Fun Times

Flowers I picked on the side of the road A WEEK AGO.

I love weekends. Especially when Zach doesn't have an overwhelming amount of work due on Monday. Seeing how the next few weekends are our last here, Zach and I are going to try and make the most out of them. This weekend consisted of date night, Communiversity, and yummies. And then there's still tomorrow!

It was about time for another car picture. 

For date night Zach and I went to Hopewell for Nomads pizza. Oh man, so so good. There happen to also be about 35 (10) 10 year old girls at the table next to us which was a bit overwhelming. I didn't really mind, but I'm pretty sure that's because I was enjoying a delicious bottle of red wine. 

After dinner Zach and I headed next door to Twine, a ridiculously cute store, then home. I walked around the block to ward off the hellish fullness of my belly while Zach started on his nap. After naptime we watched "Oliver & Company". I had never seen it and Zach hadn't seen it since we was a little kid. Cute movie. 

Playing in Twine

Zach's the fullest.

Today we slept in and I eventually emerged from our bedroom in need of some coffee and breakfast. I decided to make a brussel sprout and ham quiche and man was it delicious. After breakfast and doing more of Saturday nothingness Zach and I headed to Communiversity. Once we got home Zach had to get ready for the Hub. I headed over to Ruths and enjoyed some delicious homemade chicken soup and then came back home. Tonight Katie is going to come over for another paint session. So fun. 


Miss you and love you all. 

Found This

Good Times

Well, it's been a while and a bit too much has happened. Clearly though I am about to catch you (that's right all of you) up to speed on what's been a'happenin in the Grant Household. We shall begin at the Carly/Harper wedding. Back in May Zach and I drove all the way down to Tampa for my dear (all the way back from elementary school) friend Carly Chastain's wedding.   The ceremony was held at a church right on our street so Zach and I were able to walk to the ceremony and then to Beef O' Bradys--on the other side of the street-- for the reception. Zach and I made it through the vows of the ceremony but then we had to run home because my zipper split pretty much right when I sat down and turned to have Zach look at the back of my arm. Awesome. It was such a cute dress too! So so disappointing. Anywho, we went home and changed into a different dress and then continued to Beefs. I love attending weddings of people  I went high school (and below) with. It's always so great to see everyone and laugh and dance and play. We definitely had a grand ol' time. 

After the wedding Zach drove back to New Jersey all by his lonesome. Yes, he's amazing and I love him. He had to be at school Monday morning. I stayed in Tampa and hung out with Cathy and then headed to Saint Augustine to be with my loves. Cally, Dani, and J-9 were at work during the day so I mainly went to the beach and wandered around town. I got tan again for the first time in way too long and it was absolutely wonderful. I felt like myself again. On Wednesday I drove to the farmhouse to spend some time with my Pop. On Thursday we drove down to Lakeland for a retirement function. It was fun seeing people I haven't seen since I was like 6 but I definitely got tired of hearing, "Man, I haven't seen you since you were this (holds hand to knee height) tall. yaddayaddayadda" But that's ok, I liked spending time with Dad and the drive was pretty. Dad and I fixed up the soaking tub so the girls and I could use it as a pool for our weekend o' fun. 

Europe

Then came the best weekend ever. So picture this, there's the farmhouse. Sitting all wonderful and quiet in the middle of nowhere. Random cats occasionally asking to be fed, birds chirping, NPR in the background. Baling Baling Baling *incoming text noise* Nicole: "Be there in 15 minutes." Me: "Really? Where are you?!" Nicole: "Oh just on 90." Me: "OK see you in atleast 45 minutes." Nicole: "Nah---My GPS says I'll be there so soon!" 

~45 minutes later~

Nicole arrives and we laugh about how wrong her GPS was and how many times she passed by the house, then HALIE gets there! We immediately each grab a beer and try and settle into the coziness of the front porch. The mosquitoes didn't want to be bothered so they shooed us back inside. Slowly Jenni, Cally, Dani, and J-9 join us and we all laugh and hug and squeal with excitement for the weekend to come. 

That weekend was absolutely amazing. These girls make me feel like I am home. They are my best friends (plus the few that were unable to make it :( ) and I love them dearly. They are my sisters and I cannot imagine life without them. Sometimes I feel like I can be myself more around these girls than I can around my own family. And yes, Samantha Jones (from Sex and the City) these girls are my soul mates.

