Summer Days

I love this photo of Zach because I can barely ever catch him smiling in photos, so this one makes me happy.

Last night we went for a walk on the Island Heights boardwalk. In the picture above you can see how dark and stormy looking it was. We kept seeing strikes of lightning but thankfully didn't get rained on.

Some photos from a beach afternoon in Lavallette the other day.

And Jayne, Zach, and I went bar hopping in Seaside the other night, since we never have before. It wasn't as expensive as we thought it would be, surprisingly.

Melissa.

National Best Friend Day

In honor of National Best Friend day (yesterday) here is a photo of Jayne and I last night while we were sitting around a fire pit with some good people.

Life at home since I've graduated has been quiet, but good.

Melissa.

Graduated!

So, yesterday I graduated* from college! NYU's graduation takes place at Yankee Stadium, so this was the first time I'd been there (and in the Bronx). My parents and grandma came, and Zach met up with us after the ceremony. It was exciting and hot and thrilling and scary all at the same time, and I'm still trying to decide how I feel about it all...

*well, technically I have to take one final class during the summer before I get my diploma, but I still got to go to my commencement with everyone else in the class of 2013.

Melissa.

Last Summer...

A photo of Zach from last summer when we were in Boston because he is very handsome and because it makes me happy thinking about our vacation last year.

Melissa.

Everything's In Bloom...

It's finally feeling like spring! Well, kind of - this week was a little on the chillier side. And on the most beautiful day of the week I successfully embarrassed myself by wearing a dress and doing a Marilyn Monroe style flash show for everyone in front and inside of Think Coffee (eek!). Anyway, the rest of the weekend was wonderful and made up for it - Zach came up to visit me here in NYC and we got to do so many fun things: tried a new restaurant (Soho Park), went on the Roosevelt Island Tram, and had my roommate escort us to a bunch of secret speakeasies! And on top of all the beautiful blooms and everyone out walking their dogs (I smile every time I see a little - or big - dog here on the streets) it really just topped off the weekend nicely.

I couldn't help but take photos on my jog the other morning of these pretty pink blooms and this pretty pink corner apartment - can I live there please?! It's also - perfectly - located on Orchard Street!

We were up in that! Eek, so scary! Zach and I are both scared of heights, so on our way over to the island we were more nervous than into the beautiful views, I think ;)

First time I tried actual coconut water, and our first try of falafel... soo amazing!!

Roomies!

There are so many wonderful things about my roommate Shely but I think my most favorite thing about her is that she doesn't care, and she always puts having fun and enjoying new experiences before anything else. It's something I should try to do more often!

Melissa.

On Setting Goals, and Sticking to Them

The last two years have been pretty difficult for me, mentally and physically. I've felt a big mixture of being incomplete and temporary in many different ways. While living in a college dorm and spending many weekends home in New Jersey, it's just felt as if I live in two different places at once. I spend half of my time with one group of people, and the other half with another, but it's as if they never coincide. This journey through the rest of my college career has certainly taken its toll on my mental and physical health. While I'm at school I always feel bogged down with work, and since I'm not working at an actual job I don't have money to pay for a gym membership. Anyway, like I said, I spend much of my time going from New York to New Jersey, and vice versa. I'm never in one place.

So lately I've been telling myself: get in shape before your vacation in July! That means that I have 10 weeks to get in shape (wow, scary when you look at it like that!) and that's not much time. So, I've been really dedicating as much free time as I have to exercising, and restricting my diet to healthy (and more importantly, home made) food.

This week I've jogged each day, and I plan to keep it up at this rate. It's funny how sometimes you can immediately start to feel the effects of healthy eating and exercise, I feel much less bloated already (though my skin is breaking out, what's up with that?!).

Though last night I did get an intensive craving for ice cream or cookies or cake or sweet of any type because those are my vice. I nearly bought something too, but instead of buying food I went for a jog. And afterwards, the craving was gone!

Now if only I could apply this "setting goals" thing to my school work...graduating in a few weeks has me procrastinating on the big things I should be getting started on! Oops...

Melissa.

