Not a summer blogger...

Apparently I am not a summer blogger. I keep just randomly disappearing! I have lots of ideas for posts but I can't seem to find the time to sit down at the laptop and actually type them out. There's lots of social stuff going on, plus work is still crazy busy and only getting worse. Today was my day off and I thought about blogging but instead I went to visit a friend and her brand new baby boy (he is less than 2 weeks old and is absolutely precious!) and then stopped in to visit with my mom for a bit. J is on his way home from work now and I think we'll spend the evening relaxing on the deck or taking Daisy for a walk. At some point I'll get back in to a blogging routine. For now I'm just going to enjoy the summer.

See you soon!

Summer Lovin' Tag

The lovely Brittany tagged me in a Summer Lovin' tag yesterday so here I am! :-)

1. Summer lipstick you're loving? I don't actually wear lipstick. I'm more of a gloss person and I haven't even been wearing a lot of that lately. Now I want to go buy something new in a fun, summer shade though!

2. Summer nail polish you're loving? I've got two, neither are super expensive brands or anything, I just really like how they look. The first is Blazed by Wet 'n Wild and the second is Mintilicious by Rimmel. (I love the colour of the Rimmel one, but I don't like the brush so I've only worn it a couple times.)

3. Bathing suit you're loving this summer? I didn't get a new suit this summer because I got a new one close to the end of the season last year. (I don't wear one all that often.) It's pretty cute I guess - 2 piece with a black "skirt" and white and black patterned top.

4. Favourite summer Frappuccino from Starbucks? I can't remember the last time I was in Starbucks, I'm more of a Second Cup/Tim Horton's kind of girl. I love Second Cup's Frozen Hot Chocolate and I love Tim Horton's Frozen Raspberry Lemonade.

5. Favourite fake tan? Don't use them. I've got a pretty fabulous farmer's tan going on right now...

6. Favourite summer song? I'm loving "Don't Kill the Magic" by Magic.


7. Favourite summer accessory? I love sunglasses. Especially big, fun sunglasses.

8. Favourite summer fragrance/perfume? I don't wear a lot of scented products, but I picked up Bath & Body Works' Oahu Coconut Sunset fragrance mist a couple months ago and I love it. It's light and summery.

9. Summer book you're loving? I just finished City of Heavenly Fire (Book 6 of the Mortal Instruments Series) by Cassandra Clare and I really enjoyed it. I'm reading Prodigy by Marie Lu right now. It's been out for a while but I had never heard of it. It's the third book in a series - I just started the first book on Sunday - and I'm devouring it.

10. What are you most excited to do this summer? Just spend some time relaxing by the pool and taking Daisy on some hikes.

I'm not going to tag anyone in particular, but I'd love to know what you're all loving this summer!

Favourite Vacation Snap Shots

I've been trying to figure out how much I want to post about my vacation. Part of me wants to share every little detail, and every single picture. Part of me doesn't want to share anything because they're my memories. I've decided to compromise with myself and I'm sharing five of my favourite pictures from the week so far. (A lot of them are portrait orientation, so this post is going to look a million miles long.)

The first one is J and I on the wharf in Lunenburg. I know I've already shared this one, but it's my favourite picture of the two of us from this week. It was the first real day of our vacation and we were so happy to be spending the day together, just us. I really love the colours too, Lunenburg is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and a National Historic Site so the downtown core looks like you stepped back in time.

This second picture is Daisy and I at Taylor Head Provincial Park. Not the most flattering picture of me but I love the clouds and the waves rolling in. Earlier that day J tried pulling Daisy down towards the water but she didn't want anything to do with it. Midway through the afternoon she was loving the waves and the wet sand. There's something about walking along the beach that just makes me really happy.

