holiday circlefest.

Hold up. Before proceeding, you must start playing Silver Bells softly in the background while you read this post to get yourself in the Christmas spirit. It's necessary. 

(Still waiting....you better have it playing. I do.)

This past Sunday was the annual Holiday CircleFest in University Circle. For those of you not familiar with the area, University Circle is the epitome of all things I love. Cleveland Museum of Art, MOCA, Natural History Museum, Western Reserve Historical Society, Wade Oval....the list goes on. There are a bunch if great places to visit extending down Euclid to, Uptown, a really cool hip new area. 

For CircleFest, every museum I listed above and a number of other local organizations, opened their doors to festival goers for a fun, wintery celebration. 

I was happy to see a few of the food trucks made it to the festival. I had a gooey, warm macaroni and cheese sandwich with bacon.  Yes, you read it right: Mac & cheese, bacon, buttery toasted bread. 

We walked around the natural history museum, watched ice skaters, saw ice carving demonstrations, and even took a horse & carriage ride around Wade Oval. 

Lolley the trolley was there to shuttle us to the next stop: Park Lane Villas. We took a little tour of this historic apartment building.

The Holiday CircleFest is over, but there are fun things to do at Wade Oval all winter long! I might head back for the figure skating demos and snowman making contest.

Bundle up everyone!

lions, tigers, and scares.

This summer, I participated in a number of social media contests hosted by local companies and organizations. Twitter, Pinterest, Facebook...you name it, I played it.

And it was so worth it.

One of the biggest surprises came in August when I received an email informing me that I had won four tickets to the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo and four tickets to Cedar Point. I had won a contest through Positively Cleveland using a newer social media site, Tackk.

We visited the zoo a few weeks ago and couldn't have asked for a more beautiful fall day. Everything was decorated with hay and pumpkins, which made the visit even nicer. 

Our tickets also included four passes to the rainforest. It was so much fun walking around the indoor jungle. 

Last Friday, Chris' parents invited my family over for a clambake. The house was decorated perfectly and we all enjoyed eating the warm, hearty food. I even tried an oyster! 

Last weekend we visited Cedar Point's Halloweekends. The first part of the day was spent riding a few rides, including the new Gatekeeper (I actually cried, Chris loved it) and drinking hot chocolate.
 By the evening, the rain had cleared up and we were able to start hitting all of the Halloween attractions. This was my first time at Halloweekends and we all had a BLAST. The haunted house below was one of the scariest I've been to! 

The entire park was decorated with graveyards, pumpkins, and "scare zones." The scare zones were all themed differently with fog machines and awesome decorations. The entire park had such a new feel compared to my previous visits during the summer. I definitely recommend checking it out before the season ends! 

Thanks to Positively Cleveland for such an awesome surprise.

Follow Positively Cleveland on Twitter and maybe you will win one of their fun giveaways. Happy Monday!

all about apples.

As I am typing this blog post, the delicious smell of baked apples has filled my apartment. Between the Pumpkin Apple Bath & Body Works candle, and the Breakfast Apple Granola Crisp in the oven, I am in apple heaven.

This past weekend, was spent checking number 8 off my autumn list. Number 8 was of course visiting an apple orchard and pumpkin patch.

In order to accomplish this task, we made our way to Miller's Apple Hill in Amherst, Ohio for the "Apple Pickin' Spree." This little festival was the a great kick-off to the apple season. We took a hay ride out to the orchard and filled our bags to the brim with Fuji, Macintosh and Empire, sampling a few as we went. (what?! quality control, that's all)

After taking the hay ride back, we shopped around the store and picked up the necessary items. Necessary items meaning Miller's Apple Cider, apple fritters and candy corn mix. We grabbed a quick bite from the vendors and headed home for the John Carroll homecoming football game.

Changing leaves, football games, and hot apple cider. Check, check, check. I am thinking haunted house next...Any suggestions?

surprises.

Surprises take thought and careful planning. They take lots of self-control to refrain from blabbing to everyone (something I struggle with). Most of all, surprises don't let you down. When there are no expectations, you can't be disappointed. What's not to love.

I celebrated my 22nd birthday this past week. Birthdays are a great reminder of everything we have to be thankful for. I loved hearing from friends and family throughout the day. It was great to celebrate with some of my best friends. There were so many little surprises throughout the week. I really appreciate you all!

A few weeks ago, Chris told me he had a surprise day planned for my birthday. I tried my best not to ask him 5 million times what we were doing. I am glad he kept it a surprise.

We started off the day at First Watch. I opted for the pumpkin spice pancakes with chicken apple sausage and scrambled eggs. After a nice breakfast with Katie (one of my roommates) and her boyfriend, Chris and I got in the car.

My surprise? A ride on the Cuyahoga Valley Scenic Railroad! It was an absolutely perfect fall day for a train ride.

I couldn't believe how many people were taking advantage of the beautiful weather. The trail was full of bikers, walkers and families. The train was so full that we got to sit in the brunch car! We definitely enjoyed having the nice seating arrangements.

We rode the train to Peninsula where we got out and shopped around. I loved looking in the old style stores. The Yellow Creek Trading Co. was my favorite place to shop. The store was built in 1885 and has been a general store, blacksmith shop and post office. The original wooden floors creaked as we walked around and it was fun looking at all of the Halloween decorations.

After shopping, we sat down at a local bar and had some refreshing iced tea with an appetizer of chips and guacamole. The guacamole was the same recipe Alton Brown uses on the Food Network. Delicious.

Our train ride back was just as beautiful and relaxing. I would definitely recommend spending an afternoon in our National Park and taking a ride on the Scenic Railroad. Chris and I hope to ride bikes once the leaves change and take the train back. (It's only a $3 ride for bikers!)

Autumn is just around the corner and I couldn't be more excited. Be sure to check out tickets for the RIPE! Fest next weekend.

the definition of summer.

It's hard to believe we are already into August. This was a cool and rainy summer! I didn't mind that most days, but I was starting to feel a little sad about not spending much time in the sun. However, this weekend I was able to make up for those rainier weekends indoors.

On Saturday, I went over to Eaton on Chagrin to pick out a book for my friend and a few groceries at Trader Joe's. Barnes and Nobles was very busy both inside and out. I love the outdoor chess sets on the tables and watching kids play with the giant chess set on the pavement. The potted flowers were out of this world. So colorful! It is a great place to walk around and people watch.

On Sunday, I started the day off right with banana almond waffles with Ohio Maple Syrup and scrambled eggs. After breakfast, I went to Chris' house to get things ready to go camping next weekend and have dinner with his family.

We spent a good part of the afternoon riding the atv around his backyard picking bowls of blackberries, concord grapes, and pears. The sun was hot and the sky was clear. A perfect summer day. I loved eating the warm, sweet blackberries and grapes right off the vine. (I think I may have eaten more blackberries than I picked...whoops)

 

After picking bowls full of fruit, we went inside for dinner. Chris' dad made grilled steak, potatoes and cauliflower for dinner and his mom used the blackberry juice to make the most amazing seedless blackberry cobbler I've ever eaten. It was bubbly and warm with a chewy marshmallow topping served over vanilla bean ice cream.

There is something to love about every season, and this weekend was exactly what I love about summertime.