Allaire State Park

Last weekend was beautiful, so we took a ride out to Allaire State Park. I love that place, there's even a little train you can ride around on. It was sad to see so many big trees down from Hurricane Sandy still, and all of the little nature paths were closed off.

Look how big that root is!

Here's maybe a better picture of what the trees looked like. Crazy!

Melissa.

Another one of those weeks...

...where I had a final draft of a long-form piece of journalism due, a French presentation, an essay, a personal essay topic and scene, a new empathy-piece topic, and lots of reading due, on top of having a classroom visitor critique my work. Then, I had to go on a wild goose chase in order to walk with my graduating class, apply to do so, and then hope that they'll approve me for graduation for so many other stupid reasons.

This is how so many of my weeks at school are, and when I don't feel like I can do it anymore I have to remind myself that I only have five more weeks left. Five more weeks of having to say goodbye to my family each Sunday, five more weeks of an unbearable work load, five more weeks of stress and not living up to my own expectations. I can do five more weeks - I've already done nearly two years here.

There's quote on my desk that reads:

"I'm going to tell you a secret. Every year, many stupid people graduate from college, and if they can do it so can you." - John Green

Sometimes, this quote is enough. Days like today, it will have to be.

Melissa.

A Birthday, A Wedding, and an Anniversary..

Well, it's been a long weekend-into-spring-break! Friday night we celebrated our friend Tony's 21st Birthday, so we went out to some bars in NYC. The next day we went to breakfast at Cafe Angelique in the West Village which makes the absolute best Belgium waffles I've ever had - if you ever find yourself in the West Village, go there! Unfortunately, there's a Cafe Angelique closer to my apartment but for some odd reason they don't serve the waffles there, so we make the trek because it's so worth it. On Saint Patrick's Day, Zach and I went to my uncle's wedding which was fun and definitely funny... Monday Zach and I celebrated our 2 year anniversary! We exchanged gifts, he got me a beautiful necklace and a lovely book, and I made him a scrapbook of photos and memories like ticket stubs and a card from the place where he got his first tattoo.. his present was obviously much better, and that's why he's such a great person. For our anniversary we went to Hibachi, which I'd never been to before, and was delicious and fun to watch. Then we saw The Great and Powerful Oz, which was pretty good - despite my initial thoughts that it wouldn't be. 

He looks so charming in his polka dots, but bars are always too dark to get good photos of ourselves in them :(

I'm telling you, best waffles ever!

At the wedding, on the right I'm with my dad. I found that photo on my parents' camera, it instantly became my new Facebook profile picture, it's just too funny.

Champagne & Marc Jacobs clutch.

What I wore and what he wore.

My gift and his gift.

Beautiful necklace with black and regular diamonds (!!)

Hibachi before anything exciting happened (except the great wine we picked out for BYOB), and a Starbucks date with Jayne yesterday.

Daisy, the queen. You can't see in this photo but she's laying down in front of a space heater.. and yesterday was supposed to be the first day of spring!

Melissa.

Not last weekend, but the weekend before was busy! Zach came up on Thursday night because we were going to see Murder by Death at the Music Hall of Williamsburg that night. They put on a good show, and co-headliner Man Man put on an entertaining show, too, but not really my type of music. The photo above is from the inside of the Music Hall - pretty cool look. Jayne came up the following day and we went to Crocodile Lounge (you get a free personal size pizza with every drink you order, dinner and a drink for $5!), the Brooklyn Flea, an art gallery in Chelsea, and a cool bar in Brooklyn called The Emerson. It was a really fun, tiring weekend. I can't wait to see Jayne again next week over my spring break, and can't wait to get a break from school!

At Crocodile Lounge. Zach says he looks like an alien in this picture, probably because of his bug-eyed face.

Crocodile on the ceiling!

Donuts at Brooklyn Flea, I had the blood orange one, all the way at the other end with the red frosting.

Jayne at the art gallery.

On the left was my favorite piece, and on the right was the cool view out of the office window there.

Drunk skateboarding on the subway ride home from Brooklyn Saturday night - which took about 1.5 hours since all the trains were delayed and stopped and we forgot to transfer when we were supposed to.

My monster (cute) dog, and a cool umbrella seen earlier today on the street. I've become pretty talented at the art of photo-stalking people on the streets of New York now, especially their dogs...