After returning back to good ol' New Jersey I had work and some doctor's appointments to look forward to. --I lose insurance in about 2 months so obviously. . . -- but then we got to celebrate our dear friend Kevin's birthday! YAY Kevin! So we went into NYC and visited the MOMI --Museum of Moving Image-- It was pretty awesome. We all walked around the museum for a bit, ate lunch at 5 Napkin Burger--delicious--and then walked around the museum a bit more. The guys went to see some 2 hour karate movie so Rae and I got manicures and headed back to the restaurant for some dranks. So fun. So necessary. 

All of the following pictures are courtesy Mrs. Rae McNeal. Sup playa.

This was actually a miniature set!

Playing old school Mario and Sonic!

nomnomnomnomnomnom

Dubbing over movie lines. Hysterical.

Just. . ..ya know. . . 

This was some type of art display. . . but also hand puppets!

Afterwards we went back to the McNeals for a bit of singing and piano playing and then we headed home for the night. Then it was time for Easter! I love the church we go to right now. Kingston United Methodist is such a sweet church. At the end of every service we all circle the pews and say the Lords Prayer and sing a hymn. It's wonderful and I love it. This Easter the McNeals, Shanti, and the Heinemans joined us for Easter Linner. It was delicious and amazing and I love my friends.

 

Making Zach his Strawberry Rhubarb Pie

Kevin loves Scooby.

 And that was our lovely Easter. It's really something amazing when we are able to feel like we are surrounded by family even when ours is hundreds of miles away.


This past Monday night Zach and I were supposed to go to a Trenton Thunder baseball games. Unfortunately Zach was unable to attend because he had his first dress rehearsal for his play that night! Fortunately though my lovely friend Ruth was able to join me! We had so much fun asking ridiculous questions and eating delicious food. 

Ruth was saying something along the lines of, "Baseball!!"

Wednesday night we had Zach Senior Banquet. That's right. It was actually quite nice. The dinner was held in the campus dining hall and the professors along with the president of the Seminary served the meal. Zach is graduating so sooooon. For a more sentimental post on this event, see Rae's blog. 


Thursday night the McNeals and I went to see Zach perform in his play! Zach had been wanting to take part in the play at the Seminary since he began school up here. It's for class credit so Senior year is when it happened. He did so well! 

Waiting for the play to begin!

So fancy.

Also, at some point during that week, Katie and I managed to make state string art things! One of my co-workers, Kelly, is getting married so and we had a shower for her at work. I was excited to make a state-string-art-thing for her. Here she is with it:

Joysee!

So there's that! Kinda busy lately, but it's been great. Today and last night I took care of some homework and relaxed. 

So cozy and wonderful.

Who knows what next week will bring! Miss you and love you all! 

Painted On a Piece of Wood

So We Meet Again. . .

Well hello there. I apologize for my lack of posting. . . .I know you were crying yourself to sleep at night in fear that I may never post again, fear not. Almost a month has passed since my last post and since then there have been several post worthy moments. However, lack of time, my (one) online class, changing my diet (which requires making a real grocery list and taking time to prepare all THREE meals), going out of town for the weekend, and having a pretty constant headache have kept me away from my lil' cozywithtoast. But here I am! 


I know one day I will think back to this time and realize how much "free" time I had on my hands, but I don't feel that way right now so future self: Time management is key.

Valentines Day! I love Valentines Day. I loved it when I was single and I love it now! It's so fun and sweet and even if you are single you can go out with your lady friends and have a grand ol' time. This Valentines Day Zach and I made a delicious dinner of roasted broccoli, filet mignon,  and mashed potatoes. We enjoyed dinner with wine while we watched Midnight In Paris. Also a variety bag of Lindt chocolates may or may not have been eaten during the film(pre eating healthy). 

Yes, all of these picture came from the McNeal camera.

The Friday after Valentines Day Kevin and Zach decided to take me and Rae out on a "Surprise Date." I always try and not get too excited about these events because I have a way of blowing things out of reality and then I get disappointed even if whatever it is is awesome. So I'm dumb sometimes, get over it. I was excited but I had pretty low expectations. I know that any time with the McNeals is a good time, so there's that. But this time the guys did a pretty amazing job! We went to dinner at a new place called Nomad Pizza in Hopewell. There was a bit of a wait so we walked into the cutest store called Twine right next door until they were ready for us. Etsy and Pinterest exploded and made Twine. It was adorable and filled with things that I wanted to make or buy. Rae's cell phone rang (that's how they do it at Nomads) the little guy at the front door told us it was our time to eat! So we headed over and enjoyed the most delicious pizza. It was byob so we also enjoyed two bottles of red wine. So fun. So delicious. This is the kind of pizza that makes Papa Johns seem like fake food. Nom nom. Afterwards---that's right the fun does not end there---we headed back to the McNeals. The guys instructed Rae and I to relax in the living room while they got things ready. They set the table with wine and a delectable assortment of desserts. So pretty and also soooo delicious. After the delicious dessert we collapsed in the living room and chatted it up. Reminiscing about our wonderful evening. THEN the guys just went the extra mile and brought in WRAPPED gifts. Rae received a wonderful coffee table book of NY Times pictures and a mushroom bottle opener and I received a Pin Hole Camera kit and a snail bottle opener. The gifts were perfect for us which made everything just over the top amazing.  Koodos guys! 


