Adventures in ClassPass

I recently signed up for a new service called ClassPass. I went through a lot of back and forth before joining, mostly because I'm already a member of Gold's Gym and had also been considering buying a membership at Core Power Yoga.

I finally pulled the trigger after I realized that 1) I only go to Gold's Gym for the classes, none of which I absolutely love, 2) I've been really wanting to try out different types of classes - more power yoga, barre, and spin, and 3) at $99/month, it really is a good deal.

The deal with ClassPass is:

• You pay a monthly fee, $99, but you have access to tons of gym classes in the area.
• They're currently only in DC, NYC, LA and a couple other major cities. 
• Core Power Yoga, my new obsession, is included along with lots of other yoga studios, spin classes, barre studios, and gyms like Mint. They're adding studios all the time, which is nice.
• The catch is that you can only visit each studio or franchise up to three times a month. So the only kicker is that I now have to limit my Core Power trips to three times a month...wah. 
• They charge you $20 per missed class, so it's a great motivator! 

There are a few things ClassPass is lacking, however...

• They don't have an app yet, though they say it's coming. 
• Their website functionality isn't great, unless you're on a computer, and even then - it's not perfect.
• Sorting classes by neighborhoods isn't intuitive, and you can't select "just Virginia" or even make a list of your favorite gyms.
• There are also no referral incentives.

There are tons of more features I think they could add, but I think that's just the strategist and website project manager in me. It definitely functions well enough to be addicting. I already have three more classes booked this week!

Progress

I signed up last week and went to my first class on Sunday. I wanted to start out with something safe and relatively easy so I chose an evening candlelight yoga class at JourneyYoga. I hadn't been to that studio before, but it's actually pretty close to my house which I appreciated, because a lot of the ClassPass gyms are in DC/Maryland. The class was awesome, and the teacher was really great. Signing up and in was quick and easy. I already booked another class with them for this weekend.

My second class was yesterday, at Xtend Barre in Old Town. The studio itself is super cute and modern, and I like that they have all the mats and equipment already laid out for you when you get there. The studio owner taught the class, and was really welcoming. This was my first barre class every and I'm instantly obsessed. I already went back today, to a class with an even tougher teacher, who I loved!

I'll be documenting the rest of my classes and adventures in ClassPass, since I've been trying to talk all my friends into it anyway and I want to hold myself accountable to going!

P.S. This is my first blog in way over a year. Let's see if I can keep it up this time.


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Margaritas and Monograms

My cousin and best friend, Caroline, is getting married this coming May. Last year, she was the maid of honor in my wedding, and this year the roles are reversed and I'm one of her matrons of honor (sounds so old...). It's been so exciting and it's hard to celebrate and do as much as I want to do from far away (she lives in South Carolina), but I've been able to be a part of a lot of things so far. A couple of months ago, our mutual good friend Liz, another of Caroline's maids of honor, reached out to myself and Kim, Caroline's college roommate and bridesmaid to see if we'd like to host a shower in honor of Caroline. I was super excited because Liz, Kim, Caroline and I used to all be roommates and a reunion was definitely in order. Of course, we all share a love of monograms, so it was instantly decided that needed to be the theme of the shower.

I've never been a bridesmaid before, let alone a maid of honor, so I've never hosted a shower. We've all been planning Caroline's bachelorette (more to come on that later), so I was finally getting the hang of things. When Liz mentioned the shower, I got really excited and visions of decorations and Pinterest inspirations danced in my head. We decided the theme would be "Monograms & Margaritas". Kim set us up with a secret Pinterest board, and we started posting ideas immediately.

Our "secret" Pinterest board - so the bride couldn't see our ideas!

We came up with a few decor ideas, food ideas, and more - and being the Google Docs lover I am, I started a Google doc and spreadsheet to keep track of our ideas and our budget.

All the sudden March 2 started getting closer and closer and we realized we needed to hurry up and get the invitations out. I designed the invitation and sent them out while Liz and Kim ran errands grabbing all the decor and food items back in Greenville. So helpful!

The invitation

Finally the weekend came, I made one last run to Party City for a few decor items I could fit in my carry on, printed out some other paper items I had created for the showers, and came home to finish some last-minute DIYs. I got really cute acrylic placecard holders, printed out blank mini-versions of the invitation, and planned on using a dry erase marker to write food labels on. $8 total!

Packing for Greenville - yes I fit it all!

More monograms!

After a bit of a long layover in New Jersey (because flying from DC to NJ to SC totally makes sense...), I finally arrived in Greenville at 1AM the night before the shower! Caroline picked me up and we decided we needed to hurry home and go straight to bed. Well, we like to talk... and hadn't seen each other since Christmas... so we ended up staying up until about 4AM. Oops! I had plans to eat breakfast with my in-laws the next morning, but I needed a couple more hours of sleep instead. (Oops!! Next time!)

