April 22, 2021 Winner, Winner, Chicken Dinner: Nan’s Market Fried Chicken
I love me some fried chicken. With the pandemic, there’s no chance you’ll catch me at a restaurant….and you know how take out goes, by the time you get it home…it’s just sad. But not Nan’s fried chicken. Everyone I know loves it. Even my brother, who doesn’t like food like that, said he actually made a noise after he had his first bite. Not only is is flavorful but the skin is so.darn.crispy. The chicken comes in three flavors: Original, Nansville Hot and Kid Friendly. Here’s the deal – it’s only available 4-8pm and you have to order it TWO HOURS IN ADVANCE…so people….PLAN AHEAD! You won’t be sorry.
In addition, don’t even think about getting the fried chicken without the biscuits. These things are the REAL DEAL. I may have had two, don’t tell anyone….
Whatever you do, if you have to reheat them, DO NOT, I mean it, DO NOT put them in the microwave! Toaster all the way, low temp, slow to warm it up. Cover them in butter and maybe even drizzle some honey over those bad boys.
Not in the mood for the whole 5 piece fried chicken thing? I can’t imagine that ever happening, but they also offer a fried chicken sandwich at lunch time. Southern style with a farmhouse twist, crispy marinated all natural chicken breast on a soft roll with a smoky mayonnaise and a slaw of shaved cabbage, broccoli, kale and Brussels sprouts.
Want to make your lips tingle? Try Nan’s Garlic Beans: lightly seared green beans with fiery Calabrian chilies, garlic, cider vinegar, sea salt and olive oil.
Need a quick grab a go lunch? Try one of their grain bowls – you can completely customize it! This one is brown rice with all natural flank steak, sweet potatoes and Brussels sprouts. You can even get double protein if that’s your thing.
I saved the best for last, and I almost don’t want to write about it for fear that there won’t be enough…but the chicken and dumpling soup is AMAZING. It’s a family recipe, the measurements are literally by “egg shell full” 🙂
Pick up a cup, or a pint, but me, I buy 2 quarts at a time….and all my friends want me to pick them up some as long as I’m going, so every time I walk into Nan’s they’re like, “Oh, so you’re the one who is buying 20 quarts of soup!”
While you’re there, they have a great grab a go case and you can even mix and match your own 4 pack of beer. Let me know what you think of the fried chicken!
Nan’s Rustic Kitchen and Market
27 Great Road, Stow, MA
Open Tuesday — Sunday 7 AM – 8PM
Breakfast until 11 AM (last online order 10:30 AM)
Lunch menu served 11 AM – 8PM
Dinner menu served 4 PM – 8 PM
Market Shopping 7 AM – 8 PM
Tags: kid friendly, retail, take out
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March 28, 2021 Random Acts of Kindness: Easter with Cubze
With Easter less than a week away, I thought I would share some fun ideas of what we are doing in our house. We usually have a neighborhood Easter Egg Hunt, but this will be the second year that we will have to cancel it due to the pandemic. And while we are not having any big get togethers, sometimes it is fun to put boards and tables together to make things special.
I picked up this cute tablecloth from Target. They’re $5, and I have them for almost every holiday you can think of. They are great because they are inexpensive and they are durable. We keep them on our table for a month to do crafts on, and when they get really dirty, I don’t feel bad about just throwing them away.
The flower and gingham plates are from Target, as well as the melamine egg plate. The bunny napkin is Meri Meri – I mean, how cute are they?!
I made the Easter board on a melamine plate from Crate and Barrel and filled it with peanut M&M’s, Oreos, jelly beans in an edible nest, Ferraro Rocher eggs, chocolate bunnies from EHChocolatier, and Cubze from The Happy Chocolatier. How can you have an Easter board without Peeps? (Personally I can’t stand them, but the kids love them). Yes, those are Lady Gaga Oreos, but they were pink and green, so I threw them on the board too!