This is J's sister, Rachel and her boyfriend, Jesse at Grand Pre National Historic Site. These two are absolutely precious. I love that they're not actually looking at me in this picture. J was taking a picture using Rachel's camera at the same time so that's where they're looking. I don't actually know Rachel very well, she moved to Florida for university the year before J and I got married. She's come home at Christmas, but it's such a busy time of year that it makes it hard to really spend time talking to people. This week we've spent a fair bit of time with Rachel and Jesse and I've really enjoyed it.

This is J's brother, David and his fiancee, Tracey. They obviously had no idea I was taking this picture. I just looked over and there they were. I love the scenery in the background. We've been spending a bit more time with these two lately and I love it. They're a lot like J and I in some ways. Tracey is a few years older than David, they met at work, and she's the chatty one while he's the listener. J is six years older than David so it's only been recently that he's seen him as someone to hang out with as opposed to just being his little brother.

I love the self-timer on my camera! My camera is propped up on a sun dial (of all things!) on the grounds of Grand Pre National Historic Site. The six of us had a great day together yesterday. We went to the zoo, had a picnic, visited Grand Pre, and checked out a local coffee roastery. Family is very important to J and I and I love that we were able to spend some time with his family during our vacation. (Not gonna lie, I also loved that we were able to spend some time together just the two of us!)

Hope everyone has had a great week, and I apologize for not commenting as much as usual! I should be back on track next week.

Wednesday Wishes

The first couple days of our vacation have been wonderful.

On Monday we spent the day in Lunenburg. We went whale watching, saw the Bluenose II, visiting a micro-distillery, and had a delicious supper.



The Bluenose II

On the wharf before our whale watching tour.

Yesterday we spent the day at one of our favourite places, Taylor Head Provincial Park. It was a beautiful, sunny day and even though there were some annoying bugs during the wooded part of our hike we had a great day.



  

Daisy & I enjoying the Atlantic

I love this shot of J and Daisy on the beach.

Last night we took the ferry from Dartmouth the Halifax with J's sister and her boyfriend and then strolled along the Halifax waterfront. We don't spend nearly enough time exploring our own city.



We stopped on the boardwalk at Sugah for icecream. It was delicious!

I can't believe it's Wednesday though! The time is going by way too fast.
I wish vacation didn't have to end, and I wish Rachel and Jesse were going to be here for a longer visit. (Or that they'd move up here!) Oh, and I wish I had remembered to wear sunscreen yesterday. I'm looking pretty red today.

What are you wishing for today?

Weekend Update

I'm posting my weekend update on Tuesday again because it was a long weekend and I was off for three whole (glorious!) days.

Friday night started with a potluck dinner at my parents' house. We wanted to have a potluck so we could take part in the #PotluckChallenge. It was a good night, even if most of my friends couldn't make it. We got to spend some time with my family and we ate a ton of delicious food. See that little clown on my cake? My grandmother bought that for my very first birthday cake. I went through those years where I was too embarrassed to use it, but now it comes out for every family birthday. And I'm so glad my mom held on to it for all these years!

Saturday morning we got a bit of a late start, but I'm not complaining. I think we both needed the sleep. It's so rare that Daisy lets us sleep in that getting up at 9am was a huge treat. We took a run to Tim Horton's for breakfast and they were giving out free birthday cake donuts. It's like they knew I was celebrating my birthday this weekend. (Or maybe it's because the were celebrating their 50th birthday...)

We got on the road around noon to head out to the Seaside Adjunct. It's a little over a 2 hour drive and we were a little worried about Daisy but she handled it like a champ. It's worth it too, so beautiful. You can read all about our day here, but the long story short is that it was totally amazing and just what we needed.

Sunday was the usual. Sunday school, church, and a delicious dinner at J's folks. I chatted with J's sister, Rachel, for a bit. She's coming home next month and we can't wait to see her. Hoping to get to do lots of fun touristy things while she's home. (Hopefully cross a couple things off my Summer Bucket List!)

