Phantom Gourmet Food Festival

Mmmmm Mmmmm. Can those be the only words I use I use to describe Saturday?
There were 80 food vendors and restaurants there all cooking up & serving up some of their signature dishes. For one flat rate you could eat anything and everything all day long! Look how many people were there!!!Bryan and his mini taco
Laura and her ribs... she's not eating those ribs just to be clear... And my fabulous plate of seared Ahi tuna and Asian vinaigrette salad

These pickles were delicious!

And this guy was really really into the events of the day. He was dancing every time I saw him.

I think something bad may have happended to this squirrel:

After spotting this on the street directly in front of our front door, we went to Harvard to sit in on a lecture/ talk given by Frank Ghery. (We don't quite attend Harvard so we didn't have fancy name tags... which meant we couldn't sit in the same auditorium as him during his talk.) You'll remember some of his buildings from my blog like this one and this one. But he's also famous for the Disney Concert Hall in LA and Bilbao in Spain to name just a couple.It was great!

Now we're off to the Phantom Gourmet Food Festival to eat our way through all of Boston's finest! Mmmm...

Input Please

I'm going to re-cover this chair that I love that I've had for five or six years. I recovered it originally to this light blue from cracked green vinyl, but the light blue is a little dirty as it's been stepped in, sat on, and moved around four times.

Here's the chair in the context of the room:

Here is some fabric I already have that are candidates. What are your opinions?

A: Vintage DressB: purple & chartreuse

C: wood grain

D: blue and white

The more I look at these photos, the more I just want to keep looking for another fabric. I'm okay with that option too! Option E: Find something else.

Newport News

Bryan and I took a day trip to Newport, Rhode Island yesterday! I did a little research and discovered that 'Stuffies' were one of the highly recommended local things to eat there. Sooo... we found Anthony's Seafood (a recommended Stuffie vendor) and bought a few Stuffies and some Clam Chowder for lunch.I really liked the spicy Stuffies (we tried spicy and mild)! For those of you, who were like me, who have never heard of a stuffie, they are Quahog clams (found in abundance in Newport's Narragansett Bay) all chopped up and mixed with herbs, bread crumbs, butter, maybe a few veggies, and sausage then stuffed back into the clam shell and baked.

We took our lunch out to the bay and ate right on the water.

where we saw this:

and then this:

After lunch we walked the famous 'Cliff Walk' that is a mostly paved trail along the cliffs that runs behind several of the Newport Mansions.

Some of the mansions we saw were The Breakers, The Elms, Rosecliff, Marble House, and Chateau Sur-Mer.
On the way to the Cliff Walk we were behind this huge group of people who were really prepared for their day out. (Backpacks, water bottles, sweat shirts, hats, etc)

One woman even had a whole carton of Tropicana Orange Juice. See?

Where the heck did she think she was going?! At no point along the Cliff Walk are you more than a 10 minute walk back to full civilization and/or a grocery store.

There was also a boat show yesterday. There were hundreds of boats anchored in the bay and what a gorgeous day to be on the water!

On our way home we stopped at the Newport Vineyard. We walked around for a few minutes but didn't end up getting any wine there.

Such a fun day out of town!! We still have plenty to explore in & around Boston but when something as great as Newport is only an hour and fifteen minutes away you just have to take advantage!

Everyone,

I'd like you to meet Georgie!

And Georgie's mom, Katie.

Lots of you have asked about my first week of work so I wanted to do a quick update about it. I really love my new job nannying! Georgie is so so sweet and has the cutest little face I've ever seen! We've already started working on a schedule and a few simple signs like more, food, mama, and daddy... of course she's tiny and doesn't sign back yet, but repetition is key and one day she'll surprise us all and tell us exactly what she wants!

Plus, the perks aren't too bad either! Look where I ate lunch yesterday! An empty Fenway Park!

(Katie said Ben Affleck was filming a movie at Fenway right then too... I didn't see him, but we may go back on Thursday to watch the big car explosion scene) Katie even gave me some SWAG... like a Red Sox baseball cap and a new Klean Kanteen! Don't be jealous.

Now, that I've had a delicious and nutritious breakfast (and convinced Mr. Sleepy-Head to get out of bed), we're off to Newport, RI for the day. Maybe we'll see Peter Griffin!

"Of All the Patriots

Sam Adams was definitely the hottest!" (according to one of Laura's friends--- but who wouldn't agree?!)

Since I've been in Boston, I've seen two different couples in Boston Commons photographing squirrels.

Both couples looked foreign and so my thought is this: When I was in Australia and I saw a koala in downtown Sydney just chillin in a tree, I took a picture of it. It was weird. And so I took a picture of it. Now, maybe these people only have squirrels in zoos where they come from and think it's the oddest thing in the world that they are just out running around all over the place here. I don't know...

But in case you were wondering, I absolutely laughed out loud at the last couple who's female half was scampering about on all fours trying to snap the perfect shot.

Cheers, Ya'll

We tried again with the Red Sox game and it was great! We sang songs, we cheered, we chanted... by we, I mean the entire stadium of outrageously dedicated Red Sox fans. It was so fun and I can totally see why so many people are die hard. It was a good game but it was really the fans that made it so fun.

After the game we walked over to Boston Commons and then out to Beacon Hill and found the Cheers bar from the show! I even sat in Frasier's seat and had a beer - Sam Adams Brick Red beer to be exact. It's only sold on tap in Boston so...

Lobster Rolls, The Red Sox, and Beers

Oh My!

It's been quite an eventful few days!

Bryan and I soaked up a little local color earlier this week and picked up a couple of 'lobster rolls' for lunch one day. That sounds pretty good right? Mmmm... Lobster Rolls... I don't know why but I pictured little cheesy rolls with bits of lobster baked in. Instead, it was lumps of mayo-covered lobster on buttery toast. It was pretty tasty... not something I crave to eat often, but I would eat it again if someone visiting wanted to try one!

Bryan headed to The Merleau Ponty Circle's annual meeting to present a paper that he wrote on Thursday and will be out of town until tomorrow so I've been on my own this weekend... On my own but not at all alone! Lauren who I graduated from college with is visiting from Chicago and is staying with another girl, Laura, who we went to school with and now lives and works here in Boston. We have had so much fun the last couple of days!

Last night we went to a Red Sox game at Fenway.

(Laura, Me, Amy, Lauren)

We were super excited to see a game and as you can see, we cheered and cheered for the first three plays we saw:

Then as soon as that third pitch was thrown, the rains came. (And so did a bunch of men in red jackets with a big tarp)

Then we were a little disappointed when three hours later we were still waiting on the rains to stop.

Then they called the game. Postponed until tomorrow at noon. So basically we decided that this was great because we get to go to Fenway twice for the price of one!

Today was great! We went to the Sam Adams Brewery for a free tour (which equaled three free beers and a little beer glass)! It was such fun to hear about how they make beer and to get to taste some of their specialties and limited editions.