Aaron and I grew up visiting New Orleans on occasion when we were kids. It was a destination to bring out of town guests and a way view Louisiana culture first hand. Yung and I flew there last week to stay with Aaron for a few days. It was my first time spending more than 48 hours in the city, and also the first time I clogged up a toilet. Yes, ya’ll. Aaron is now the proud owner of 3 plungers, and we are all experts at toilet unclogging. It took 12 hours to solve (A REAL conundrum), and I don’t think the toilet has ever been cleaner.

Other than our bathroom fun, we did some touristy things and had some yummy food. There is so much more to New Orleans besides the French Quarter, and we enjoyed getting to know the city a little better. Miraculously, we ran 3/4 of the days we visited in Audubon Park. I am obsessed with big oak trees with Spanish moss. New Orleans also happens to be a very colorful city. Has anyone else noticed that? I loved seeing the brightly colored homes with large porches surrounded by lush greenery.

A good portion of our time was spent checking out restaurants, and here are some favorites that we tried during our trip:

• Cafe Du Monde: You cannot (or should not) leave New Orleans without eating beignets and drinking cafe au lait. Cafe Du Monde is in the heart of the French Quarter, and a great option for an out of this world fried donut experience.
• Morning Call: My preferred location to get beignets. Right inside City Park, and adjacent to the sculpture garden.
• Pierre Maspero’s: We ate here in the French Quarter, and it was actually pretty good. Southern Creole at its best. Really delicious pistoulettes. A bit over priced, but expected, as it is right in the tourist hub.
• Parasol’s: Poboys! Really delicious.
• Kin: Teeny little ramen restaurant.
• Dong Phuong Bakery: Omg ya’ll. Here’s what happened, we went in, got some pate chaud (if you’re like me and didn’t know what a pate chaud is…go straight to Dong Phuong), ate them all in our car, and then ran in to get more.
• District Donuts: We had breakfast here, but we’ve heard the sliders are good too.
• Rue de la Course: Cool coffee shop
• Willie Mae’s Scotch House: Not fried chicken for the poor, but actually pretty decent.
• Hansen’s Sno Bliz: Snow cones! Expect a line. They have very unique fruit flavors. And try the grapefruit and coconut!
• Atomic Burger: This looks like In and Out vs Sonic vs Whataburger, but it is not! We tried the slider box, so we tasted all the different burgers. Fries are GOOD! Edamame is available for those that are watching their figure.

Thanks for a great time, NOLA. Catch you on the flip side.

XOXO

Yung and I spent last week in New York City, and I can’t wait to share some stories and tips with you. We originally booked the trip to visit Nicole, who freakin graduated from NYU business school–what a rockstar! I was also so happy to see Nicole’s mom and have her meet Yung. We got lot of recommendations from friends and travel blogs on what to do in NYC.  Since it was Yung’s first time in the city, we had to hit up all the touristy places and also did some exploring on our own. 

 It happened to be SWELTERING hot (like 90s) on the few days we were there, and on the day we left, it was 60. Weather can definitely impact my mood, but we didn’t let it get us down. 

Here are the places that we visited:

Times Square

Grand Central Terminal

The Today Show

Rockefeller Plaza

Trump Tower

Soho

The Plaza Hotel

Central Park

Washington Square Park

Chelsea Market

The Highline

World Trade Center

Brooklyn Bridge

Brooklyn Bridge Park

Jane’s Carousel

The iconic Friends apartment

Bryant Park

Chinatown

East Village 

The verdict: 

The touristy places are fun, but overwhelmed with people. I seriously have been experiencing a bit of culture shock coming back to Dallas and seeing normal sized bathrooms and streets that are not swarmed with individuals. We accidentally stumbled upon East Village and it seems like a fun neighborhood. We always like to hypothesize if we would live in cities that we visit. I think after the initial shock of foot and car traffic and the sheer volume of people, we’ve decided that yes, we could maybe live in NYC, but just not in the hub of craziness. Yung loved the diversity of culture + people and the feeling of togetherness. 

Good eats:

We take food very seriously, and everyone kept saying how delicious the food is in New York. We tried a lot of places, so I will just include my recommendations on places I’d definitely return to!

PS. We didn’t mean to, but we ate a lot of Asian food. 

Shanghai Asian Manor (soup dumplings!!)

Apotheke (a cool speakeasy on the oldest street in Chinatown)

Totto Ramen

Doughnut Plant (Very unique flavors and so delicious at 2am)

Real Kung Foo Little Steamed Dumplings Ramen (we only had dumplings there, and I am now kicking myself for not trying their noodles)

The Meatball Shop

Buvette (FYI, this is right by the Friends apartment)

Luzzo’s Pizza

Chelsea Market (we didn’t eat here because we stumbled on it accidentally and had just eaten, but I’d love to go back to eat some hand pulled noodles that I saw)

Zundo ya Ramen

Xian Famous Foods (hand pulled noodles!!!!! Can you see a trend?)

