Dad and Daughter Weekend

God bless America and God bless three day weekends. I don’t know why I said the latter; I just came back from vacation.

I hope you all had a wonderful weekend and a lovely Memorial Day to my fellow Americans. As always, it’s nice to have a day off, but it is essential to remember why we do. Thank you to all the men and women who sacrificed their lives so that we could live ours freely and joyfully.

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Let’s catch up!

Friday

Up and at ’em early for my physical therapy internship! Brought to you by overnight oats in a jar.

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I’ve been adding chia seeds to the mix, and they increase the doughiness factor by at least 50%. I totally made that up, but chia seeds = thicker overnight oats = even better texture.

Lunch was eaten in the parking lot after my internship. It was tuna salad I had made that morning (with Greek yogurt, mustard, honey, olive topping, paprika, and black pepper) on mixed greens, alongside 34 Degrees cracked pepper crackers from Blend.

Cracked pepper crackers that are like crack.

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I saw my partner in crime (Daliza) on Friday night! I greeted her with egg yolk dripping down my face/hands/arms as I ate this for dinner:

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Once you break the yolk, there’s no turning back. You just have to inhale the rest of the toast so you don’t lose the dippy goodness.

P.S. I’m going to convince Daliza to do another vlog with me!

Saturday

I slept in and made a rather patriotic breakfast for Dad and myself— Greek yogurt with blueberries, raspberries, banana, cinnamon, nutmeg, stevia, chia seeds, a leftover whole wheat banana pancake, and Nuttzo power fuel.

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I don’t remember everything I did on Saturday, but I do know that I finally decided to unpack my luggage, did some moves with a leg strength circuit, and attended Mass. I also ate some delicious things in the afternoon!

Lunch was a salad with homemade tahini dressing, leftover pork chop (buried under there), and a sweet potato with melted garlic herb cheddar. Weird but YUM.

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I was feeling lunch dessert that day (…like every other day), so I broke into my stash of mint chocolate chunk Quest bars from Blend. I followed Aimee’s suggestion in my last post’s comments and microwaved it for exactly 23 seconds before topping it with peanut hazelnut butter.

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Yep, I’ll be doing that again! 🙂

Oh! I got new sneakers in the mail too! I won these in a huge raffle at the end of Blend retreat. Lucky for me, because I left my other sneakers in Boulder since they were so muddy from hiking all week.

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Thanks, Wellcoin and Puma!

After Mass, Pop and I went to my favorite Japanese restaurant for dinner! I went with the classic sushi combo that comes with yellowtail, tuna, and eel avocado rolls. All gone into my tummy.

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The waiter also surprised us with a complimentary dessert! Chocolate souffle cake with raspberry ice cream. Ohmahgoodness. I know I say I don’t like chocolate that much, but this was dreamy.

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Pop and I hunkered down for the night and watched not one, but two movies— The Giver and Macfarland USA. I totally loved both!

Sunday

Another sleep-in day, another breakfast for Pop and myself. I hadn’t eaten cookie dough cereal in a long time, so it wasn’t difficult to choose what I wanted that morning.

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I cleaned the floors on Sunday, and look at this horror.

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This is a picture of cleaning done in the highest shoe-traffic area of our house, but still, yuck! (Two-year-old word, I know.) You don’t really notice the dirt until you get down and scrub.

Moves involved yoga and a quick walk around the neighborhood. The weather was perfection!

I babysat at night and actually enjoyed my snack-time-esque dinner.

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I brought all the snacks myself, except for the cheese 🙂 (I was given permission.)

Monday

Pop and I started our Memorial Day with Mass and the local Memorial Day parade.

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Then we headed back home to cook and eat for the rest of the afternoon! Pop and I have never grilled without mom being around, since she is Mrs. Chefmaster Hospitality. But we had a successful cookout, I’d say! I shopped for the food, prepped it, and then left the grilling for Pop. He nailed it.

We had simple beef burgers with garlic herb cheddar and caramelized onions + tons of grilled vegetables. We also ate outstanding grilled shrimp using this marinade recipe.

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glass o’ vino in hand, what a natural
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Having a BBQ for two people also means lots of leftovers for the week!

Moves included grooving to music in the kitchen and a two mile neighborhood walk. I see a tan emerging!

After eating more of grilled goodies for dinner, we ended the night on a sweet note, as every night should end in my book. I macerated some fresh strawberries in lemon juice and honey for a few hours, and then we ate those on top of vanilla bean ice cream with a slice of the blueberry poppyseed mini loaf from Flagstaff House in Colorado!

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Me: I macerated some strawberries.

Dad: That sounds like it hurts.

