Goodbye Paradise (and bugs)

Hello friends!  I must quickly report that my mini vacation to St. Lucia was amazing.  My mom and I stayed at the StoneField Estate Villa Resort in St. Lucia in our own private villa (which was more like a house with 3 bedrooms and a private pool).  My mom has a sweet gig where she gets to travel for virtually no cost, and happened to win this particular hotel stay.  I was lucky enough to be her plus one.  We laughed our heads off when we got there and discovered that the whole resort (and the island for the most part) catered to honeymooners, and that we definitely were not.

Despite the romantic setting, we still had a great time.  It was so nice to get away and try to force ourselves to just do nothing.  With these kind of views from our resort nestled between the world famous Pitons, it wasn't too difficult to do.

The only part about St. Lucia that was NOT so great was the bugs.  The villas are basically open to all critters with only louvres (similar looking to shutters) with screens on some of the windows.  The resort is literally right in the jungle so we were serenaded to sleep by our own personal sound machine of crickets and who knows what else.  I laughed my head off after the first night when my mom recounted the fact that the bug she thought she had flicked off her bed the night before was sitting on the pillow next to her when she woke up.  EEEK!  We are talking a big cockroach style bug... not a little house fly.

Of course I lucked out to find something very similar to this creature in my closet the next day. 

I wish I was in the right frame of mind at the time to take a picture but I was seriously just too terrified to think of anything but running away and getting that disgusting, huge, furry thing out!  A little gardener man was outside our villa and I asked him to help us, so he of course casually walks in, goes right up to the fist sized fur ball and picks him up with a black garbage bag the way you pick up your dog's poop!  We almost died!

Needless to say, we both took sleeping pills the next night to get some rest. 

I have to show you some pictures of another resort we toured, the Jalousie Beach Resort.  If I had all the money in the world, here is where I would stay.  The decor and architecture of the resort were to die for.  I had to stop and take pictures in one of the lounge areas that led up to their formal dining room.  I wish my entire house was decorated like this.

 This antique pewter framed mirror looked perfect against the modern white vases and aged table.

 Check out the black and white checkered marble tiles.  Need I say more?  They are also lined in the corners of the room with dark walnut wood floors.  Swoon.

 I fell in love with this bookcase/ armoire!  The wood had a natural weathered look with cream linen fabric lining the glass panes. 

They had hanging beds in the lounge with the most unbelievable views overlooking the ocean.  Loveee the caning on this bed and the chairs in the lounge.

In my next life I will be a billionaire who has a house that is decorated like the Jalousie Beach Hotel, and a view from my back yard that looks like this:

Until then, I will enjoy all the free trips I can get with my momma.  She is amazing (and not just because of the travel perks).  I love you, mom!

Hello, Paradise

I am currently sitting in a lounge chair at the edge of a cliff overlooking the carribean sea below and gazing up at the petit piton to my left. If someone told me I was in fact dead and made it to heaven, I'd believe them. If you are unfamiliar with the Piton's as I was before we arrived, they are two huge mountains on the carribean island of St. Lucia. My sweet momma and I are here on a short 3 night getaway staying in an amazing little resort in our own private villa (surrounded by fresh mango and lime trees that we've been picking from).


I am realizing here how insanely busy and chaotic our lives in the USA are. It's been tough for me to just sit back and relax. I think we all need to be reminded somtimes to stop what we are doing, sit back, and just relax... Take a mental check of our selves and how we are doing. Heaven knows I need to! It took me traveling across the world to be reminded of that. Perhaps you have already learned this secret yourself.

Have a fabulous weekend!

Xoxo

Pw

Fabulous eats of San Francisco

Happy end of weekend, everyone.  I had a fabulous weekend that I just can't resist sharing with you.  My sweet friend and employer Kathie asked me to be sure to send her pictures of all the fun things we did and great food we ate on our planned vacation to NYC this weekend so that she could live vicariously through me.  What a funny gal. I'm hoping to give each of you a mini vacation vicariously through ours as well. Unfortunately we didn't make it to NYC since we were travelling standby on my mom's flight benefits and it was a sold out flight (she works for the best airline, jetBlue) but we went with our next best option of San Francisco for a fabulous quick getaway filled with lots of shopping, and scouring for great food. 

My dad has teased my mom and I accusing us of having 90% of our conversations or planned events revolve around food.  I laughed at first, but realized pretty quickly that we really do operate like that.  The truth is, I wouldn't have it any other way.  I absolutely love good food.   In fact, my dream job would be to travel the world and try out restaurants to review for travel books.  Anyone wanna hire me for that?  I promise I won't object...