Yesterday we decided at the last minute to head to the Shubenacadie Wildlife Park with J's brother and his fiance. We've all been there before, but it was still nice to get out and do something a little bit different. The weather was supposed to be pretty gross but it actually turned out not too bad so we stopped for ice cream on the way home. Of course I had to try the confetti cake blizzard! (Delicious in case you were wondering.)

Unfortunately when we got home we had a bit of a scare, we found a tick on Daisy. Unfortunately it's a holiday so our vet isn't open. We called the Metro Emergency Animal Hospital and they told us how to remove them. We've kept them so we can take them to our vet to have them tested for Lyme disease. I'm a bit of a wreck right now. Crossing my fingers, I've read that most ticks don't actually carry diseases so hopefully the one we found on Daisy was safe.

Other than the whole tick thing our weekend was pretty fantastic. Hope you enjoyed yours too!

Wild, Wild Life

We were really disappointed when we saw the weather forecast for today earlier this week. We were hoping for a day like Saturday, which was absolutely gorgeous. Warm (but not too hot) and sunny. Unfortunately today's forecast was pretty bleak. Cloudy with a 60% chance of showers all day. And cold. Boo. We've been wanting to go to the zoo with David (J's younger brother) and Tracey (David's fiance) since it opened Easter Weekend. We all ended up with today off but with the weather forecast we weren't sure we wanted to drive all that way.

At the last minute we decided to head to the Shubenacadie Wildlife Park and I'm really glad we did. The weather was warmer than we expected and it didn't rain at all. It was so nice that we even stopped for ice cream on the way home. It was a great way to end our long weekend.

There are peacocks everywhere!
 

We found a couple of love-birds roaming around. ;-)
 

Canada Geese and their babies!
 

He was so cute! He did a couple turns, just like Daisy, before settling down.
 

Posing with my new friend the Artic Wolf.
 

I love raccoons. I know they're basically pests, but I just think they're super cute.
 

David and Tracey checking out the otters. They look so graceful in the water, but so awkward on land.
 

Of course we had to pose with the bear!

 I loved having three days off in a row this weekend. J and I really enjoyed the time together and it was so nice not having to set an alarm. Hope you enjoyed your weekend, especially those of you in Canada celebrating Victoria Day!

An Afternoon by the Atlantic

This weekend is a long weekend here in Canada, and two small miracles happened. One, the weather yesterday was absolutely amazing and two, I'm off! I'm off for three whole days and I couldn't be  more excited. J and I have been really busy with work the past couple weeks and haven't had a lot of time to spend together so having three days off together is just what we needed. After writing about how much I loved the Seaside Adjunct and how perfect our day was there the first time we were there we decided that's where we would take Daisy.

The weather was absolutely perfect, and it was just as beautiful as I remembered. We spent a couple of hours roaming the beach and climbing the rocks. I took a ton of pictures, though I don't think any of them actually do the area justice. We basically had the place to ourselves which made for an extra peaceful afternoon.

Daisy absolutely loved it. I really wish we could let her off-leash but with a beagle who wasn't trained as a puppy it's just not something we want to try. She still enjoyed all the smells and all the new places to explore. She didn't seem to be overly fond of the waves though!

We saw seals too. Lots and lots of them. I love getting to see wildlife when we're out on our adventures.

The best part of the day was just that we got to totally relax. I left my cellphone in the car and we spent a couple hours just talking, laughing and catching up. I really think that's crucial to making a marriage work.

Daisy was exhausted by the time we were on our way home and actually slept most of the drive home.

It was pretty much the perfect Saturday. Hope you had a great Saturday too!

My Summer Bucket List

There are a lot of things that I would like to do this summer, but most weeks the only day J and I have off together is Sunday and Sunday is an extremely busy day for us.  My number one goal for the summer is to make time for J, and make time for my friends and family. Even with my work schedule I think I'll be able to cross most of these items off my list before the end of the summer.

The List;

1.) Visit some animals! I absolutely love the zoo and we have a few options that can easily be done as a day trip. We can visit the Oaklawn Farm Zoo, the Shubenacadie Wildlife Park, or The Moncton Zoo.