[5 minutes later]

Dad: What did you say you did with these? Masqueraded?

Me: No, macerated. But masquerading them sounds fun.

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Hope you all have a great day! Clean your floors perhaps, eat string cheese, and say thank you to more people. *Also, stay tuned for an awesome giveaway later today!*

So tell me:

One productive thing you did this weekend.

One fun thing you did this weekend!

Do your floors ever get this dirty? We clean them often, I swear.

Americans, what did you eat for Memorial Day? 

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House Project Weekend

Hey!

Despite the weekend posting, I haven’t been updating you on what’s been moving and grooving over here the past few days. It’s been hectic, but marvelous-hectic.

MiMM

Linking up with Mrs. Marvelous herself— Katie!

Thursday

We’re starting all the way from Thursday this time! Thursday is like the new addition to the weekend, right? Anticipation for Friday?

Moves: A lower body workout with pistol squats, Bulgarian split squats, sumo squats, and elevated bridges. I used light weights, but my legs were still trembling! Totally not used to anything but bodyweight…

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How I feel at the bottom of a pistol squat

I babysat for a few hours, during which I walked down memory lane (aka Sesame Street), picked up chicken nugget pieces, and chased around this cute little munchkin.

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Later, mom and I went to church, and then I got crafty.

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My aunt gave me the nice frame, which came with a code for a free collage that I could create online, and I made the pink poster myself. Mom said my poster was “crusty” due to the good ol’ Elmer’s glue. I say it’s rustic!

Friday

This past Friday could also be known as “move ALL THE THINGS day” in our house. Not only was I finally starting to pack clothes and books for college, but mom and I moved all the furniture and objects from the rooms upstairs to the main floor. This happened because mom is renovating the rooms with some new floors and painted walls. The current 12-year-old stained carpets and scraped walls just aren’t that cute anymore.

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Sorry the panda pillow pet is mooning you

In the process of getting something from the top shelf of my closet, I bonked my head really hard on the edge of the door post. I have a hard head, but I stepped up quite quickly and forcefully, so it hurt pretty badly. There’s a tender bump on my skull, but now I have an excuse if I start acting giddy and loopy!

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Ice ice baby

Some walking and fresh air helped!

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My quads were toast from my workout the day before, so walking down the stairs at the park was the hardest part of my day. Going down is deceivingly difficult with sore legs! It was even more comfortable walking uphill than walking on a level path.

Saturday

More furniture moving and treasure-finding while organizing our things {treasures = a bunch of cookbooks}!

Moves: unscrewing things from the walls (serious arm workout with those stubborn screws!), moving furniture, pushups, and an 8-minute ab tabata

After I ran some errands, mom and I went to choose the new paint color for the walls. We got a color called “Beach House,” so I’m hoping it feels tropical in here when I get back from chilly Boston. 😉

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I went out to dinner with my friends that night and we had some awesome laughs and conversations. I had a monster Thai Chicken salad that was drowned in sauce, so the dressing was completely unnecessary.

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We had a fun night!

Sunday

7 hours of painting.

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Paint in my hair, paint in my eyelashes, paint in my underwear.

A break was taken to nourish ourselves, buy extra paint brushes, and detour to buy ice cream for the apple pie we bought from a church fundraiser. Painting all day is tiring, so I’d say this was a well-deserved treat!

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Although, I still would have had it whether I painted all day or not.

Now that our rooms are all filled with paint fumes, we’re having a slumber party in the basement! I think the fumes already started affecting me though, because I was extra giggly last night. Or maybe it’s my head still.

Hope y’all have a great Monday!

So tell me:

One thing you did this weekend!

Have you done any house projects recently?

What were your moves this weekend?

Egg-Celent Weekend

I had to.

I know you’re cringing at the pun “egg-celent,” but it’s quite an accurate adjective to describe my weekend. Lots of great company, delicious food (including EGGS of course), and lots of my weird antics per usual.

MiMM

‘Twas marvelous! Linking up with the fabulous Katie 🙂

Friday

I successfully did Susie’s prom makeup in the morning! It took a few tries, but she looked gorgeous, if I do say so myself.

We had our senior picnic on Thursday, and next up was our fancy shmancy senior luncheon. We ate good food and signed each other’s “Class of 2014” pennants (those flag thingies), which was fun just because you felt like a celebrity signing your autograph 100 times. There was also a chocolate fountain, so that was a hit…for the people that actually really like chocolate.

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Who uses that “inside the plate rim” rule anyway? I cleaned that plate right up.

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“Core Four”

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Chorus buds

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CHEESE!

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Stunning Sam (aka salutatorian!)

