The Holidays in New York = Magical

So, I guess I feel off the bandwagon with my blogging about my diet! The good news is that I did not fall off the bandwagon of the actual diet! All told I have lost 5 lbs, which is not as good as I had hoped, but better than a sharp stick in the eye. I have cheated just a touch, on Saturday night, when Taylor and I went out for desert (so clearly, this was premeditated cheating, on my diet, not my husband). Anyway, I had a cappuccino and we split a piece of apply pie a la mode, but I was good and really Taylor ate 75% of it :)

Anyway, back to the purpose of this post. This weekend, I had some moments that reminded me why Christmas in New York is unlike Christmas anywhere else.

First, I emerged from our apartment at about 1:30pm on Saturday to realize that about half of the 20-somethings in New York had been up drinking since 9:30am for the annual "Santa-con." I don't know how I never heard of this activity before this weekend, but from what I can tell, it involves lots and lots of belligerent Santas wandering around the city all day. Here are a few shots near our apartment:

From Drop Box

From Drop Box

From Drop Box

Later that night, still oblivious to the craziness that is Santa-con, Taylor and I went out for desert (the very trip I described above) and saw - actually we HEARD - one of Santa's Elves (ie. a skankily clad girl) completely drunk a couple of booths away from us. She was belting out the words to every song that came over the diner radio and kept yelling for more coffee. Then, after about 15 minutes, she stumbled out. Very interesting indeed.

The second fun New York City Christmas activity of the weekend was truly unique. The MTA, which normally stinks in every way, does something need on Sundays in December. They take out old Subway trains and run them on select routes throughout the city. I caught one on my way downtown to buy a present for my Aunt Sheryl (do you still read this, Aunt Sheryl??). Here's the train pulling into the station:

From Drop Box

The cool thing about this train ride is that it wasn't full of jaded, grumpy New Yorkers. Instead, everyone was like a kid in a candy store. No one really sat down, we just walked around looking at all the features of the old train, including the old-timey ads and everything. Here are a few more photos:

From Drop Box

They had ceiling fans and incandescent bulbs!

From Drop Box

Ads advocating violence, no big deal :)

From Drop Box

With accurate start/end points!

From Drop Box

The origin of the word straphanger (well, actually this is second generation, at one point they were leather!).

From Drop Box

I like this shot because the guy looks old-fashioned and then the yellow coat is so modern.

Hope you've enjoyed this!

South Beach Diet = Hungry 24/7

Well, it's day 2 of the diet and I am doing a pretty good job with sugar cravings and going without caffeine. My biggest problem is that I'm always hungry!!! I mean seriously, I'm eating dinner and I feel completely full and then 15 minutes later I'm hungry again. I know this all sounds like self-torture and I've had people ask me why I'm even on a diet, but the truth is that this is good for me because as my husband will tell you, I am a SLAVE to my cravings and I eat at the slightest feeling of hunger. So this is definitely good to build some tolerance. Don't worry, I will not waste away! :) My penchant for margaritas ensures that this will never happen.

Anyway, on to my menu for today:

Breakfast: onion and peppers omelet with tomato juice
Mid-morning snack: celery with Laughing Cow swiss cheese
Lunch: chef salad with balsamic vinegar and olive oil
Mid-afternoon snack: 2 ham roll-ups with spicy mustard and a little bit of cheese and a handful of almonds
Dinner: rosemary salmon and sauteed asparagus
Desert: Vanilla Ricotta "ice cream"

South Beach Diet, Day 1

Today is day one of the South Beach Diet and so far so good! For those of you who don't know, the South Beach Diet is designed to regulate your blood sugar and cravings for sweets. I have done it a few times with moderate success, primarily because I am not good about sticking to it for the full two weeks, which is the duration of phase 1. Well, that's changing right now! Today, I'm kicking off my 2-week Phase 1, which ends December 21 just in time for the holidays. Hopefully, by getting my appetite under control before the holidays and being inspired by my success over the next 2 weeks, I can set myself up for early success in the new year!

So, I'm going to take the time over the 2 few weeks to use my blog as an accountability partner for my diet. I'll be brief and won't bore you with all the details. Hopefully you'll find it interesting. And hopefully I'll take time to interject some other stories so you're not bored out of your mind reading this.

