A very Philadelphia wedding.

Five years ago yesterday, Dan and I showed up at Philadelphia's City Hall, him in a suit, and I in a bright blue mini dress, with wedded bliss on our minds. Surrounded by our parents and my two cousins, we said our vows in judge's chambers. A steak dinner at Ruth's Chris followed, as well as some of the most fun pictures we've ever taken in our lives. My cousin Hayley acted as photographer, and my cousin Danny as photographer's assistant. We snapped shots at City Hall, Love Park and the Philadelphia Museum of Art in the freezing Philadelphia cold. Rocky poses and laughter commenced. We raced the remaining sunlight to capture all the fun of that day, all while we hopped in and out of cabs, and Hayley lovingly yelled at us to run up the steps, to look at the camera, to look wistfully off in the distance, to flash the rings.

And now five years later here we sit, in our little home in SwitzerFrance, with our baby girl Oswin. We've traveled the world, suffered the loss of loved ones to illness, made friends, lost friends, and learned a lot about ourselves in the process. For all the uncertainty in life, we always know that we have each other, and knowing that is all I need to know.

A la prochaine friends...

Honey 

Anniversary of the best fight I ever picked.

Yesterday was the six year anniversary of the night that Dan and I met at a small historic bar that sits in a tiny alley in Philadelphia. I overheard someone say that the name of the song being sung at karaoke was from "St. Elmo's Fire," when it was clearly from "The Breakfast Club," and I intended on telling the person so. Turns out that person was pretty cute. 

Best fight I ever picked, that's for sure. 

And so began a year and a half of long distance dating between Philadelphia and Chicago, before our nuptials at Philly's City Hall, six weeks before moving abroad. 

Turns out you can meet your soul mate at bar after all. 

Six years and one baby later we celebrated with some macarons and wine from Ferney-Voltaire. They have officially become my second favorite macarons behind Ladurée. That's kind of a big deal. 

We should probably go watch "The Breakfast Club" to honor our beginnings, but really we're pretty pooped. I guess that's what happens when you get old. Or maybe we'll just save that for when we can celebrate with drinks at McGillin's again.  

A la prochaine friends...

Honey 

Three Year Anniversary.

{Ventnor, NJ}

The last few days of our three and a half week Duggan US Tour were spent on the east coast, visiting my parents in Southern New Jersey. We walked on the boardwalk to Atlantic City, visited with the fig trees I planted in the yard before Hurricane Sandy (Update: I think they're gonna make it, but we won't really know until they hopefully bud in the spring), and relaxed with some football and old black and white movies, because frankly, we were exhausted.

 

I'm a good traveler, I've come a long way in terms of packing light and being able to handle long stints of living out of bags, but it starts to wear on me after about 3 weeks.
 

 {Mom and I}
 

It did however do me a lot of good to be able to breathe a little salt air, see the ocean, walk on the boards, hang out with my parents, and see how the island is faring post hurricane in the recovery efforts. For instance, the water line that is still on the side of my parents house shows that two out of the four fig trees I planted in the yard were completely submerged in flood waters. There's a lot of work still to be done for some of the local businesses and private homes alike, but things appear to moving forward as fast as is bureaucratically possible.

 

Just before heading back to SwitzerFrance Doc surprised me with a night in Philly to celebrate our three year wedding anniversary. 

 

Sushi is something that we don't get too much of in France, mainly because our close proximity to Switzerland makes the prices astronomical, so we took advantage of being able to gorge ourselves on sushi without having to take out a loan first. We tried out a new-to-us place in Old City called Zento, and it was amazing!

 

The sushi was great, the staff friendly, and they played old black and white Kung Fu movies on one of the walls during dinner.

 

After dinner we grabbed drinks at Amada, somewhere I hadn't been since my 24th birthday...

 

...where I had an incredible cocktail that we are definitely going to attempt to recreate at home: lavender infused gin with celery water.

 

We finished with scotch at the hotel bar like we did three years ago, and sipped our drinks by the fireplace, and called it a night by midnight...

