Tuesday night

Tuesday night found me sweating in my kitchen. I had the oven up at 400 degrees and I was baking tomatoes. It was so totally worth it though. I sliced up some my big farmers market tomatoes, scooped out the insides (with my handy serrated grapefruit spoon!), filled them up with a mixture of egg, chives, and Parmesan cheese and baked them. Served over some warm orzo it was like summer on my plate. Unfortunately, it felt like summer inside my apartment too, it didn't cool down until at least 10pm. No more oven for a while.

Here's what I'm loving out there right now:

interior design

I love this idea of turning any quote into a framable piece of art. Do it here on Recite.

Ashley and Jamine at Handmade Home are feeling the need for a design change - as much as I love everything they do, I'm excited to see them change it up. It's always fun to follow along as my favorite bloggers redo their home.

fashion/style

If you're already loving WhoWhatWear and their fabulous home site Domaine, then make sure you check out Byrdie, the newest fashion and beauty site from Hillary Kerr and Katherine Power. This empire is growing!

food

Jennie, the total Brooklyn girl, bought a house upstate! I love her ruminations on having a place that your children can come home to. Oh, and there's a recipe for a blackberry old-fashioned, luckily I have bourbon at home right now.

Ok, clearly all food references are just going to be cocktails, cause I'm never turning my oven on again. Here's a fresh peach jalapeno margarita from My Baking Addiction.

And here's another bourbon drink: Sweet tea and bourbon from new (to me) LA blogger Sugar and Charm.

And let's sip it alongside these amazing raw tacos from Laura at First Mess. 

hard to define

Just in case you're struggling with a work life balance (and who isn't, really?), Anne of City Sage pointed me towards the motivational site, Live in the Grey. Started by two marketing dudes, it's all about how to find your passion and actually live the life you love.

In this household, we've left our summer holiday plans to the last second and we're still browsing Airbnb nightly. The problem is, I'm finding too many drool-worthy places, and am now left helpless, unable to make a decision. Does anyone else have this issue? Airbnb's cofounder, Joe Gebbia gave Domaine his top 10 destinations list - and most of them are surprisingly cheap, perhaps this will help me.

So, How Was Your Day?

Hey lovelies, I hope you've already begun relaxing this weekend. But just in case reading blogs is part of your relaxation (it's totally part of mine!) then check me out on the awesomely clever site, So, How Was Your Day? by the lovely Jessica Murnane. You'll learn more than you ever wanted to know about my day, and the days of other creatives. Jessica also runs One Part Plant, a site for foodies who love plants (and want a happy life and clean head), and has a stationary company. Thanks, Jessica!

Lovely weekend + links

I hope you all had a lovely weekend. We spent it at my parents house in Pennsylvania. There was an iron heritage festival going on in their small town so we had fireworks, barbecues, and pools to relax beside (as you can see in the last two photos above). Oh, and Ted and I ran a 5K with my dad and sister on Saturday morning. Now we're back in the city, waiting for the heatwave to heave its last gasp of humid air.

And p.s.: I'm so glad Kate's baby is here. Now I can stop worrying about it and move on to something else, like the Bachelor or starting Orange is the New Black on Netflix or something else equally fascinating. 

interior design

The talented interior stylist Justina Blakeney announced her upcoming book on her blog today - and I'm the lucky editor to work with her on The New Bohemians. She's so super creative that I feel my energy picking up every time I'm on her site. I can only imagine what skill she'll bring to an interiors book.

Jen at I Heart Organizing did a painting stripes tutorial and her point about ripping up the tape before it totally dries seems like a no-brainer tip. Plus the room looks amazing.

With all of the white in kitchens nowadays, it was nice to see this post from The Decorista on the color black and its place in kitchen decor (as long as you have tons of natural light, that is).

This Ikea side table hack is my next project - it has marbled contact paper! Posted by Abby at Style Me Pretty Living.

fashion/style

If you're not reading A Blog About Love yet, then I hope you have room in your lives for one more. Mara and Danny live in Brooklyn and write about love, loss, second marriages after divorce, trying for children, and living life to the fullest despite setbacks. It's beautiful and inspiring. Today they hosted a question answer session in the comments and it's really interesting to hear their answers on all sorts of topics.

Tattly (run by Tina Roth of Swissmiss) has added NYC subway lines to their tattoos!! I didn't think it was possible to love this company more.

food

I've been in the mood for desserts with a tamer taste these days, something a little less heavy than the chocolate mousse-y things I crave in colder weather. This lemon, ricotta, and almond flourless cake from Mint is exactly that.

In that same vein, I think these fresh apricot bars from Diane and Todd at White on Rice Couple would be the perfect weeknight sweet-but-not-overly-sweet dessert.

I know Coco and Kelley says these braised pork chops are good for a crowd but I'm thinking about making them tonight.


See you later this week.

Honey day

You know how some days the words flow quickly like cool water on a parched throat. But then other days, they drip agonizingly slowly, like honey falling in sticky drops from a spoon? At least that's how it feels to me.

This is a honey day, so I'm keeping it short and sweet.