The morning of the shower, Liz and I met at Kim's beautiful, new house to start getting ready for the party. We did a few last crafts, one of which was my favorite. We put cute duct tape around water bottles in place of a label (thanks Pinterest!). Then we headed to the venue to start setting up for the shower.

Cutest/easiest DIY ever

The venue was my absolute favorite part of the shower! Kim's sweet friend Mary Sims just started a business called Wedding101. It's a wedding planning venue where newly engaged brides can go, entirely for free, and get help finding and picking vendors for their wedding. Talk about a dream job! It's a new concept that recently opened in Nashville and Columbia, SC. Definitely check it out! So, we were able to use this gorgeous, already-decorated space for the shower.

Mexican-themed food and monogram cupcakes

Kim's photo wall

Monogram gifts!

The buckets I decorated and carried on the plane with me

Liz's cute idea: write down a date for the newlyweds

Funfetti and red velvet monogrammed mini-cupcakes

The margarita/daquiri bar

We set it up, the guests began to arrive, and we had a really fun time watching Caroline open all her gorgeous presents.

Welcome! 

The beautiful bride-to-be

Current and former roommates

Pretty girls at the pretty venue

Obviously Kim and I really liked this gift

This shower was so fun and easy to plan, mostly because I had two awesome co-shower-throwers (whatever it's called!) who did most of the heavy lifting since I was 500 miles away. Thanks so much girls, and WE LOVE YOU CC!

Fun times with fun girls

The hostesses and the bride-to-be

Day Trips and Drinks: Annapolis

Ever since my husband and I returned from our honeymoon to the Virgin Islands last August, we've been searching and searching to find the exact drinks we had down there. His favorite was the Painkiller and mine was called the Bushwacker. The resort we stayed in, Sugar Bay, was all-inclusive, meaning we could have as many of these drinks whenever we wanted. I'm sure each one was 500 calories each, but whatever - it was so worth it (and every bride deserves those calories after the wedding!). 

Me with my first-ever Bushwacker from The Beach Bar - St. John, USVI

Well, we finally found a place nearby that claimed to make the true version of these drinks (meaning that they use only Pusser's Rum). It was only about an hour up the road in Annapolis, Maryland: Pusser's Caribbean Grill! Perfect! We couldn't wait to plan a trip to Annapolis to try them out and compare them to the true USVI version.

A few weeks ago my friend Hadley asked us if we'd like to do a quick Annapolis trip with her and her boyfriend and another couple. We knew this was our chance. Thankfully the restaurant our trusty travel guide Hadley chose was, you guessed it, Pusser's!

We drove up to Annapolis Saturday morning, and it was such a quick drive from DC. I had only been to Annapolis once as kid and barely remembered it. We spent the day walking around, trying out the go-to spots. We had to grab crabcakes at Chick & Ruth's Delly and tour the US Naval Academy. The campus was gorgeous and it was interesting to see. The girls shopped at the cute little boutiques while the guys beer-hopped.

Rainy but beautiful Annapolis

On the USNA campus

Finally Saturday night came and it was time to try the drinks. With our fingers crossed we ordered them and they were PERFECT! We were so excited and it really made us reminisce about that awesome week back in August. Counting the days until we can go back to try the real thing once again.

The group at Pusser's

Here's the recipe for each drink - I've never "tried this at home" but I definitely want to try now. Since the restaurant itself was called Pusser's, it had a legit gift shop selling the hard-to-find rum, but the gift store was closed by the time we made it. As soon as we can find some, you can bet I will be trying this at home.

Thanks for a fun weekend Hadley & co!

Painkiller & Bushwacker

Two Tiny Cats

If you follow me on any social media it's no secret I'm pretty much obsessed with posting pictures of my two kittens. My husband and I adopted them from Home Alone Feline Rescue back in January. They came from Prince George County in Maryland, which is apparently a high-kill shelter. Jill, the director of HAFR rescues the kittens and then places them into foster homes. As soon as we saw them, we fell in love and it's been a fun ride being cat parents so far.

Lady

Beau

Growing up I only ever had dogs (golden retrievers and a fox terrier) and never considered myself much of a cat person. After our fox terrier, Hunter, passed away a few years ago, my mom got a black cat, Marley. A year or so later came our other two black kittens, Augusta and Patton. I fully expected them to move to DC with me when I did, but I couldn't separate them from each other. Breck always grew up with cats and is definitely a cat person. We always knew we wanted to get kittens but just had to wait for the right time (and the right house!).

Once Breck and I bought our house here in Arlington, we were finally able to get kittens. And now, here we are with Lady and Beau. They both headed to the vet yesterday to get fixed and are spending today recovering. I think it was more traumatic for me than it was for them! Can't imagine how it's going to be with actual children...ha.

Prepare for about a million more pictures from here on out...