I think that it is fair to say that this year has been hard on everyone, but especially the kids. They have missed out on holidays, family get togethers, seeing their friends on play dates, birthdays…and the list goes on. So this year, we decided that even though we couldn’t have our friends over to look for eggs, we would bring the hunt to them. We are filling eggs with Cubze and surprising friends by leaving them in their lawn! Yes, we could put in the usual suspects (and don’t get me wrong, give me ALL THE REESE’S), but this time around it is quality over quantity, and we love a good local business! The truffle Cubze come in a variety of flavors (traditional milk and dark chocolate, but also flavors like dark chocolate orange, milk chocolate cappuccino, and cookie & cream to name a few) and are the perfect size for when you need a special treat. Each truffle comes with an inspirational quote about happiness – just a little pick me up to your day! When you buy Cubze you are supporting a local business and, as an added bonus, with every sale, a percentage of the profits are donated to Feeding America.
We are also leaving little treat bags of Cubze for our mailman Steve (who is just the greatest), our UPS driver Dan and our milkman. We like to surprise them every once in a while with fun things (pictures the kids draw, notes, treats etc.) because we appreciate all that they do and it’s important to acknowledge them. I tell my kids every day before they go to school to remember to be kind and to be a good friend.
When I was putting together baskets this year, I decided to really scale back. Instead of filling their baskets with lots of $1 items (although WHY is that the stuff that they love the most?!?!) and things they will look at for 5 seconds and promptly forget about, I went with practical items. I put Cubze in for the kids – yep, you read that right. It’s funny how they will eat maybe one or two good pieces of chocolate and be happy – as opposed to trying to eat 200 pieces of the “regular” candy. My little guy continues to surprise me because I just found out he actually PREFERS dark chocolate.
Why yes, those are Valentine’s Day pajamas in the Easter basket. I bought them this year and forgot to give them to the kids, so in to the basket they go. I mean, hearts don’t have to be JUST for Valentine’s Day. I picked up those cute bunny glasses from the dollar spot at Target. We use so much chalk in the summer time I feel like I should own stock…so these Crayola egg shaped chalk boxes were a good find. I always like to add a book into each basket – and we are a Duck and Goose loving family.
My kids have been asking for cameras for the longest time. I found these at Target for about $25. We will see how they hold up!
To friends, we decided to forgo the traditional baskets with candy and decided to make a baking themed basket. Cute bunny plates and carrot napkins by Meri Meri, bunny ear measuring spoons, some fun baking cup liners, Easter colored sprinkles, some spatulas and of course some Cadbury mini eggs, because you have to have SOME chocolate!
For my daughter, I picked up this cute rainbow basket for under $10 at Target, which she can use to store all her “treasures” in when Easter is over. We picked Betty Bunny as our book for the basket, written by an old friend, added Cubze for the sweetness factor and some bunny ears from Pottery Barn. To be honest, I bought these a few years ago and I put them in her basket every year, she doesn’t seem to notice and I get to reuse something – win win. Everything is rainbows and unicorns as far as my daughter is concerned, so I picked up some cute gardening gloves for about $5 each. We can never have enough art supplies and I love everything ooly makes – pictured are the ice cream erasers and the scented twist up crayons. We use so much washi tape – so I picked up this cute four pack from Michaels.
And last but not least, for the littlest bunny in the house, some cute carrot and bunny pajamas from Old Navy, pink bunny slippers from L.L.Bean, a blue goose made by Le Voyage D’Olga (that I bought from one of my favorite stores – Gus and Ruby Letterpress), sparkle bunny ears from J.Crew and the book Easter Bugs.
What are you doing to make Easter special?
Disclaimer: I was gifted samples of Cubze. All opinions are my own.
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October 16, 2020 Quarantine Activities For Kids
We are how many months into this quarantine and I’m sure that like me, you are struggling for new things to do with your kids. I don’t know about you, but those rainy days kill us – we are trapped inside of the house with no way to burn off that excess energy. We do a LOT of baking in our house. I love that a lot of bakeries are giving out recipes for their beloved treats, so when SusieCakes put out the recipe for their sweetheart sandwich cookies, we jumped at the chance to make them. While the original recipe calls for buttercream in the middle of the two cookies, we opted for jam – we made so much home made jam this year! We used these cute bunny cookie cutters for the inside, but you could use whatever you have on hand. You can find the recipe here.
