've been finding it pleasant to daydream about things I was doing when it was a little bit warmer out. In the fall, N and I were invited to the wedding of some very-cool-but-not-that-close friends of ours. The reason I mention the not-that-close part is because the wedding was smack dab in the middle of the beautiful Great Smoky Mountains, a whole, thrilling 9.5 hour drive away from where we live. We spent weeks agonizing over whether to go, and how important was it really that we were there, and texting admiring pictures of the venue and the Smokies to each other before finally deciding to go (well after the RSVP date...because we are bad people, but like I said, these friends are very cool and chill and do not hate us...to our knowledge). Here they are being totally adorable for your viewing pleasure:
Having never driven through this part of the country, I was a little worried we were looking at 9 hours of farmland, but turns out...we headed straight through the Cumberland Gap National Forest (which I only know exists because of the Wagon Wheel song, being from the west). It was stunning and even the pouring rain could ruin the drive completely. P.S. Feel free to complain about the crack running through these pictures courtesy of N still not having gotten his windshield fixed even though it's been this way for like 3 years.

Before the wedding, we ended up having several hours to ourselves to do a little exploring, and weather be damned, we took advantage of it! Fall was just beginning to show it's colors in the mountains and we managed to find this lovely little waterfall for a quick hike.
Yes, this one was taken by balancing on rocks in the center of the creek.

And then, there was the wedding itself. I can't say enough about how elegant and quaint and rustic and just plain ADORABLE this wedding was. Also, they had a drone that, while drowning out part of their vows to the audience, took amazing aerial panoramic pictures of the ceremony. The reception was in a half indoor-half outdoor rustic barn/lodge-type thing, which was equally gorgeous. Also, the reception had cocktail appetizers and there was much dancing and a photo booth, so I was a happy lady.

I've never given a whole lot of thought to what I want my wedding to be like (mostly because the idea of planning that gives me the beginnings-of-panic-attack feeling if I think about it for too long), but I'm pretty sure that expensive rustic mountain wedding has recently shot to the top of my list.

Nostalgic Trip

I am currently sitting on the balcony of my hotel room and looking out at this view, except now the sun is setting so the hotel adjacent is reflecting the pink light of a beautiful California sunset:
I have a glass of water at my side because I bought a bottle of wine without realizing I had no corkscrew, but I've been thinking. Something about living here made me want to start blogging, and even though I've had months of absence on this blog since I've moved away, being back here again after three years (and in a swanky bay-side hotel I didn't have to pay for on top of that) made me want to blog again. I'm pretty sure this feeling will go away once I return home, so I figured I ought to hurry up and post this.

I am so enamored of the food here. I am lucky if where I live there are places have 3.5+ stars on Yelp with >50 reviews. Here, I am swimming in 4.5+ stars and sometimes >1000 reviews. As someone with an obsession with Mexican food and sushi that could rival our society's obsession with celebrity breakups, I am in fresh salsa and fish HEAVEN. I seriously never want to leave. It's been so amazing to see a few of the wonderful friends that live here and spend time with them, too. And finally, this conference I'm at has been excellent. It's reminded me why I went into infectious diseases in public health and how critical conferences like these are to keeping up with research and making connections in the field. But, I wish I could be doing this from somewhere else. I don't mind the Midwest, but it pales so much in comparison to where I grew up and the hot southwest that I love.

Why did I leave again?!

That Darn Travel Bug

This is one of the few summers in my life I have not spent doing any traveling for fun...and I am going insanely stir crazy. This is not at all helped by the fact that N is going to the beach in southern California for a week with his family soon, during which time I will undoubtedly be the most grumpy person to ever grace this earth. So instead of doing the work I should definitely be doing, let me fantasize to you for a moment about within-the-range-of-reason-and-budget places I would like to go this summer, because I'm pretty sure the people in my real life are sick of hearing about them.

Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore Can you believe this place is in northern Michigan? Also, look how humongous those dunes are compared to the teeny-tiny ant-people! From what I hear, the weather is not-too-cold in the summer, and there's some amazing hiking and kayaking on the lake.