 

...because we're old.

The following morning, before heading to the airport, we grabbed brunch at my favorite brunch place, Sam's Morning Glory, in the Bella Vista neighborhood of the city.

{Frittata and biscuits}

Until next time Philly!

 



A la prochaine friends...

 

Honey



"Oh look, they've dressed him in a little suit!"

Day 2 in Brussels: We got up early (for me) and headed down to partake in one of my favorite pastimes - flea market lurking.


It was considerably more windy on the second day of our trip, which made for an interesting and slightly dangerous time at les puces, because fragile and heavy things alike were flying off of tables, hitting people in the head, and then shattering everywhere. So much so that I wanted to yell "Opa!" everytime we heard a crash...



This les puces had a very different vibe than my beloved Plainpalais, in that it seemed like the vendors were all working together, like they were "pulling their tips" so to speak. It seemed like there were a couple of managers who held the money, and these managers each had a section and would check up on the vendors. (I don't know if this is true, but it's what it seemed like.) It also appeared this way because it seemed like each vendor had a department - one guy seemed to have all of the chandeliers, another seemed to have all the furniture, a few close together had the majority of the kitchen stuff...which to me makes it not quite as fun to search through boxes (though it does streamline the whole process a bit). It was a good market, but my heart still belongs to Plainpalais...


We then went to wandering a bit, and found what ended up being the best frites we had the whole trip. If you go to Brussels, the guy sells them at la Chapelle from a stand. We loved it with tartar sauce...



Our next stop was for a drink at Leffe. We both were disappointed with our time here because it ended up being extremely hoitey-toitey. And our server sucked. I mean he was just terrible. And rude. Leffe didn't feel like a Belgian beer experience, but like going to a boring, white-walled, expensive restaurant where your server thinks you just purposely ran over his dog with a steam roller. I understand everybody has bad days, but it's still no excuse to be rude to people who are being very nice to you. The good news is that you can drink Leffe anywhere in the city, so spend your money elsewhere...


And elsewhere we went...






...to go see Manneken Pis again! And look! They've dressed him up in a little suit!


It turns out there was a marching band playing in front of him earlier in the day, and the organizers dressed him up in a matching suit, and gave him a little trumpet.


This area - in and around Grand Place and Sablon - were my favorites to hang out in during our weekend. There were plenty of cool little places to eat and drink, lots of people around, and lots of beautiful architecture to take in. There was also plenty of gaufre. What is gaufre you ask?


This is gaufre. Think little waffles. With whatever toppings you want on it. (You can also get them plain.) I don't know if it's a Belgian thing or a Brussels thing, but all I do know is that it's delicious.


My eyes were bigger than my tummy when I ordered mine - which as you can see is covered in hot chocolate, whipped cream, strawberries and bananas...needless to say, Dan had to finish most of mine...


Did you know that gaufre makes you thirsty? Well, it's true. So guess where we went next? Back to Delirium Cafe! Yeah!


The place was packed when we got there, and we were lucky enough to grab the last beer barrel table in the place...



[Delirium tremens and Rodenbach Grand Cru...]


[Kwak, young gouda sprinkled in celery salt, and Pink Killer, which is made from grapefruits...]






[Honey beer - yumma.]



Dan drank a coconut beer out of a coconut...


And with that we bid Adieu to "Delirium Cafe." It was a sad good-bye, but we know we'll be back...


Lucky for us, all those little alleyways that lead you to Delirium are lousy with restaurants, all of which seem to be serving similiar or the same menus, so we picked one with a nice big awning and sat down for some more moules and frites.




And of course we couldn't say good-bye to Brussels in the morning without having seen Grand Place at night!





The following morning we had an hour or so to make a last minute trip out for souvenirs and frites for the train, and of course it was the first bit of sun we saw the whole weekeend...




See ya, Brussels! We had a fantastic time and can't wait to see more of you on our next trip out there.

A la prochain friends...