With more than one kid at home, there are bound to be arguments. Sometimes we need to go to our own corners – here’s where those forts come in handy! We happen to have these teepees at our house, but you could easily construct a fort with pillow cushions and sheets or blankets. We string up some holiday lights on ours and my kiddos love to go in there are hide from one another or read books.
Another idea if you are stuck inside is to make an indoor obstacle course using things that you already own. We brought in hula hoops so the kids could hop from one to the next, we practiced jumping over the jump rope on one leg and on two, crawling under the pool noodles, doing forward rolls on the gym mat, and practicing throwing fake snowballs into a bucket. Or maybe just use found objects on the floor and pretend the floor is lava and you can only step on the objects you’ve set out (but be careful they don’t slip).
I don’t know about you, but we have a TON of Easter eggs in our basement. I filled ours up with loose change and hid them around the house. Not only did the kids go crazy having fun looking for the eggs, but afterwards, we emptied the eggs and sorted the coins. After sorting, we counted and rolled them so we can deposit them into the bank. This is a great independent activity, guaranteed to give you at least 30 minutes of peace and quiet to yourself.
If the weather is nice, go outside and find a place where you can feed the ducks – or in our case, there were just a lot of Canadian Geese and sea gulls, but hey, the kids were amused for 30 minutes! If we have left over bread we just throw the pieces in the freezer and take them all out when we have enough to feed the birds – sometimes though, we make croutons).
Sometimes I just don’t want to deal with the hassle of markers. My kids end up with marker in places you have no idea how they even could have gotten here. We always have some fun cardboard shapes on hand (we picked these up at the dollar section at Target) and I let my kids go wild with washi tape.
Coffee filters can be used for so many things. You can have the kids color on them with markers and then dip them in water (or spray with spray bottle full of water) and let the colors bleed into one another.
Another option of how to color coffee filters is to use water colors on them. Makes sure to put a paper towel under them so the colors don’t bleed onto your work surface.
We used some of our coffee filters to make these fun hot air balloons! All you need besides the colored coffee filters are some pipe cleaners and construction paper.
Another project we used the coffee filters for were these fun flowers. Grab the coffee filters in the middle and scrunch the filters up. Do this three or four times and then secure the bottoms with a pipe cleaner.
You could also use the colored coffee filters to make fun butterflies.
We love to bead in our house. Great for small muscle control and hand eye coordination. If you are cutting your own string, you can tape off the end to make it easier to thread the beads.
See what patterns your kids can make: can you make a necklace with all round beads, or all pink beads. Write out a pattern on a piece of paper and see if they can follow it: heart, square, heart, square or, perhaps round, round, square, round, round, square, etc.
We have a few large windows in the front of our house, and every month or so, we like to change things up. Everyone in our neighborhood compliments us on them and they can’t wait to see what we are going to do next. This one was a flower scene: we used contact paper with glitter for the centers of the flower and then construction paper for the rest. Use your imagination!
Other displays included a rainbow made from all hearts, and an underwater scene with fish, whales, and even an octopus!
Have your kids use their imagination and write a book! We got this “Make Your Own Little Golden Book” as a gift, but you could certainly just fold up some white paper in half and you’re good to go.
Paper plates are something we try and craft with in our house. Relatively inexpensive and you can make about a million different animals with them. We colored our plates and cut the plate to look like butterfly wings. Throw in a popsicle stick covered in pompoms and antennae made with a pipe cleaner and you are good to go.
I can’t remember where we saw the inspiration for these, but my kids loved making them. Get about 12 or so brown paper lunch bags. Glue them all in the same direction two or three at a time – this will make the cutting of the patter easier. After you cut your first two or three bags that have been glued together, add another two or three and repeat cutting out the pattern.
After you have all the bags glued together, take the first bag and glue it to the last bag and viola! you have a beautiful snowflake!