Northern Kentucky I would never have thought I would ever really care to go to Kentucky, but it's one of the few places within driving distance and I did tell you I was going really stir crazy. Desperation is a good way to get yourself to broaden your travel horizons, no disrespect to Kentucky. My two top interests are some of the tons of Civil War museums, monuments, and forts and the Kentucky Bourbon Trail. I haven't looked into it yet, but I also hear there are some really neat caves there!

Cummins Falls State Park, TN This is another place I recently discovered, also more or less within driving distance. Of course, going to Tennessee would certainly also warrant a stop in Nashville, I think seeing these unique falls and getting some swimming in would be incredibly fun and refreshing.
And finally, Niagara Falls. Do I even need to comment on this one? Maybe with a side-trip to Rochester or Pittsburgh or Toronto on the side...

A Dark World Aches for a Splash of the Sun

I was in DC last month for a conference, but my timing, fortunately, coincided perfectly with the cherry blossom festival and getting to see two of my best friends. I've been to DC a few times before, so this trip was truly about catching up with old friends, but we did make sure to see the blossoms, especially because the weather was AMAZING.
On our first night, we stopped by a little pub that had Duck Rabbit Milk Stout! This beer was, hands down, my favorite North Carolina local beer I had in all my time in Chapel Hill and I was missing it so bad. Imagine my surprise to see this baby on the bottle list! It was a happy moment.
We went to this adorable little place for brunch the next morning. It's tucked away in a little corner in the Georgetown area right near the water. It's in an old warehouse or auto garage, but decorated all modern! Also, the food was delicious! Now, on to the copious blossom pictures!
  Cherry blossoms!

Dress:Thrifted
Cardigan: Macy's
Necklace: Francesca's
Boots: Ross I learned on this trip that the pink blossoms are actually magnolia blossoms! Sorry cherry, but I think I might like the magnolias better...
My lovely friends. I barely get to see these ladies with our busy schedules these days, so having three whole days of time with them was unimaginably wonderful. And will you check out that sunshine?! It was glorious to be able to walk around after the frigid winter.

More blossoms by the Jefferson Memorial. Hoping and wishing to go back soon, because DC is an amazing place!

Next Stop, Literally Anywhere!

Hello lovelies. Spring is supposed to be settling, but in true disappointing North Carolina fashion, it is once again cold and rainy outside. Good for you, I guess, because cold and rainy inspires me to blog.

I think I am going stir crazy. Summer is coming up quick (though the weather doesn't seem to have gotten that memo yet), which for most of my life has meant that I would be traveling. This summer though, is uncertain. I think I'm going to be here for most of it and then possibly moving, and I want to spend the rest of my time in North Carolina enjoying it, but I also can't shake the desire to go anywhere. Anywhere but where I am right now.

Maybe bold and bright Amsterdam...
  Or driving down the Atlantic Ocean Road in Norway...
  Or the Kawachi Wisteria Gardens in Japan...
  Or Disneyland...or maybe a return trip to the Harry Potter theme park...
But I don't need to go so far, I think. Even some of the local sights sound like a nice respite from the lil ol' Triangle. I don't even mind going on my own.
  This awesomely futuristic sculpture in Charlotte...
  Or Slide Rock once it's a little bit warmer...
  Maybe a few days in the Blue Ridge Mountains with Fleet Foxes as my background music...
  Or just some good ol' beach time (and history time - Kitty Hawk is out here!) on the Outer Banks...
I want to go anywhere and everywhere and take a thousand pictures with my obviously-not-expensive point-and-click camera and do things that make me happy.

What I've Been Up To This Winter

I'm certainly still figuring out what's going to go in this blog's version 2.0, but for now I want to tell you about what I've done this winter. Quite a number of fun activities have kept me busy and sane. Also, bless Arizona for being 70 degrees in December, because as I discovered this morning, snow (even an inch of it) is difficult for the unprepared.

12 Days of Christmas at the Carolina Inn. This display might actually require its own post sometime.

Chihuly in the Desert

Sedona!

Valley of Lights, Prescott

Mint Julep....that kinda kicked my ass.

Fun times with N!

Hiking Camelback Mountain....that also kinda kicked my ass.

Got some snow in NC last night! Woo!