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The fountain of youth

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I wasn’t feelin’ that chocolate though. Except for the brownie.

Since my principal wanted my commencement speech draft sent to him by Saturday, I spent most of my afternoon and evening (after a nice, long nap) finishing that sucker. I grooved so hard when I practiced it and found that it was not too long and not too short. Hallelujah!

My moves were little bursts of 20 air squats, 20 pushups, 20 sit-ups, and 10 burpees (5 rounds total for the 100 challenge) every time I needed a mental break from speech-writing.

Saturday

Woke up late, moves were a ton of handstands, cleaned, went to church, and babysat all night!

I did have a killer lunch that day:

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English muffin with avocado and sunny eggs + sriracha. PARTY IN MY MOUTH!

This made me sad though:

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Not even because it got on my laptop (we already know that’s a usual occurrence), but because I wasn’t able to dip my bread in the yolky goodness since it didn’t land on my plate.

Judge me.

Oh, and when I babysat, one of the boys asked me to read this book to him twice:

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LOL.

It’s a Spanish dialect called Catalan. It’s like Latin + French + Spanish all in one. I did my best, but let’s just say it’s a good thing they were not harsh critics. I feel like I may have accidentally cursed in a different language, considering the way I was trying to pronounce some of those words.

Sunday

Father’s Day!

I woke up bright and early to make dad a special breakfast: DSC_8592

Kale, onion, mushroom, swiss frittata. More eggs!

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I sorta winged it with the frittata, using some online recipes for guidelines, but it was super tasty! I’ll probably post the recipe later.

I totally scraped off and ate all the crispy, flavorful bits from the bottom of the cast iron skillet after mom put the rest of the frittata away. She asked me: “Are your eating the charcoal?” Yes, ma, I’m eating charcoal.

Moves: Jess’ Lean Legs workout. I haven’t done this in forever, but I remembered how much I love it. Love to hate it, that is.

Apparently my quads were starving afterwards, because I housed a Hugh Jass lunch (even with a big breakfast and pre-workout snack).

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Sautéed kale, mushroom, chicken with garlic and some leftover steak+potato hash

This was only ⅔ of it. I finished the other ⅓ when my plate wasn’t so full. I think I satisfied my protein intake for the next two days with this meal.

Then I had a lovely catch-up session with my good friend, Anushka! We chatted over some vanilla ice cream 🙂

Dad decided that he wanted to go to Bareburger for dinner, so we went there for a late dinner and final Father’s Day celebration. I got a lighter meal since my lunch consisted of a whole farm.

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Walnut apple salad with applewood-smoked bacon and goat cheese (mmmm) + quinoa veggie burger

It was delicious! I also had a bite of my mom’s classic beef burger, which was awesome.

WOW that was a jam-packed weekend, now that I’m blogging about it. This was a random, long post again….sorry. Tomorrow I have a short post with a VLOG though! 😀

Have a marvelous Monday, friends!

So tell me:

What was the last thing you ate that was a party in your mouth?

What is your favorite way to eat eggs?

What did you do yesterday?

Feelin’ Lucky {MIMM #28}

Good morning and…

Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

Fun fact: St. Patrick’s original associated color was actually blueSo if you accidentally wear blue today, you can tell people that.

I hope you all had a fun weekend filled with some luck and {root} beer (as my Economics teacher says)! I wouldn’t say my  weekend was filled {root} beer, but it was definitely filled with loads of smiles, tears, and delicious food, which always makes me feel lucky. And marvelous!

MiMM

We’re lucky to have Katie as the fabulous host of MIMM!

It’s becoming one of the most (if not, THE most) hectic times of year with school, dance, and church events, so it’s easy to overlook all the blessings right in front of me. We’re all doing ten things at once at any point in the day, but it’s a wonderful thing to just reflect on all the things we’re blessed to have. So here’s to all the blessings from this weekend! But for the sake of St. Paddy’s day, we’ll just say lucky. 🙂

Friday

We were lucky to have a chilly, but absolutely gorgeous day on Friday. I couldn’t fathom the idea of cooping up in the gym for a workout, so I opted for a refreshing outdoor workout.

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Moves consisted of several plyo exercises (jumping jacks, high knees, burpees, jump lunges/squats) and different variations of pushups. I took sufficient breaks and took it easy, but it was nice to get the blood flowing in the great outdoors… of my backyard.

I’m lucky that coconut oil tastes good. I tried that trendy oil pulling technique (inspired by Gina and Katie) on Thursday. Basically, you swish around a vegetable oil in your mouth for about 20 minutes every day, and it’s supposed to aid in teeth whitening, gum health, and have some other health benefits. I’m in it for the teeth whitening. I still haven’t done it again since Thursday though…

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Let’s face it. Swishing oil in your mouth for twenty minutes is kinda nasty.