Melissa.

Drinks&Eats

I take so many photos of my food before I eat it, I thought, "hey, why not put them all together in a post rather than have them sprawled throughout a regular post?" So, here it is. And I think it's helped me to understand my diet better, and why exactly I'm not losing as much weight as I'd like to. It appears that when I eat something healthy, I always eat something unhealthy which ultimately cancels it out. Which sucks, because I have this idea in my mind that I'm a pretty healthy eater, but by looking at all my photos of food together I realize that maybe I'm not! I hope this visual representation helps me to fix my diet for the better in the future...

Anyway, on the right above is a delicious salad I made last weekend (on the most beautiful day - I sat in the sun in my backyard while I ate it, with my dog!). It was made of just lettuce, sliced apples and strawberries, and I made some dressing out of a mix of olive oil and honey. On the left is a delicious margarita which I ate with an equally unhealthy meal that night, haha.

Blood orange donut from the Brooklyn Flea! I've been dying to try this donut, I see it on Instagram all the time (who knew donuts could be Instagam famous?) Anyway, it was delicious. But one is good enough for me, now that I've tried it. Watermelon was on sale this week at the food store.

On the right are some leftovers from when I ate at this new restaurant The Cleveland, which I'm actually writing a story about for my Journalism of Empathy class. I had these french fries which were served with a delicious alioli oil and a kale salad which was delicious as well.

On the right was a Pinterest-recipe inspired fail. I'm not sure what I did wrong, but I didn't like the grilled onions in this. It tasted better before I added them, when it was just chickpeas, feta cheese, and fresh lemon juice.

On the right is from this place Crocodile Lounge we went to - they give you a free personal pizza whenever you order a drink! $5 for dinner and a drink, I love it.

Melissa.

Daisy is 3 today!

My sweet baby girl is three years old today! Already! I wish I could see her!

Happy Birthday, Daisy!

This is how small she was when I first got her, and look at all that dark hair, where did it go?!

I love you, Daisy!

Melissa.

Flying jerky patterns like snowflakes in the air.

Nemo found us this weekend! We had a (mini) blizzard! Zach came up to visit me in New York just in time for the snow to start! Once it was finished falling, the next day, we went to Central Park! It was so beautiful there walking around with so much snow and so many kids sledding all over the place.

The above photo is from a section of Central Park I'd never been to before, but it was like a hidden gem.

CP.

CP. Zach taking photos on his nice camera, while I took photos on my iPhone :)

Snowman on the roof of the building next to me!

Zach's friends turned this outdoor theater into a place to snowboard near their apartment in Brooklyn.

I prepared for the storm by making cookies and buying lots of hot chocolate. Besides that I've been trying to keep to healthier food! On the left is a healthy pizza I've been eating a lot recently - in place of pizza crust use a whole wheat tortilla, marinara sauce, low-fat mozzarella cheese, and then put any vegetables on top which you like! I used cucumber, pepper, and broccoli here. It's also delicious plain or with pepperoni.. I've tried all the variations I could ;)

Fiat Cafe, right around the corner from where I live, and one of our favorite places. We grabbed breakfast here one weekend morning - french toast and fresh fruit, yum!

And on Sunday we unwound with a little treat from Little Cupcake Bakeshop.

Last weekend when I was home we went to Red Lobster because they were having a special deal on shrimp. Though I'm not a big seafood fan, I really enjoyed what I got: mango jalapeno and ranch parmesan shrimp. Ok, ok, I know it looks like I'm really "breaking" my diet or healthier eating, but I promise I broke the Red Lobster meal into two days worth of meals! :)

This adorable pup posing for me on our walk back from Central Park. I wanted to take him home with me! :(

And my beautiful pup, to make up for the want I had for the previous one. Also, a pretty necklace I got from Francesca's last weekend.

This weekend was also the Chinese New Year (lots of stuff going on this weekend). There were festivities in Chinatown.

He needed to buy one of these party popper things since everyone else was setting them off and confetti was all over the place (mixed in with slush from the snow, too, which was kinda gross).

Some panorama's I've taken while either walking or jogging.

The East Side.

And the West Side.

Melissa.