Since I always love to travel with a few great suggestions for restaurants before I go, I thought I'd share a few of our favorite places that we found this go around.

The first great restaurant we found (after an average but not mention worthy indian restaurant for lunch) was an Italian place called Umbria.  It was right by our hotel in the downtown district on 2nd Street.

We ordered the Rustica Pizza and liked it but were not blown away.  We did however score with the Pasta, "Fusilli con Pollo e Carciofi".  It was unbelievably flavorful and consisted of corckscrew pasta sauteed with diced chicken breast, fresh artichoke hearts, sun-dried tomato and fresh arugula in EVOO and white wine.  We spoke with the waitress about how the dish was prepared because really the flavor was so intense for the ingredients.  She said that they marinate the sun dried tomatoes in the white wine and EVOO first, then toss in the pasta and artichoke hearts.  The chicken is prepared with garlic and salt and pepper and added to the marinade.  It sounds so very basic but I can't even describe how flavorful this was.  I will definitely be trying to concoct this myself soon and will share the recipe if it's a success.  I think the marinating of the sun dried tomatoes is the secret.

Our next day was spent wandering around inside the Ferry Building.  We sort of stumbled upon it (trying to find a great clam chowder in a breadbowl place by the wharf) and spent hours inside sampling different foods from all of the cafes and restaurants inside.  This place is fabulous.  If you haven't been here before, you must GO.  We were able to get small tasters of everything we wanted so that we got to taste a huge variety of foods rather than filling up on just one menu item. 

Here are just a few of the amazing places we tried:

G.L. Alfieri Premium Nuts and Fruit

Oh. my. gosh.  They handed out a sample of their Almond brittle as we walked past and everyone of us was hooked instantly.  I am a toffee and candy freak so I certainly don't buy just any toffee.  This was hands down amongst the best I have ever had.  They also have a huge variety of fabulous almonds (we loved the butter toffee almonds) and pistachios.  I couldn't leave without the lemon chili flavored pistachio meats. 

Cowgirl Creamery

This one is for all you cheese lovers out there.  We're talking, walk into the store and the further in you go the more it smells like stinky feet kind of cheese lovers.  Oh yeah.  I personally love a good sharp cheese and am of course willing to try any and all cheese they want to freely sample to me :)  My sweets loves a good Gruyere so per the cheese connoisseur's suggestion, I brought him home some fabulous cheese called "challerhocker".

 It tastes divine and will be saved for a special dinner with filet mignon (coming soon with the 1/4 cow we just butchered ordered).

We loved their cheeses so much and ordered a plate of Roclette cheese over yukon gold potatoes and asparagus to share.  Our family has an annual tradition of eating rolette, so we had to try this one and were not disappointed.  Roclette is a Swiss cheese that is prepared on a roclette grill similar to fondue (i.e. you melt the roclette cheese and pour it over beef, veggies, bread, or even fresh fruit).  Your house will smell like a high school football team's locker room full of sweaty feet but the taste really doesn't match the smell.  Did that entice you to try it or what?

After our fabulous day at the Ferry Building, we had to do some more shopping, and ate dinner in the Mission District at a great little burger joint (ironically for their cobb salad and to-die-for sweet potato fries) so that we were near our final and ultimate food destination for the day...

Bi-Rite Creamery

This tiny hole in the wall ice cream shop is so worth a cab ride and even hour long wait if you have to.  Since it was pouring cats and dogs outside, we were able to get right in but I would seriously fly back there again just to go eat this ice cream.  They have outlandish flavors like "earl grey tea", "honey lavender", and "orange cardamom" yet somehow the flavors that seem so bizarre for ice cream just so work.

My two favorites were "salted caramel" which tastes just as it sounds though I also felt like it had almost a "burnt" flavor.  My other favorite was "brown sugar with ginger and caramel sauce".  I would never think of ginger in ice cream but oh my heavens.  It worked.  I literally had to savor every single bite and was so tempted to get more after my two scoops.  I kind of regret that I didn't actually.  Next time.

All in all, the trip revolved around great shopping, fabulous food and a few moments of relaxation for our mani/pedi.  Every mom deserves a break like this every now and again.

Also I need to brag quickly about one of my darling little dance students.  She performed the solo I choreographed for her in her first dance competition this weekend (which I sadly missed) and won Queen in her division.  I am so proud of her!

How was your weekend?

~PW