The Maldives

Well, I think I found a place to add to the list of places to go with my new passport: The Maldives. 

Isolated: Check
Romantic: Check 
Quiet: Check
Island Paradise: Check Plus 


This is probably a good honeymoon spot, it's doubtful this is a family vacation spot. A 13-hour flight to Qatar, then another 5 hour flight to one of the islands is not something you want to do with some 10 year old! At least I wouldn't want to. 


After reading this article in Food & Wine, I became very intrigued by this place. The Maldives are in serious danger of being flooded away. As it is now, global warming is bleaching the coral reefs surrounding the islands. 


Have to see it now before there's nothing left to see! And it's worth mentioning that it's the smallest Asian country (in population and land mass), so if I visited, I could cross Asia off my bucket list of visiting every continent before I died! 


But in all seriousness, this country looks beautiful and peaceful. Since the land is really in danger of being all below sea level in our lifetime, the Maldivian government has begun using tourist profits to buy land for the Maldivian people in other parts of the world. So when/if the islands are flooded, they have another home to evacuate to. Very very sad to think their homes may be no more, but it does make you want to go visit them to help them with their future and also to see the beauty that they still call home.

Passport Has Arrived!

Well that was quick, I feel like I just sent in my passport for renewal and already it arrived in the mail yesterday:

That'll be accompanying me through 2022! First stop: Turks & Caicos! Next stop? Don't know yet! But can't wait to see all the places we go together!

Banana Nutella Bread

I made this on a rainy Sunday afternoon. And it was delicious. I baked it about 5 minutes too long, but it was still delicious. I'd recommend. Especially for banana & nutella lovers!

Since my bread didn't come out looking too good for a photograph, here's a picture from the blog (oleana's blog) you can find the recipe on:

Great Article

I just picked up The Atlantic last night for this article: Is Facebook Making Us Lonely? 

Very interesting read and makes me happy in my decision to cut off Facebook for all except family and friends I've had before the phenomenon of Facebook. It's a good resource to stay in touch with people, but when people start to make it their home base with information about themselves, then that's when I start to get a bit aggravated. If you want to share good news with me, call me or email me. Basically go that extra mile to make an effort to share news. Don't assume I'm stalking your page to see vacation photos or a sonogram. If you're not sharing news with me, then I'm assuming you don't want me to know something. It's that simple. But yet Facebook has complicated so many friendships/relationships and I'd rather not participate in that. I just wish there were more people like me so we could go back to writing letters on pretty stationary and having hour-long phone conversations. Or better yet, a meet up for dinner or tea somewhere. Face-to-Face contact - such a rarity these days!

I hope you find the article as interesting as I did. And maybe if you're an obsessive Facebook-er, you'll have a change of heart and fall back to social reality.

KPixie Online Yarn Store

Time for a new baby blanket! Friends are expecting and I wanted to get new yarn for this baby blanket that's different than the last ones I've been making. 


Up until today, I had completely forgotten about this awesome online yarn shop: KPixie. I've purchased yarn in the past from them and it's been great yarn to work with and quite luxurious to the standard buy-in-the-store kind. I love the Blue Sky Alpaca yarns and they have a nice selection of them. 


Yay babies!

Washington, DC Trip

It was a spur of the moment trip to see the Annie Leibovitz Pilgrimage Exhibit at the Smithsonian, but my 28-hour trip to DC ended up being more about the Capital than anything else. I've visited DC several times already and having gone to the monuments, I don't think they've packed the punch until now. They are amazing.


Here are the photo highlights:


The Jefferson Memorial 

The Washington Monument

We were hoping to see the Cherry Blossoms, but this is the only one we encountered:

Apparently they bloomed 3 weeks ago!


Here are some i-phone photos of the trip:


Union Station

 

Washington Monument under the Knapp Bridge:

Washington's Portrait at the America Presidents Gallery in the Smithsonian Museum of Art

Pilgrimage

And of course there had to be some eating involved on this trip. Jose Andres' restaurant Zaytinya came highly recommended. It did not disappoint.

We did not venture out of the Capital at all, which wasn't intentional, but just the way it worked out. It was a lot less intimidating to stay in one spot and allowed time to fully absorb just how awesome the Capital is. 

St. Patrick's Day

I realized I never updated on St. Patrick's Day - which ended up being quite the feast this year! Photos are better than words: 

Cupcakes (for work)!: 

How adorable are these three?: 

Corned Beef & Cabbage (Braised in Guinness, of course!): 

 

Bailey's Mousse setting in the fridge: 

Irish Soda Bread - best recipe yet!

Shepherd's Pie:

Quite the amazing food. I tweaked the recipes, but below are the recipes they were based on: 

Shepherd's Pie 

Corned Beef & Cabbage

Bailey's Mousse 

Here's the Irish Soda Bread receipt though - try it, you'll be thanking me until the day you die... 

Irish Soda Bread

3 cups all-purpose flour

1 tablespoon baking powder

1/3 cup white sugar

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 egg, lightly beaten

2 cups buttermilk

1/4 cup butter, melted

1/2 cup raisins

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F. Grease a 9x5 inch loaf pan.

Combine flour, baking powder, sugar, salt and baking soda. Blend egg and

buttermilk together, and add all at once to the flour mixture. Mix just until

moistened. Stir in butter. Mix in raisins. Pour into prepared pan.

Bake for 65 to 70 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the bread comes out clean. Cool on a wire rack. Wrap in foil for several hours, or overnight, for best flavor.

Reason #80291 why I love NYC

Every once in awhile, I look up in NYC. Last time I did, I saw this: 

I love these trees in NYC more than any place else in the world!

Passport Renewal

I randomly get bad feelings that won’t go away. My most recent was: my passport expired! Sure enough, it did. Just two months shy of my trip to Turks & Caicos. Why it never occurred to me that my passport was expiring until now is beyond me. You’d think I’d have an alarm clock set for something like this considering all the traveling I do.

I hated having to part with my old passport, it brought me to many places: Spain, Italy, Austria, Morocco, Bermuda, Mexico, Belize, Honduras, the Bahamas & Caribbean … so many great trips in just a span of ten years.

What will the next ten years of travel bring? My list is endless of places I want to see, but over the course of the upcoming ten years I want the stamps in my book to include: Ireland, Antarctica, Australia, India, Africa, South America, and maybe a few more stamps of Spain & Italy. There is so much to see in this world!!

In order to get my passport renewed in time for T&C, I had to expedite the process for an arm & a leg in costs. Totally worth it of course as I'm beyond excited to spend my birthday this year in paradise!