stay here: north fork 53

Before Ted left for the summer, we spent a couple of days in Nehalem, a sweet town on the Oregon Coast near Manzanita Beach. Our intent was not only to relax and enjoy each other's company in some beautiful new surroundings, but also to scope out the charming North Fork 53 Bed & Breakfast for an upcoming wedding Ted was photographing.

We have been fans of B&Bs since our first encounter with one in Castle Combe, England. There's something so sweet and romantic about staying in a B&B. Yeah, Ted and I are already old folks... That's okay, though. We embrace it!

We were absolutely smitten with the house, the food, and the grounds. Ana, the bed and breakfast manager, made us feel right at home immediately! She even had homemade treats in the fridge waiting for us. Our whole stay was just as sweet.

Our first floor room was simple and cozy. The surrounding garden and trees were a haven for lovely walks and laying in the grass. Absolutely heaven. Did I mention that the included breakfast was delicious and fresh, with roasted veggies straight from their organic garden?! Um, best deal ever!

The only minor problem we encountered was that we weren't able to figure out our private bathroom's bathtub--probably just us being clueless--but even that was an unexpected delight, because we discovered that the upstairs bathroom had a beautiful walk-in shower! It was meant to be, I guess. We enjoyed our stay there so much I'm already dreaming of our next stay.

nostalgic + ready for something old in a new way

I've been on and off the blogging train for some time now. Tonight I'm feeling a little nostalgic for the blog world, and my small corner of the internet. So here I am, again. All images from my Pinterest board Live Colorfully, an oldie by goodie!

inspiration // baby blue

Hey, I'm back. To show ya some pretty pictures of baby blue things. Because why not? There's something so peaceful and calm about blue. Probably because the sky and the ocean and stuff, right? Makes sense. That's how I've been feeling lately: peaceful and calm. Happy, even. It's a wonderful thing! I'm looking forward to this new season in my life, where I feel so content. These pictures kind of sum it up for me, I guess.

 

weekly wanderlust: scandinavia

Norway

It's been a while, my friends. I've caught the "instagramming is so much easier than blogging" bug and it doesn't seem possible to come back from. But I'll try. I don't want to force anything that's not meant to be though.

I've been feeling the itch to travel lately. I even planned a mini trip to Seattle this week to quench it a little, but it's always going to be there (apart from the week after an exhausting trip when all I want to do is sit in a Netflix trance weighted down by blankets with just enough arm movement to craft lazily).

The destinations on my mind lately have been of the Scandinavian variety. Ever since I saw a few bloggers this past year visit Iceland, I haven't been able to shake the feeling of I MUST GO. Not just Iceland though--the whole enchalada, people. Ted and I went to Amsterdam for a few days, but that's as far as we got. The whole snowing-in-Portland-for-a-hot-sec also got me hankering for snowier climates. It's just something so foreign to me as an Arizonian! Waking up to snow falling literally turned me into a joyful toddler jumping up and down on the bed. Can you blame me? Snow is magical and exotic to desert folk.

One day I will make a Scandinavian backpacking trip happen. But for now, I will drool over pictures online and plan my wardrobe contents around how cool I want to look in Scandinavia when I visit someday. That's what normal people do, right?

But, come on. Just look at this. And these are just the tip of the iceberg.

(Did that get a pity laugh at least?)

Sweden (I blogged about the Ice Hotel years ago, y'all. I wanna go realll bad.)

Iceland

Finland

Greenland

Denmark, AKA Hogsmead amiright

good ol' all hallow's eve

I've always loved Halloween, and even as an "adult" it's still a great excuse to eat a lot of sugar and dress up.  I tried to go to approximately one Halloween house party in my college time. I hated it. I'm not much of a party person, unless I get to host it OR it's Christmastime.  I will suffer drunk people if Christmas cheer is involved.

I digress.  Halloween 2015 was a good sweet spot in terms of fun.  The night before, I made cupcakes and shared them with some friends at a game night. I spent most of my Halloween at work in my bat skirt and black & orange jewelry (thanks Grandma!). Halloween music filled the air, which I was pleased about. It rained BUCKETS. Seriously.  Flooding was a thing. I ate a lot of candy, too.

When I got home, I started the Sadness-ing process. I put on my big pale blue cashmere turtleneck (um, yes, I used this as an opportunity to buy something nice from work to wear again in the future!) and blue pants.  I put on my blue wig. I put on my awesome new blue lipstick (the last time I bought lipstick was last Halloween for my Lorde costume!). When Ted got home, he put the finishing touches on his Bing Bong costume. I helped him with the getup, and it turned out quite cute. He even bought himself fun rainbow socks for the occasion.  It was adorable.

And then our crazy night began! We ushered at a choral concert. I worked the comp tickets table. Why yes, we do know how to party hard! Thanks for asking.  But really, it was great--the music was a bit spooky, and afterwards we got drinks with a couple of friends at a pub in our neighborhood called North 45. Somehow the waitress brought us everything except for the two things I ordered, but otherwise it was a lovely time, with lots of entertainment (aka drunk, dressed up adults acting like children). Oh Halloween... We ended our night with the first season finale of Twin Peaks. I'd say it was a good Halloween.