At some point in time I had to take the much dreaded GREs. I studies all 200 vocab words. I knew them front to back. I had a good handle on all the random math that I had ever learned in my entire life. Maybe 15 of the words were on the test and the math, well I have no idea where that came from. I did completely average on the test. I felt a bit defeated. Right up until I logged onto the University of Saint Augustine website and saw that I had made a higher score than what they require! So wooo hoooo. I will NEVER have to take that horrible test again! 


Last weekend Zach and I drove up to Fishkill, NY to surprise our good friend Christina Congi for her 25th birthday! Her sweet mom and dad put together this whole surprise party for her complete with catered yumminess, a DJ, and balloons. It was so wonderful. When Christina first walked in to the room Zach and I hung back a bit and watched as she slowly realized what was going on and then just started smiling and tearing up. Then she walked in a bit her mom pointed to us. She screamed and started crying! I was so happy they we were able to surprise her and join in on celebrating her birthday. Zach and I met some of Christinas family and friends, enjoyed the delicious food, danced, and simply enjoyed the time we had together to sit and talk. Wonderful night. Afterwards we headed to Christinas house and changed into PJs. Christina opened her gifts while we watched SNL and then it was bedtime. The next morning we slept in and then headed to lunch at a yummy BBQ place. Can't remember the name but it was so good. Then it was time to head back to Princeton. Another wonderful weekend. 


Last story. This week is Zachs Reading Week. It's like a Spring Break except he is expected to read the whole time because work is due when he starts back to school on Monday. Dumb huh? Yesterday he took a much needed opportunity to get out of the house and participated in an MRI study (or something) at Princeton University. They paid him $40. When I got home he surprised me with a pair of opal earrings that he purchased with his money. So sweet and our of nowhere. With the money he also got lunch and an ice cream cone. Just imagine Zach walking around Princeton all happy with his ice cream cone in one hand and a little gift for his wife in another. What a happy guy. What a lucky lady. 


That's it for now. 


Miss you and love you all. 

Drankin-N-Paintin

Last night my friend Katie came over and we painted. Well, we drank wine, watched a weird movie, got oil paint everywhere, and painted. It was wonderful! It felt good to paint something new. It felt good to paint. 

Miss you and love you all!

N-I-A-G-R-A wrong. N-I-A-G-A-R-A right.

OK I admit it! I was spelling Niagara wrong this whole time! Well, in my brain at least. I'm not sure I have ever had to write down the word. . . but up until a few days ago I definitely would have been corrected by spell check. I learn so much when I visit new places! Another thing I learned is that pretty much every attraction in Niagara Falls is closed for the Winter. It's a good thing Zach and I like eachother so much or else we would have been bored out of our minds. 

We finally arrived at the Red Coach Inn in Niagara Falls Wednesday night around 6:30pm. Right when we got there we were amazed at the giant billowing tower of mist that rose above the falls. Though we were a couple blocks away we could still hear the pounding sound of the water crashing down far below. The Inn is right across from the rapids that lead into the falls. At dinner that first night we looked over and saw the rapids thrashing along. So dang powerful. 

Thursday morning we woke up to an amazing breakfast. Seriously. Delicious. I had Eggs Benedict two days in a row. Now that's a vacation! After breakfast we grabbed our passports and drove on into Canada. We were immediately greeted by smiling faces and warm hugs. The Mounties were there to guide us on our adventure. Not really, but wouldn't that have been great. The day was spent staring at the powerful falls, driving deeper into Canada to visit a really cute little town, Niagara on the Lake, finding ourselves on Lake Ontario, "It's so foggy you can't even see the other side. . .. oh wait. . . " We even walked around a good ol' Canadian mall and drank some Canadian Starbucks coffee. We had a wonderful day. 

Lake Ontario

Niagara Falls is beautiful, even when all the attractions are closed. We did decide that we would like to return in the Summer one day. Though it would be packed, it's basically like a giant water park. Sounds fun. 

Miss you and love you all.