So, to get started with the South Beach Diet, I had to make a couple big shopping trips. The main items on my list were vegetables, dairy, meat, and decaf coffee. In order to use said coffee, I had to clean my coffee maker, which my husband is keen to remind me has not been used in months and really is just a large clock taking up all of our counter space. Well, not anymore! I brewed 16 oz of Dunkin' Donuts this morning and added Sugar-Free Hazelnut creamer and 2 Sweet 'N' Lows and I must say, it's very good!

I spent a lot of time prepping my foods for this diet. I made mini quiches with spinach, green peppers, onion and cheese. I also made turkey roll-ups, salads for lunches, celery sticks with laughing cow cheese, and a delicious ricotta desert mixture.

Today, here is my menu:

Breakfast: 2 mini quiches (need to buy tomato juice to have with them next time, it wasn't substantial enough)
Mid-morning snack: String Cheese
Lunch: Chef Salad with Balsamic vinegar and olive oil and I'm also going to go look for some sugar free jello cups if they have them at the store. If not, I'll make some tonight
Mid-afternoon snack: 2 turkey roll-ups with cilantro mayo
Dinner: Grilled chicken, steamed veggies (haven't decided which ones yet, probably broccoli with a little low-fat cheese), and salad
Desert: Vanilla Ricotta "ice cream"

Looking forward to having one day done!

This is the first I've heard about it, but apparently next Friday is the 3rd annual Free Shipping Day. Looks like it's a pretty big deal!

Click here

Memories of Magdalene

Perhaps it's the holiday spirit, or maybe it's my constant quest for thoughtful, creative, and socially responsible gifts, but today I was reminded of a very dear part of my college life and I thought I'd share it with you all.

My sophomore year at college, I lived with 9 other girls in an apartment called "Mayfield." In order to live in this apartment, we had to submit a proposal for a community service endeavor that we would participate in for the academic year. We decided to partner with an organization that at the time was called "Magdalene House" but has since shortened it's name to just Magdalene.

Magdalene is a residential program where women who have a history of abuse, prostitution of drug addiction can enroll and receive shelter, counseling, rehabilitation, education and job training. They fund themselves by running a separate organization called Thistle Farms, a social enterprise where the women create home and bath products by hand and sell online and throughout Nashville.

Magdalene's headquarters is the beautiful St. Augustine Chapel on Vanderbilt's campus, and I have many fond memories of volunteering there throughout my Sophomore year and beyond. Here are a few:

- Tutoring a woman for her GED in basic high school math. She had no trouble grasping the concepts, but the fact that someone at her age had never been exposed to so much really opened my eyes to my own good fortune.
- Cooking meals in the Magdalene kitchen and serving them to the women and their families.
- Helping make candles, soaps, and lotions in advance of the holiday surge. The scent of Lavender is forever linked to Magdalene in my mind.
- Volunteering for an overnight homeless event at St. Augustine Chapel where we go pick up people from an over-full homeless shelter and house them at the Chapel for the night.
- Cleaning up the yard at one of the Magdalene residences. They were so appreciative and it looked so good!
- Having a holiday even at our sponsor's house. It was a wonderful night of friends, food, and coining of the nickname "Mel Hester"
- I will never forget the day that the secretary at Magdalene, a nice, single lady in her 30s with a few pounds to lose, came in to the office all excited and said, "Guess what!? I just started smoking to lose weight!!" Shocking, really.
- Cleaning and organizing St. Augustine Chapel seemingly every week because there were always so many people in and out of there.

I'm thankful to Magdalene, Becca Stevens, Leigh Gilchrist, and Vanderbilt for the opportunity to look beyond my own little bubble during my time at Vanderbilt. It was truly a blessing.

If you're looking for good Christmas gift ideas, may I suggest checking out Thistle Farms and telling their story along with the gift?

Blessings to you this holiday season!

I'm so fashion forward...

A few weeks ago, I sent Taylor a text that said, "What are your thoughts about a yellow jacket with black poodles on it?" To my surprise, he said "Sounds very cool."

So, I of course purchased said jacket immediately. Taylor was shocked, he thought I was joking!

From First Anniversary Trip

and I'm not the only one! I've seen the jacket on several web sites, in magazines, and even in the Willow Smith video, Whip My Hair.

Here are a few screen-shots:

Vandy Basketball has started!