Milk Bar (try the corn flake crunch on whichever flavor of soft serve you order. Next time, I am getting the birthday cake soft serve with sprinkles + crunch. yum!)

Levain Bakery (cookies! We ate a bite at the bakery and they were gooey and warm. They are just as delicious at midnight.)

Prince Street Pizza

99 cent pizza in East Village (the best!!!!)

The Original Halal Guys (didn’t eat here because we were full/we eat there in Dallas often, but I am totally regretting it now, because it smelled amazing)

We desperately tried to find delicious NYC hot dogs, but decided that Sam’s hotdogs are the bomb.com and you just can’t deny it. Same with pizza. This was a close one. We got a lot of pizza recs, but I think the 99 cent pizza takes the cake. 

We were not planning on seeing a show, but a few days before our trip, we attemped to buy Book of Mormon tickets, only to discover that they were much more than we wanted to spend. We decided to try our luck at the daily lottery that they hold a couple hours before the show. We arrived at 4:30pm and put our names in a drawing, and learned that they planned to give away 13 reduced price ($32, y’all!), FRONT ROW tickets. We didn’t think we had a shot. There were a LOT of people hoping to get their name picked. Funnily enough, my name was the second name drawn, but the first tickets handed out, because the first name didn’t show up. We were super surprised and excited! I pretty much went into this musical not knowing anything about the plot, and I’d love to hear your thoughts on the show. We were definitely entertained, and I would recommend this show if you are ever in the city. 

I also dragged Yung out of bed at 6am on our 1st full day to go to The Today Show! He was such a trooper, even though I know deep down, he could have used 3 more hours of sleep. We had a lot of fun, but truthfully, it was a pretty sleepy Wednesday morning in Rockefeller Plaza. We did shake hands with Al Roker, so it was all worth it in the end. Pro Tip: get breakfast at Bouchon Bakery, right across from The Today Show, and you can sit at the window and watch the action with a pastry.

Well, my feet are tired (no, I didn’t go for a single run the entire trip, but I know we walked about a bajillion miles each day), so I will leave you with a few tips:

-Wear tennis shoes. I gave up wearing cute shoes (and also cute clothes for that matter-it was way too hot) on day 2.5 and just stuck with tennis shoes for the rest of the  week. 

-Eat only a small portion at each meal and/or share with your travel friends. This will enable you to eat a greater variety and try more things. 

-Map out what you want to do/see before hand. Either use google maps or draw it out on paper. This will eliminate back tracking and save time. 

-Walk or take the subway when you can. We walked if our destination was less than 2 miles away, but took train if it was further. We only took an Uber to the airport.

-Stay somewhere that will enable you to hop on the train easily, or someplace close to a destination you know you’ll want to visit time and time again. We stayed at The Roosevelt.

NYC, you are a bit crazy and congested, but we love you anyway. Until next time!

Check out some cool night shots of our trip on Yung’s instagram here.

xoxo hand-pulled-noodle-lover (Me!).

Happening lately

Life has certainly been happening in our neck of the woods. We are gearing up to kick off summer with some fun travels and lofty fitness goals. I’ve been feeling very up and down since the new year started. We are living in marital bliss, but I had been experiencing a state of un-motivation, when I usually am more of a go-go-go let’s do a million things in one day and feel really accomplished type of rhythm. I feel like I am constantly behind, and trying to catch up. I’ve learned that I am 30 and eating more and not exercising equals weight gain.  Turns out when you stop moving, the clothes stop fitting. So I’ve started swimming, biking, and running, because I’m a crazy person and I’m doing a triathalon in July. Who’s with me?!

Currently eating

Mostly healthy because we are going to New York City and New Orleans this month. My goal is to carve out some time to do some running while we are gone. We have been cooking and trying to meal plan, so if anyone has any suggestions, please share! I aim to be the meal plan queen, but I am in need of major help.

Currently drinking

Water with lemon. All day every day. We busted open a wedding gift recently when we hosted Mother’s Day brunch. It’s a drink dispenser that we made fruit water in and it was so yummy. I may just keep it out for every day use.

Currently wearing

Lots of big t shirts and stretchy pants.  And shorts. Summer has arrived in Texas!

Currently reading

Back on our trips in March and April, I read Big Little Lies and Tempting Fate. I would recommend both. I keep saying this to myself, but I need to get my booty to the library to get a card. I would love your recommendations for new books to read.

Currently watching

I finished watching Big Little Lies and enjoyed it. It was fun to see the book come to life. I am way behind in the times, but I just started watching The Good Wife and Army Wives, and I’m loving both shows. I have also watched the first few episodes of The Handmaid’s Tale and it completely eeeks me out. Should I read the book?

My Facebook memories have reminded me that I finished my Master’s about 3 years ago, and it is so fun to reminisce with old photos.

Wishing you a happy week! Tell me what you have been up to!