I’m lucky to have had another smooth evening babysitting my company director’s little guy. I fed and changed him, and then he went to sleep in no time. All I had to do was check on him every once in a while, watch Youtube videos, read blogs, and do homework. Is that what motherhood will be like?? 😉

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I’m also lucky that they had watermelon popsicles in their freezer.

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Yeah, I raided their freezer (with permission).

Saturday

I’m lucky to have peanut butter, oatmeal, and Greek yogurt. As if I haven’t made that very clear.

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I’m lucky to have lunches on the go. This was eaten at dance: spinach salad with curry chicken and grapes + BelVita biscuits.

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I’m lucky to have a dad who loves taco night as much as I do. We had a fiesta in honor of St. Patrick’s Day because we’re multicultural like that.

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Whole wheat tortilla, lean ground beef, cabbage, avocado, cheese, cilantro, pineapple salsa, and squeeze of lime.

It had beef and cabbage, so it’s sort of like corned beef and cabbage, right?

Sunday

I’m lucky to have 14 dance company girls and an amazing company director who made my last company rehearsal EVER pretty darn great. My feet hurt and we were sweaty beasts, but I’m glad to have spent it with such beautiful, hilarious, loving ladies. I didn’t cry, but the waterworks are guaranteed to come during our last show in less than two weeks.

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I WON’T CRY NOW.

I’m lucky to have a dad who will run to the store to pick up some buttermilk for Irish soda bread. I’m a huge fan of the stuff, so of course I had to make some for St. Patrick’s day! I used this recipe (I used half whole wheat flour), which is a fun twist on the traditional Irish soda bread with raisins. This one has dried apricots and orange zest!

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Sample with some buttah. The crispy crust— DUDE.

Lucky. Lucky. Luckkkkyyy. I’ve been saying it in my head a billion times, so now it has lost its meaning and it sounds weird.

I hope you all have a great day!

So tell me:

Did you do anything for St. Patrick’s Day this weekend?

What is your favorite St. Paddy’s food?

Ever tried oil pulling?

What are you feelin’ lucky about?

Almond French Toast + Weekend at Binghamton {MIMM #24}

Happy President’s Day!

Hi, guys!

I hope you all had a fun Valentine’s Day and a restful weekend. I have a crapton of marvelous things to share with you all from this weekend, so let’s get to it!

MiMM

Thank you to Katie for another marvelous linkup!

A lot of bloggers have been recapping their awesome V-day happenings, and I’ve been commenting on them about what my Valentine’s plans looked like:

French toast for breakfast

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To make this:

  1. Whisk one egg. Mix in a splash of milk (enough to turn the egg a pale yellow color), dash of cinnamon + nutmeg, and a scant ¼ tsp. of almond extract. Pour mixture into a shallow dish.
  2. Heat up a skillet on medium-high heat.
  3. Soak 2 slices of hearty bread (day old/dried out preferably) in the mixture for about 30-40 seconds on each side.
  4. Add a small pat of butter or coconut oil into your heated skillet and add in the slices of bread. Cook for 3-4 minutes per side.
  5. Meanwhile, cut half a banana lengthwise and sear on the sides of the skillet along with the bread. About a minute per side.
  6. Repeat steps 3 and 4 with two more slices of bread (or however many slices until the egg mixture is all used up).
  7. Serve with desired toppings! (I love mine with a dollop of Greek yogurt, nut butter, and a drizzle of maple syrup.)

This was my Valentine’s Day gift to myself and it rocked my socks off. Thanks, Alison. You’re welcome, Alison.

Homemade cinnamon rolls (This recipe for the rolls [minus the egg— I don’t think you need it!] This recipe for the frosting)

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I couldn’t find our rolling pin, so I just used my mom’s pestle and wrapped it in wax paper. Gotta do what ya gotta do.

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These definitely turned out JUMBO-sized, but as Sir Mix-a-lot and Arman said, “I like big buns…and I cannot lie.” They did sink a little once they cooled though. I didn’t actually have a whole one with frosting and all until last night, and mannnnn was it dreamy. Like the recipe says, they really do taste like Cinnabon! 

Babysitting

The only stressful part about this was driving to the house because of all the snow (and I got lost), but otherwise, this guy was the cutest Valentine’s date ever. He was also the most well-behaved baby I’ve ever taken care of! I even got to do yoga after he went to sleep. Yeah, I did yoga at someone else’s house. Guatever. It was my dance director’s place, so it’s not THAT weird.