Winter can be sad, long, cold and depressing in New York, especially after the holidays. Each year that I've lived here, we've had a beam of shining light and excitement to revive our otherwise unfortunate existence in the December - March timeframe, VANDY BASKETBALL!!! :) We have many traditions that go with this,

1. Being the only 2 patrons at Ship of Fools at 11am on a Saturday to see Vandy play
2. Frequenting Dan Ross's sweet apartments, preferably with Gosha sitting on the stoop
3. Concocting ridiculous plans for how we will win tough games. Ex: "Ok, if we're down by 10 with 8 minutes left, then we'll totally win" or "Ok, I'll sit here, Taylor, you stand and cheer, Dan, go to the bathroom, Gosha, GET BACK ON THAT STOOP...there, now we can't lose!"
4. Constantly monitoring the AP and ESPN rankings and discussing them at length if they don't reflect the true greatness that is Vanderbilt (they usually don't)
5. Calling our players by silly names
6. Making fun of the tall awkward white guy on our team...oh wait...we DON'T HAVE ANY THIS YEAR!

I'm sure there are more, but you get the idea. It's a generally good time. Yesterday, Taylor and I rang in the new season and watched the first half of Vanderbilt against Nebraska in the Puerto Rico Tip Off Tournament.

Here we are with our cider beers:
Vandy (the black line) pulled it out at the end!:
I promise, this won't become a basketball blog, I just thought I'd share how we like to spend part of our winters in NYC.

After a tough loss to West Virginia, Vandy also beat perennial powerhouse (and Taylor's brother and mom's alma mater) North Carolina on Sunday night!

Coming to you from 34,000 feet

Well hello there! Like I said in the title of this post, I am typing this from seat 31F on Delta Flight 2986 from Atlanta to New York's LaGuardia Airport! I am returning from a very fun and very tiring girls weekend in Charleston, South Carolina and wouldn't you know it, they finally go Wi-Fi on planes (What's that? You're telling me they've had this for a while? Well pardon me, I'm the girl who's had the same cell phone since George W. Bush was President, but I digress...)

Anyway, I will not be recapping the weekend in Charleston just yet, that will have to wait until I sort through the 200 or so photos I took and can summarize appropriately. Stay tuned :) Right now I'd like to blog oh-so-belatedly about Taylor and I's first anniversary trip to upstate New York.

I already blogged about our early anniversary weekend at Taylor and Talia's wedding in Newport, RI. We decided we'd also like to do something somewhat special on our actual anniversary so I planned a one-day getaway to upstate New York for apple picking and wine tasting (among other things). Now, you might have guessed that this isn't EXACTLY how Taylor would have elected to spend a Sunday in the fall (especially not the part where we had to be on a train by 7:45am). However, the Jets had a bye week, the Giants were playing on Monday, and I had already bought the tickets so off we went!

The day started out eventfully when, just as we were getting on the subway to head to Grand Central Terminal, I realized that I had forgotten our train and tour tickets! Luckily, we were able to hope in a cab that took us home and then to Grand Central and we arrived with plenty of time.

I decided to don a new and most unusual article of clothing for the trip, a yellow sweater with black poodles all over it that I had recently purchased at H&M. Here's a shot of it - I mean us! - on the train.

From First Anniversary Trip

The train ride up was arguably the most beautiful and most surprising part of the trip. The entire trip is right along the Hudson River with beautiful views of the fall colors on the west bank. Here are a couple of shots I took through the train window:

From First Anniversary Trip

From First Anniversary Trip

The itinerary for our trip had us arriving in Poughkeepsie, NY at around 9:30am, boarding a bus, and visiting 4 sites for about 1 hour each before returning later. The four sites were: a cheese farm, a quaint little downtown called Millbrook, NY, an apple orchard, and a winery.

We had expected it to be a small group of like-minded New Yorkers just looking to escape the hustle and bustle for a day. Well, we got everything right except the small part. When we arrived, there were over 150 people and 4 full-size coach buses to carry us all!! That's New York for you, crowded EVERYWHERE!

Nonetheless, we boarded the bus and headed to the cheese farm first. I'll tell the rest of this story in mostly photos.

We made some friends:

From First Anniversary Trip

This goat had a cold and kept weezing, it was cute!

From First Anniversary Trip

The lady said she wasn't sure what this bird was called but only knew that it is Polish....you don't say!