A Weekend in Charleston

My favorite picture of the trip - Folly Pier

I have a new rule, and it's "never waste a good three-day weekend". So, last Sunday night my husband and I decided that we needed to go somewhere for President's Day weekend and that somewhere would be Charleston. Not only is it one of our favorite cities, but it's the city we got married in last August. We actually hadn't been back since then.

We left Friday around 4:00 p.m. and hit the trifecta of horrible DC traffic: Friday afternoon, holiday weekend, and an accident on 95. It set us back about two and a half hours. We were planning on getting in pretty late, but ended up getting in at almost 2:30 a.m. We're used to driving long distances and getting in well into the night, but this was pushing it, even for us.

We pulled up to our little rental apartment on Folly and instantly loved it. We searched VRBO.com (one of my favorite travel sites) for something small, cozy and, honestly, cheap for the weekend. It was perfect! It was a small kitchen, bathroom and bedroom in a little complex right behind Snapper Jack's. It was only about a block from the beach and just around the corner from Center Street, where all the restaurants and shops on Folly are.

Saturday we spent the day shopping on King Street, which is one of my absolutely favorite places to shop. The best deal of the day went to Brooks Brothers, where I got some cute khaki cropped pants for more than half off. The pants aren't on the website any more, but lots of cute stuff is 60 percent off right now!

That night, we tried out a restaurant I've always wanted to try - Mercato. It's downtown right next to the market, hence the name. I had Pork Milanese and Breck had Chicken Marsala. Our food came out in less than ten minutes and we were literally blown away. Definitely one of the best dinners I've had in a while. We will be back!

Allagash White, yum

We spent the rest of the weekend hanging out with friends and eating at some more favorite places. Sunday morning we had brunch at Lost Dog Cafe and it was so good. I was craving some good cheesy grits and I got my wish. We also got about four drinks each...

I'll take a Cranberry Mimosa, Diet Coke, Coffee and Water...

We spent Sunday being lazy on Folly. We walked into Bert's Market, and saw a sign on the door for bike rentals down the street. We wandered over an met an interesting character who gave us two bikes for $10 as long as we promised to bring them back later that night. We rode down the island and even down the beach during sunset. It was definitely the most beautiful sunset I've ever seen. The photo and video opportunities during this trip were insane!

Sunday night we ate at another one of our go-to places, Taco Boy. You can't go wrong with a black bean quesadilla there, and we tried the Mexican cake dessert, too.

Monday we got up early to check-out of the condo and headed out of town early. We stopped at the Smithfield outlets in North Carolina on the way home and cleared out the J. Crew. Almost everything I bought was either black or neon pink. Whoops. The best score was definitely this pink blazer that I got for $40!

Nude wedges on super sale

Notice a pattern?

  

Overall it was a fun weekend, and I'm always happy to get to spend time in my favorite city. Can't wait til next time...

The Grammys

I have to admit I have never been an awards show fan. But, recently I've been more impressed. Plus, the E! Red Carpet shows get me really excited beforehand. I watched the Golden Globes this year and really liked it. The Grammys, however, were just amazingly awesome.

Favorite moments:

[Via ABC News]

Justin Timberlake
Bringing down the house with Jay-Z and debuting another new song. I'm sorry, JT can do no wrong.

Bonnie Raitt and John Mayer
 I'm legit obsessed with both of these artists. Big time.

The Weight
No words. Elton John?? Zac Brown? Alabama Shakes. AND Mumford? I die.

Kelly Clarkson covering Carole King
Two amazing women. One beautiful song.

Best Dressed:

[via HuffingtonPost]

Taylor SwiftUm, have you seen these hilarious GIFs?

[via HuffingtonPost]

Carrie Underwood
Who apparently hates Taylor and requested to be sat far away from her - not sure if I believe this...

Worst Dressed:

[via HuffingtonPost]

Adele

No, just... no.

[via JustJared]

Florence Welch

Is she a lizard? A dinosaur? It's the Pantone color of the year, but I'm scared....

What did you think? What did you love or hate? I'm actually kind of excited for the Oscars now, even though I'm definitely more of a music person than a movie person.

Taking the plunge

I resisted making a blog. I love social media. I work for the social media arm of a public relations company. I Facebook, I Instagram, I tweet, I Foursquare, I just started Vine-ing and now...finally, I'm blogging.

I've always looked at blogging to be a little self-important. I feel awkward writing about myself, and like I've said before, I'm not a writer. But, I think my mind is changing. Time to take the blogging plunge.

It's not that I don't love blogs. One of my favorite things to do is curl up with my iPad and pull up Flipboard and swipe through all of my favorite blogs. They leave me feeling inspired and creative. Recently I decided, "Hey, I can do that, too!"

I'm hoping this blog can be a fun outlet for me to expand a little on the short snippets that I share daily on other networks.

Wish me luck!