XO Connie

Part 2 of our Oklahoma trip consisted of spending a couple days in Beaver’s Bend State Park. It is a quaint spot with plenty of hiking trails and outdoorsy things to do. We stayed at the Lakeview Lodge, and all the rooms overlook Broken Bow Lake, which was really nice. There were hiking trails two feet away,  a small playground for the kiddos (or for the kids at heart), and picnic tables for those who like to eat outside.

During our journey, we saw plenty of locals coming down for a few days of R & R, and also from Kansas, which is just north of Oklahoma. Our favorite part of the trip was finding some delicious food along the way. We had the best pizza (try the chicken/spinach/roasted garlic/white sauce (homemade ranch!) Pepperoni is good too. I could eat this every day!) at Grateful Head and enjoyed a delicious meal at Moon Tower, which is owned by Executive Chef Tabb Singleton (winner of Chopped).

We are savoring our adventures together during this newlywed season <3

XO

Read about Part 1: Pioneer Woman Mercantile here.

Hi ya’ll! We just got back from a quiet week in Oklahoma where we visited the Pioneer Woman Mercantile and spent a few days in Beavers Bend State Park.

You may remember that I am a big Pioneer Woman fan, as I have met her not once, but twice at her book signings. The Mercantile opened in Pawhuska, OK last fall around our wedding, and I have been dying to visit ever since.

My sweet husband was kind enough to drive us a whole 5 hours there, and we had a great time exploring the little town. First, we waited in a line to get into the restaurant. It was about 3:30pm on a Monday, and the line moved very quickly. We tried the cowboy coffee, chips and queso, white spinach lasagna, fried porkchops, and tres leche cake with churros. The chips and queso were on point, but the dessert was by far the best part.  We had a croissant to go, and I was sorry we didn’t pick up a few extras.

After our tummies were full, we made our way around the retail store and browsed for gifts and goodies for our friends and families. Our final stop was the upstairs bakery//coffee shop//and candy bar where you can watch the bakers make delicious sweets through the windows and there is a nice seating area to enjoy your treats. It would be a fun place to meet a friend for a meal or a coffee and I wish we could transplant The Mercantile over to lil ole Dallas.

They are periodically offering tours of The Lodge, where the Pioneer Woman shows are filmed, but sadly, we missed the tour dates by about a week. That would have been the coolest thing ever.

Until next time!
Much love to the PW and all that she does.

XO.

Hello sweet friends + readers!! What a year it has been so far. Yung and I have been married a whopping F I V E months, and we can hardly believe it. We are settling into our new (old) home (we moved into the condo I’ve been living in for the past seven years), repairing things (old things break!), and trying to make it our own.

I am still having NIGHTMARES about our wedding. I dream about not having enough time to get ready and rushing through our timeline. The dreams usually occur after a particularly stressful week at work. I had one the day I was running over an hour behind in clinic.  I also still read wedding articles and started following wedding related Instagrams after the fact.

Maybe it comes with the territory? I hope this is normal.

Nonetheless, I am excited to finish wedding blogging so I can officially say au revoir and start making my wedding photo books.

Just getting used to this whole adulting thing. There are days when I just want to curl up with a good Beverly Cleary book and some pizza rolls and read and read. (I did this a lot as a kid). Aaron and I used to huddle by the window AC unit in our house and read Harry Potter together. I miss those days. We would also go swimming every afternoon and our mom would feed us bagel bites. Childhood staples.

Back to being an adult. I am married!! My husband, by the way, has been amazing. He fixes all the broken things and puts up with my mood swings (because apparently I have those now). Life is good. More to come.

Hope you have the happiest of weeks!

XO.

 

We are grateful to be spending our first married Christmas together (8 weeks and counting!). We hope you have been having a happy Christmas season with your loved ones.
XO,
Connie

Christmas card 2015
Christmas card 2014

I love having different groups of girl friends, and it is so important to reconnect with girl time periodically. The four of us found each other during nursing school, but wasn’t until after graduation that we decided to stick together like glue and paper. Beans and rice. Chips and queso. You get my drift 😉

Now, 9 years later, we have been through the gamut together. Amanda moved to Waco a couple years ago, and last week, we decided to road trip down there and have a slumber party at her house. We had an evening with lots of laughs and silliness. We also drove by the Palladium, where Amanda had her wedding reception 6 short years ago!

Waco will always hold a special place in my heart, because it is home to my alma mater, Baylor. In the last years, the city has gotten publicity because of our beloved Chip and Joanna and Magnolia Market. Waco is now home to Torchy’s Taco’s and Twisted Root, right across from the Baylor campus. So hip, and I am pretty jealous. Unfortunately, businesses still close by 6pm, so went on a driving tour and saw the Silos all decked out for Christmas from the car. I can’t wait to go back next time to visit when they are open. 

Hope you are all having a happy week before Christmas!

XO,
Connie