time sure does fly

and just like that my time at home is over. but what a five weeks it has been!

i haven't even finished posting about the rest of my vacation but i promise next week will be the week for catching up. for now i have some last minute packing (it always is last minute) to do, and then i fly tonight.

enjoy your weekends everyone!

a weekend with the girls

two weekends ago i headed to philadelphia for a girls weekend with two of my bests. oh what a weekend it was! none of us had ever spent too much time in that city and since it is just a short drive we thought it would be the perfect location. we didn't want to put too much pressure on ourselves to do a whole lot of touristy things but instead just focus on having a good weekend together. so we walked around the city until our toes couldn't stand the cold anymore and then ate delicious food at different restaurants until our stomachs couldn't hold anymore. i was also lucky one night to meet up with one of my old roommates from college and it was the best to catch up with her for a while. 

it was just the kind of weekend i needed. plus i was able to cross one of my wishes off for this year!

catching up

i hope you will excuse my absence recently. instead of blogging i have thoroughly been enjoying my time at home and have taken two more little trips since my journey to tampa for christmas! two weekends ago i went to philly with some friends and most recently i just got back from 5 days in boston. but i need to play a little catch up so i'm going to bring you all the way back to christmas again.

we ventured over to ybor city while we were in tampa. ybor has one of the most famous cuban restaurants called the columbia restaurant (take a moment to work that one out). and inside of said restaurant it looked like we had traveled all the way to the motherland, spain.we enjoyed some great tapas for lunch that day and then some more for christmas eve dinner that night. don't worry we didn't overlap! basically this trip consisted of family and a whole lot of spanish food. my kind of trip.

the best food

for christmas eve and christmas my aunt cooked up a storm. my mother's side of the family is spanish and since i was little every family gathering has involved delicious home-cooked spanish food. and even though my aunts and cousins don't get together as often as we used to, my mom still loves to make all the tapas my dad, brother, and i can eat. lucky us!

so for christmas eve my aunt prepared a ton of tapas that were a huge hit with everyone. stuffed mushrooms (with the good jamon), croquettas, codfish with tomato sauce, manchego cheese, red peppers, and more. then for christmas dinner she made a traditional paella. these pictures really don't do it all justice but writing about it makes me want to eat it all again.

does anyone else have traditional foods that they eat around the holidays? (or always?)

happy weekend everyone!

someone else's home for the holidays

i didn't take all that many pictures on christmas eve or christmas day. and the ones that i did take are all very different from one another so i wasn't sure how to make a post about them.

which is why i picked three of my favorites to post for now.

my parents and i hopped on a plane sunday morning and headed south to tampa, florida where both my aunt and grandmother live. so we all headed to my aunt's house for christmas eve dinner with some of her friends and then christmas with just the family. they were two very laid back but also very fun days. i haven't seen a lot of my family outside of my parents and brother in quite a while so these past few days were just really nice. not to mention we were constantly indulging in some great food (thanks aunt monica!).

so before i sort through the rest of my pictures (and my dad's because lets be honest, i'm going to snag some of his better ones) i thought i would leave you with a few scenes from my aunt's lovely home.

i hope everyone had a very merry christmas!