My kids LOVE science experiments, the messier the better (for them). One simple one is the reaction of baking soda and vinegar. We keep a bunch of these plastic egg cartons on hand (they are perfect for painting) – so just add a few drops of food coloring on the bottom of each space. Cover with baking soda. My kids like to guess what color each one will make!
Have the kids pour the vinegar on top of the baking soda and watch the colors bubble up! Or if you have droppers, those are certainly a good way to help with those fine muscle control skills!
Salt dough is super easy yo make, it’s just three ingredients: flour, salt and water. You can find the recipe here. Roll out the dough and cut them into fun shapes with cookie cutters. Cook for about 2 hours and let completely cool. We used paint markers, but really, any paint will do. If you want to give them an extended life, spray them with something like Modge Podge Sealer.
We took it one step further and made ornaments for friends. We placed them on their trees during the day so they could have a scavenger hunt for them later.
I’m not going to lie, this one is a little messy. We made nail polish rocks. Fill up a shallow pan with warm water. Pour in your choice of nail polish and quickly dip your rock (or object of choice) into the liquid – pull out immediately and place on a wax paper lined sheet pan.
You should be good for two dips, but after that, take a chopstick or something similar and swirl it around the water to collect the used nail polish and wipe on a paper towel to discard. Begin again with new polish. We found that flat, light colored (well white is the best) rocks were the best. Again, if you want them to last longer if you are placing them outside, use a sealer like Modge Podge on them.
We all have about a bazillion extra stickers at home. If you need 5 minutes of quiet time, get out a large piece of paper and, for example, draw a circle and a square on it. Have your kids place the square stickers in the square shape and the circle stickers in the circle. All other stickers that are not circles or squares can go in the blank space left on the paper.
And when all else fails, have them do some printables. Here are some of our favorites:
http://www.littlegoldenbooks.com/activities/
https://www.joshfunkbooks.com/stuff-for-kids
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April 5, 2020 Easter
With the state that the world is in right now, Easter is bound to look a little different this year. For us, I usually host a neighborhood Easter egg hunt. We have about 25 littles and 50 adults come together for an afternoon of fun. This year we had to cancel, but hopefully we will get to do it later this spring.
I put together some really simple Easter baskets this year, glad to not be going overboard. I added things that I could order online easily and tried to support local/small businesses whenever I could.
This top basket has a stuffed Jellycat bunny, some vanilla caramels from McCrea’s (they’re offering free shipping), chocolate bunnies on a tractor and on a motorcycle from Laughing Moon Chocolates in Vermont and flutter nutter bunnies from EHChocolatier (they’re offering curbside pickup if you’re local).
For my daughter I picked up this cute unicorn hooded towel from Pottery Barn Kids, because we are all about the unicorns these days (and the llama-corns and kitty-corns). I added in these cute ring dings from the Ring Ding Bar (they’re offering free shipping), my favorite bunny from Harbor Sweets, some sparkle sunglasses (you can never have too many pairs), some chocolate bunny pops from EHChocolatier, and some fun stationary (with stickers) from local shop Calliope Paperie.
Here’s a better look at those ring dings starting on top left and going clockwise:
Peanut Butter and Jelly: Peanut butter cream filling and raspberry jam schmear form the nutty nucleus of this snack cake that makes for a tastier (and tinier!) alternative for your lunch box.
Pistachio Raspberry: Savory and sweet meet in this delightful marriage of fruit and nut. Nutty pistachio cream filling and tangy raspberry jam sit within a sandwich of pistachio cake and green-tinted white chocolate.
Nutella: Chocolate cake and a dark chocolate shell encase a savory-sweet center of thick Nutella cream, choc-full of classic Ferrero flavor.
Red Velvet: A red chocolate shell and red velvet cake filled with tasty vanilla cream that’s as smooth as the surface that inspired it.
Strawberry Shortcake: Vanilla cake and pink-tinted white chocolate surround strawberry jam and strawberry cream filling.
Lemon: Lemon cake and white chocolate cream fill yell-tinted chocolate shell in this tantalizingly tart addition to snack cake canon!
Check out my post from last year for more inspiration!