Cause embarrassingly enough, instead of typing here all I want to do is listen to the NKOTB single, Remix. I cannot believe I just admitted that in a blog post. But it's true. It's been in my head for days!

food

Did you guys watch Beth of Local Milk on the show Masterchef? I for one, am glad she's back home and sharing recipes with us again (and I think she is too). This brown butter waffle cake with sorghum clearly reflects her excitement to be back home and blogging.

Adrianna did a great series lately on A Cozy Kitchen where she toured a favorite restaurant and managed to snag a delicious looking recipe for white peach crumble with brown butter. It's a candidate for my next dinner party, for sure.

interior design

I'm totally obsessed with this Chicago apartment featured on Design Sponge today. It's how I would design in my dreams.

Anne Sage has found me another Etsy addiction and this time it's a midcentury modern store called Davey's Vintage - I could imagine this furniture all over my apartment. And now I just got sucked down an Etsy black hole.

fashion

Baggu has released a new line of beautiful supple leather totes. You could win one at Miss Moss.

undefinable

We're publishing Nat's book (yes, that Nat of Nat the Fat Rat fame!) and it's going to be about love, motherhood, inspiration, life, and loss, and I think this one is going to resonate with a lot of people.

I'll be back later to tell you about what I've been baking lately: peach lattice pie, the brown butter peaches wrapped in pie dough that I made on saturday night, and the mushroom bourguignon that slipped silkily off my fork.

Look

Going for a quieter look in the site's header today, what do you think? I kind of like the bookish and clean feel.

Hope you guys had a lovely holiday weekend (if you're in the US). We got to visit the ocean on Friday and I could have sat on the sand forever, feeling the tidal pull and listening to the crash and roll of the waves. I'm not a beach every day of the summer kind of girl, but a few trips every now and then fill me up for the rest of the year.

interior design

Kim and Scott of Yellow Brick Home have moved into their new house and are (finally) sharing photos of their blank slate home. I cannot wait to see what they do with this light!

Summer in a cottage on the Costa Brava? Yes, please! My Scandianavian Home takes us there (and I never want to leave).

food

Clotilde has a new book out! Head over to Chocolate and Zucchini to congratulate her and win a copy of The French Market Cookbook that just came out this week.

Salads are about all I can wrap my mind around these past few weeks (that or ordering delivery, to be honest). Sprouted Kitchen gives us a recipe for mache peach salad with jalapeno vinaigrette that makes dinner seem bearable.

I heart camping. Which is strange because I haven't had the chance to go in years. But if I did, I'd carry a ton of avocados and use these avocado recipes from new fave outdoors site, Dirtbag Darling.


That's what I love out in the blogworld so far this week! See you in a few days.

Transplanted no more

So, I was on the train this morning, and I couldn't stop staring at a group of young girls chattering away to each other about the different areas of the city they were exploring. It was obvious they were new transplants to New York. They seemed fresh with possibilities and energy, and stared wide-eyed at the rest of us. And that's when it hit me: I no longer feel like a new transplant to this city. I'm part of the regular sleepy and cynical hoard traveling to work by rote - shifting mindlessly to one side when people get on the train, and barely raising our eyes except to change the page on our kindles. When I exited at Union Square, I walked behind another young threesome, their so carefully chosen black clothing flapping awkwardly, newly, around them and they proclaimed loudly, "it's so HUMID here!" as they walked past stands with fragrant piles of zucchini and lavender.

After I noted these two groups of fledgling New Yorkers, I reminisced about my own arrival to NYC and realized today that tomorrow, July 4th, marks my 11 year anniversary in New York City! 11 years ago tomorrow, my father and I ran a 5k race in Pennsylvania, then jumped in our car and drove up to the city to move me in. Was I too fresh with possibilities and energy then? I don't feel so very different from that girl today (minus the wide-eyed element). Tomorrow I'll celebrate July 4th as America's birthday, my sister's birthday, and also as my own personal coming to NY holiday. Cheers and slainte to new beginnings and possibilities! I hope your own holiday is equally as meaningful.

interior design

I love the home goods store Wind and Willow. They feature wood bowls and kitchen tools and many other things that have been dipped in gorgeous, bright colors. I was lucky enough to get one of their little bowls dipped in pink paint in my Alt Summit goodie box, and I use it for my rings every night. A whole collection of their bowls would look so pretty on a white shelf.

Travel to Honey Kennedy to wish Jen a happy birthday, and while you're there, enter to win lots of things!

food

Have you tried the famous Cronut yet? Everyone in NYC is going crazy for this pastry, which is basically a croissant fried in a doughnut shape. Pioneered by Dominique Ansel, it sells out in 2 hours every morning. Ansel picks a different flavor each month, and July is a sweet blackberry cronut. The Kitchn has the scoop.

This weather may not call for a savory pie, but I cannot stop craving this chicken pot pie put together by Alice Gao and Maria del Mar Sacasa for Nikole Herriott's "for the love of pie" series.

Sometimes we forget that the simplest of dinners are the best. Luisa reminded me of that with her meal for baby Hugo.

I plan on raising a glass tomorrow as we watch fireworks, and hopefully that glass is filled with Amanda Freitag's strawberry basil margarita found on The New Potato.

Tara at Seven Spoons reminisces about her childhood summers (so, so different from my temperate Irish ones!) and gives us a recipe for campari strawberry limeade ice pops.


If you're in the US have a wonderful holiday weekend!