From First Anniversary Trip

Rastafarian sheep!

Next, we headed to downtown Millbrook where most of our time was spent in a bar watching football and grabbing a bite to eat!

A pretty tree we saw on the way:

From First Anniversary Trip

From First Anniversary Trip

Next stop, the apple orchard!

From First Anniversary Trip

He thinks my tractor's sexy...

From First Anniversary Trip

Ready to go!

From First Anniversary Trip

Sadly, the harvest came really early this year, so this is my "where are them apples?" pose!

From First Anniversary Trip

Taylor took charge of the hunting and gathering (spotting and picking?)

From First Anniversary Trip

From First Anniversary Trip

And he got one!

From First Anniversary Trip

This one is for my mom, especially the bright red tree in front!

From First Anniversary Trip

6 lbs of apples later became...My first ever apple pie!!!

From Fall 2010

From Fall 2010

I included the pre-cooking photo because it looked so much better and I forgot to take a photo before digging into it. It turned out really well if I do say so myself!!

Our final stop was a winery where we got a very good tour of the facilities and some yummy upstate New York wines:

From First Anniversary Trip

From First Anniversary Trip

Taylor was very proud of this reflection shot.

From First Anniversary Trip

Barrels and then in the case above them is what the inside of a used barrel looks like.

From First Anniversary Trip

Lovely sunset on the way home

From First Anniversary Trip

If you look on the island in this photo, you can see the frame of a building. It was a hollowed-out, crumbling castle and look SO COOL

All in all, a VERY fun day! :)

NYC Marathon Day!!

Long time no blog, I know I know. Today is most certainly blog-worthy, it's NYC Marathon Day!!

Taylor and I had several friends, co-workers, and teammates (Team In Training and the Covenant House Home Team, who we ran Chicago with) who were running the race. To commemorate the occasion, Taylor and I invited some friends over for brunch and to watch the race. I made a yummy (if I do say so myself) breakfast casserole and some potatoes and then we had mimosas.

The New York Marathon is actually kind of interesting in that they start people over the course of an hour and a half just to make sure the course isn't too crowded. It works really well, but makes for a LONG day of spectator-ing :) Luckily, the course goes RIGHT by our apartment, so it's super easy to cheer and hop back inside for food or to use the bathroom.

So, we started the day by going out and watching the Elite Women:

From NYC Marathon 2010

and the Elite Men:

From NYC Marathon 2010

pass near our apartment (Mile 17 of the race). We were shocked when the elite men went by not to see Haile Gebrselassie, the world record holder in the marathon and most touted runner this year. I just looked online to see that he actually dropped out of the race on the Queensboro Bridge, and has since (in the last 3 hours) retired from the sport of running altogether. This isn't surprising since supposedly he's 37 years old but he looks more like 60! I was bummed, though, because I had hoped to see him run.

The other big story for the elite runners was that an American woman, Shalane Flanagan, in her marathon debut (as in, this was not her first New York City Marathon, it was her first marathon, period.) placed second. SECOND, that's amazing!

So after we watched the elite runners go by and then returned to our apartment to watch them finish on TV and to eat brunch, we went back out to watch our friends and all the rest of the "normal" people pass. Here are some highlights:


Edison Pena (circled, in white between the two people in yellow), one of the Chilean Miners who was stuck underground for 69 days this year. I can't find his final results, but apparently he had to stop shortly after I took this photo to get some ice on a knee injury he incurred underground. It was really inspiring to see.

Taylor, Susie and I cheering!

From NYC Marathon 2010

My friend Lauren just after I got a hug from her. She looked and was doing great and killed her 4 hour goal by 5 minutes! Great job Lauren!!

From NYC Marathon 2010

A chicken

From NYC Marathon 2010

A rhino


Jared Fogle, from Subway (circled, in a black hat)!

From NYC Marathon 2010

Taylor's boss Jim and the President of Covenant House, Kevin, in the background in the same shirt.

From NYC Marathon 2010

A nice little emotional moment. Kevin hugging Peggy, an old friend who was out cheering with us.

From NYC Marathon 2010

Taylor and Peggy cheering!

All in all a very fun day :) Now it's time to watch the Lions beat the Jets (sorry honey) and relax!

UPDATE: In typical Lions fashion, they did NOT beat the Jets! :(