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{I received his mom’s permission to post this}

I believe Valentine’s Day was a success!

Early Saturday morning, my mom and I hit the slushy, snowy roads for Vestal, NY since this weekend was Binghamton University’s admitted students day!

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Pre-driving fuel: Greek yogurt (I go through containers like it’s my job), half sliced banana, leftover French toast, chia, hemp, sunflower seed butter

It was really not a good time to be on the roads, but the police cars, salt trucks, and ten other travelers on the road kept us company. Luckily, Binghamton is not terribly far from where we live, so we made it there in fair time.

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After checking into our hotel, we found a Vietnamese restaurant through Yelp called Nhu Y that was about 30 steps away, so we ate lunch there. We needed some pho to hit the spot on such a dreary day.

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Mom and I shared a bowl of beef meatball pho and a lemongrass chicken dish that was delicious! Binghamton isn’t really known for having the most amazing food, but this wasn’t bad at all.

After lunch, we veg-ed out in our room. When I finally had an ounce of motivation to get out of those fluffy hotel beds, I went to the hotel exercise room to do something.

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There weren’t many options, so I just did a 45-minute incline walk on the treadmill while watching the Olympics. By the way, workout selfies will forever make me uncomfortable. Check out that mini lion-mane.

The rest of our evening consisted of Mass at the Binghamton Catholic center (so lovely!), a sushi dinner, and late-night shopping at an awesome supermarket called Wegmans. We actually went a little crazy at Wegmans because it was like Target + Trader Joe’s in one. A dangerous duo (imagine me saying that in an Australian accent).

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Beautiful Mass as the snow softly fell outside— it felt like Christmas!

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Vestal sushi is sub-par since we’re so spoiled with the sushi around our area.

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We’re bread hoarders. (We freeze them for later.)

The next day was the Binghamton University Open House!

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Hotel breakfast: Oatmeal square, nut bar, orange

The parking and check-in were very well-organized, which is much appreciated. My favorite part of the whole day was probably the Welcome session though. One of the all-male a cappella groups called “The Crosbies” entertained us while we waited for the event to start. They are incredibly talented and hilarious entertainers!

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At 11:00, they introduced the BU President to make the welcoming address. Apparently, university presidents are superstars.

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Dying to shake hands with him 😉

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After his speech, along with a few others from different faculty members/students, we were allowed to break into different groups to attend sessions that interested us. Since it was FREEZING outside and I had already taken a campus tour in August, I passed on that. I decided on a general information session and the Harpur College of Arts and Sciences session.

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Of course, we tested out the campus food at lunch too.

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Sandwich made to order (chicken breast, roasted red peppers, muenster cheese, lettuce, tomato on whole wheat) + minestrone soup

My meal was not too shabby, but the options in this dining hall seemed a lot more limited compared to that of University of Maryland. Other items available in this particular dining hall yesterday included pizza, made to order omelets and pancakes, savory breakfast/brunch foods, typical cafeteria hot foods (fried chicken sandwiches, burgers, etc.), and a salad bar.

Overall, my experience at the open house neither deterred me from Binghamton nor drew me to it. These are the main points I concluded from the weekend:

Pros: distance from home, value/price, community

Cons: academic programs may not be the best for my interest (physical therapy as of now), location is sort of out there

My mom and I agree that Binghamton University will probably not be the place for me. Right now, I think Maryland and Virginia are my top choices, and I’m visiting both in April. We shall see!

Ok, wow. Are you still reading this? 

This was definitely a longer post than usual, and most of you probably couldn’t care less about my college experience, but this weekend was definitely important in helping me discern my college decision.

Wait, I’m not done actually. So Blend Retreat 2014 tickets went on sale last night, and my mom and I are seriously considering going this year! If you don’t know what the Blend (blogger + friend = blend) Retreat is, it’s a blogger/blog-reader weekend retreat during which the attendees get to hang out, get active, get swag bags, and just have FUN. I’ve seen some of my favorite bloggers attend in the past, and I can only imagine how amazing it would be to meet them in person!

You have no idea how excited I was to find out that my parents were on board with the trip. I could technically go by myself (I will have turned 18 just a week before the retreat— score), but my mom is totally up for going as well. The only thing that’s keeping us from registering right now is school. I have exams the Monday after we get back, and I’m just not sure if I could afford to go on a trip that weekend. It just depends on which subjects the exams are for, because then I can gauge how much pre-retreat-studying I should do. Schoooooool.

K, I’m done. Have a marvelous Monday, everyone 🙂

So tell me:

Tell me three things you did this weekend!

Are you planning on going to the Blend Retreat?!