At the Magnetic Hill Zoo waaay back in 2007.

2.) Go to the beach. I love the ocean, but I'm not really a beach lover. We have some beautiful beaches in Nova Scotia though and it seems like a shame not to spend at least one afternoon laying on the sand reading and playing in the Atlantic Ocean.

3.) Have a picnic. I love picnics, I don't know why. We usually have at least one every summer and I'm hoping that we'll continue the tradition this year.

4.) Have some friends over and roast marshmallows. We bought a little fire pit shortly after we moved into our house but we rarely use it. And any time we've had a fire it's just been the two of us. It's romantic and everything, but s'mores are a lot of effort for just two people!

Roasting marshmallows last summer!

5.) Read 5 books I've never read.

6.) Eat downtown on a patio. There are so many restaurants in downtown Halifax that set up patios for the summer and I want to take advantage this year. I love the people watching aspect, plus food just tastes better outside.

7.) Try two new restaurants. We get a free "Halifax" magazine delivered to the store I work at and I grabbed it to read on my break the other day. It had articles about a couple great sounding restaurants. Too often J and I will go out to eat just because neither of us feel like cooking and we'll end up grabbing fast food or at a chain restaurant like Boston Pizza but I'd rather use our "eating out" budget to try out one of the restaurants I read about even if it means eating out less.

8.) Go camping. If I worked a Monday to Friday job and had every weekend off I think we'd probably buy a little trailer and go camping a bunch of times during the summer. I don't work Monday to Friday though, so it's not really worth it to buy a trailer. We do have a tent though, and we love camping. I want to make sure we fit it in this year. (Last year we went to an amazing park right on the ocean. It was an amazing weekend.)

Camping at Kejimkujik National Park a couple summers ago.

9.) Visit another province. New Brunswick and PEI are both do-able as a daytrip and there's lots to see and do in both provinces. (If we hit New Brunswick I'd love to eat at the restaurant Jesse from  Top Chef Canada works at!)

10.) Check out two museums. There are so many museums around here, we have a really rich history. My dad was a history teacher for years and I'm pretty sure he dragged my brother and I to every museum around when we were kids. I haven't been to most of them in years though and I think it would be kind of fun to go back and see them as an adult.

Anything exciting on your summer bucket list? Anything you think I'm missing?

xo,
Sara

Summer 2014 Book Challenge!

I totally stumbled across this late, but I'm definitely jumping in. I haven't figured out all of the books I'm reading, and I still have to finish the book I started before May 1st, but I'm so excited!

I've already picked out books for a few of the categories...

Freebie! I think I'm going to go with Redshirts by John Scalzi. I originally looked at it for my dad, but I think it's something I might enjoy too, and it's definitely different from what I usually read.
Read a book from the children’s section of the library or bookstore. I'm going to use one of my three re-reads for this one and re-read A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett.
Read a book that was/will be adapted to film in 2014. Definitely going with The Fault In Our Stars by John Green. I'm super excited about this one.
Read a biography, autobiography or memoir. I bought Barbie and Ruth: The Story of the World's Most Famous Doll and the Woman Who Created Her for my mom a couple years ago. (She's a Barbie Doll collector.) I'm not sure she ever read it, but I'm going to snag it the next time I'm over there.

Some of them I still need to think about...

Read a book that was written before you were born.Finish reading a book you couldn't finish the first time around. (This is going to be tough, even if I'm not enjoying a book I try really hard to finish it.)
Read a book that is on The New York Times' Best Sellers List when you begin reading it.
Read a historical fiction book that does not take place in Europe.
Read a book with “son(s),” “daughter(s)” or “child(ren)” in the title.
Read a book written by a blogger. (Would definitely love some suggestions for this one!)
Read a pair of books with antonyms in the titles.

Do you have any books you're planning to read this summer? Any suggestions for categories I haven't picked a book for?