Centering Myself

Life has been a bit chaotic lately and I need to remind myself to become more centered. It's a mixture of a bit of everything, where there's not one cause I can truly pinpoint to help alleviate these feelings. This blog was a place meant to put my thoughts into a place that's more concrete, and I need to dedicate a bit more time and effort here. I've been on a hiatus from investing in myself and although my productivity is high within my work output and as a mother, I don't quite necessarily see the same outside of that.

I recognize that I want to make the most of my life in a holistic sense. So, I'm bringing back my to-do lists where it lets me really take into consideration the possibilities of each day. It goes beyond the typical errands, and allows me to think through additional ways to impact or create value not only in my life but also in others.

For the rest of the year, I want to dedicate myself to this way. I no longer want to be in the passenger seat. It's time I get back to putting forth a real drive. All of this goes to say, you'll see me be more active on this blog from here on out and I'll be sure to be noting my journey.

A Day in Grapevine, TX

It's my last week on mat leave and then I'm back at work, and Kaylee will be in daycare. I'm definitely nervous about the transition for both of us, but I'm also excited to start jumping back into a routine again even though it'll be a new one.

As a last hoorah, I've been trying to keep my last week busy (if weather permits!) So, I invited my mom out to explore a new nearby city that's between the both of us. We have always passed through Grapevine, but never really stop to see what's going on. One of my favorite things to do is actually discover new places through Google Maps app. I've become somewhat of an avid user and bookmark lots of places, parks, restaurants and categorize them like crazy. So, with Grapevine I simply started browsing around on the map and came up with an itinerary that ended up being a great day.

Here's how it went:

1. Kicked off the day by picking up breakfast at Eatzi's. They have a great spread of hot off the grill food. We picked up a customized omelet, a burrito, and a cup of oatmeal. They also have a great coffee menu where we got our caffeine needs.

2. Headed to the Grapevine Botanical Gardens at Heritage Park to have a picnic. My mom absolutely loves flowers and plants. She was so surprised to see this little beautiful oasis. We found a park bench we liked and settled down with all our food. It was right across from a small pond and lush plant vegetation. We simply caught up and took in the calmness of the scenery. Of course, we did have to walk through the entire park to take in every inch of it where my mom decided to take a photo of every flower we walked by.

3. Next up, I found a little farm that was right across the street from the Botanical Garden. It's called Nash Farm. This is one of Grapevine's historical landmarks and basically provides education to how this farm worked back in its prime. It consisted of the main farmhouse, with several other parts that you can walk through like the barn, places where they keep animals like chickens, turkeys, and sheep, plus fields for harvests. In my opinion, this would be another good place to visit with a friend and have a cup of coffee with a change in view. It's free to walk around the entire property.

4. Then, we headed out to Downtown Historic Grapevine. We parked near the Vintage Railroad which has a train that actually runs down the Cotton Belt, but we'll save that for another time. You can walk down this downtown street visiting dozens of boutiques and wineries. There's also a nice spot to pick up some gelato on a hot day. Interspersed in between these shops are more historic landmarks.

5. Finally, we ended our day with a nice refreshing glass of wine. I originally wanted to go to the Cross Timbers Winery, but unfortunately, it was closed at the time. So, on the fly, I found another winery that was in Coppell at a place called The Sound. Now, we didn't really know what we were getting into, but The Sound is a relatively new area that has about 5-6 restaurants right on the edge of a lake. It's not that pretty since it's just now developing, but it definitely will be in the near future. We got our glass of Riesling wine at the Landon Winery and sat on their outdoor patio. The Sound does seem to host live music concerts on their property, so it'll be on my list to come back to enjoy.

We started our day around 8:30 am and made it back home by 4. Although it didn't seem like a fully packed schedule, it did keep us busy. Plus, Kaylee who's now 3 months old enjoyed the entire trip so you could say this is baby approved!

An Indoor Picnic

We've had to be a bit more creative given the Coronavirus pandemic situation on what activities we can do to keep ourselves busy. The other thing you have to think about is this Texas weather. It can be scorching outside which makes it super unbearable for myself (others could probably deal with it more whereas I love being at a cool 70 - 80 degrees environment all day, every day).

So, this last weekend my best friend came up with a great idea - an indoor picnic! We probably would have loved this 10x more if we could have hiked somewhere outside, picked a spot, and enjoyed each other's company, but you got to make do with what you got. Anyways, my friend came over to my house in the early afternoon where we decided to plan out our menu. We took into consideration that it was the 4th of July and maybe we could do some color-coordinated red, white, and blue food. We debated out which entrees and desserts would best fit our indoor picnic vibes, listed out the ingredients, and decided to head off to the grocery store.

We ended up deciding to go with vegan + beef dumplings and a side cucumber salad for the main, with white chocolate covered strawberries and strawberry whipped cream sandwiches for desserts. After we got back to my place with all the ingredients, we hustled on all the dishes. Our favorite part was folding up the dumplings. I set up the living room so we had a blanket to sit on and an open space to enjoy. We poured some wine and cheers to it all. Here's how it turned out.

Ain't that a sweet spread? With how crazy it is in our current world, it was nice to spend some time with a great friend and put together something fun and creative with food. It's not easy anymore to "hang out" in some ways, not just because of having a baby that must have a lot of attention, but because we're so limited on what we can do. Now, these personal experiences are also good memories. Couldn't do it without this lady by my side.