What is your Easter going to look like this year?
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February 18, 2020 Valentine’s Day Crafts and Baking
Valentine’s Day may be over, but I love hearts all year round. Between working on our school Valentine cards, our crafts at home and our grazing boards for friends, we have been celebrating all month long.
When I have the time, I like to make things from scratch, but usually, because the littles are running all around the house, I take a few short cuts. For example – those cupcakes above? Made the cake from a box mix. Made the frosting from scratch because, I mean, let’s be honest, nothing is more important than the frosting!
These cookies I make from a sugar cookie recipe I got from a friend. I love them because they aren’t sweet, as some sugar cookies can be. The frosting is just confectioner’s sugar, milk and vanilla so it is SUPER sweet – but paired with the cookie (that isn’t sweet), it just works out to the right amount of sweetness.
I always stock up on sprinkles. Those cute ones on the cupcakes – the multi colored hearts – were a cute find at Michael’s. I love all things pink and red, but these were a refreshing change of pace. At Michael’s they have smaller $1 packets of sprinkles and you can always find some cute things at Home Goods.
I put together this cute grazing board for a play date: vanilla cupcakes, sugar cookies, M&M’s in Valentine colors, cinnamon hearts, gummy hearts and Starburst jelly bean hearts. Let’s not forget The Happy Chocolatier in the mix with their cubze – the fun messages inside just make me smile.
For play dates, I sometimes like to have one structured activity and then have some free time to play. My go to is decorating cookies. The kids could really care less what the cookies taste like, so if I’m in a rush, I just pick up a roll of cookies from the market and cut them out in fun shapes. I buy the frosting from a jar and divide them up into little cups to keep things from getting too messy. My secret trick is doing everything on either baking sheets or disposable aluminum plans (which work well because the kids can just take these home afterwards). I give each child a set of their own sprinkles – I put them in egg containers that I cut in half. It has been a hit at every play date!
One of my other favorite activities that we did this month was decorate mailboxes. My kids like to play “post office” all year round. I picked up these cute mailboxes at Target for $1. (Full disclosure, I made this one as a sample) The kids decorated them with stickers and fun washi tape. They had a great time writing each other letters and “delivering them” to friends.
Put together this cute little plate last minute. A strawberry shortcake from Whole Foods, Linzer cookies from the Whole Foods bulk cookie bin, those cute vanilla and chocolate hearts are from Whole Foods too (sensing a pattern here?) Chocolate cubze from The Happy Chocolatier, and assorted heart candy from Priscilla Candy Shop in Concord (which by the way had some really good prices on candy).
I have a few rules in my house, one of them being, we NEVER do glitter. Let’s save that for school and let the teachers clean that up 🙂 But I kind of allowed it for this project. My kids had a BLAST making them. We started off with some self seal laminating sheets. We peeled back half of the sheet and put on our glitter directly to the sticky side – you can use glitter, or in this case, we tried out confetti. When we were done, we peeled off the second half of the paper and folded it over the confetti, making a 5×7 sheet. Don’t worry, it doesn’t have to be perfect – ours had wrinkles in them! For the hearts, take two pieces of construction paper and fold in half. Cut out large hear and a smaller on inside. We taped the laminated confetti sheet to one side of the heart and then glued the other heart on top of it We left some of the hearts plain, but you could certainly embellish the construction paper with markers, stickers or washi tape. Punch a hole and add some string/ribbon and you have a fun Valentine you can hang in the window! Another idea, if you really can’t stand the idea of using glitter or confetti is tissue paper – find some cute heart paper or some pink striped paper and cut into thin strips! You can make this any time of year just by changing the heart into a circle or any other fun shape.
What are your favorite things to do for Valentine’s Day with your kids?
Tags: candy, cookies, crafts, grazing board, holiday, kids, short cuts, valentines day
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February 6, 2020 The Neighborhood Holiday Party
Every year our neighborhood has an adults only holiday party. This year, we ended up hosting. Hosts provide the main dish and everyone else brings appetizers, sides and desserts potluck style. So what was on the menu? A 20lb whole turkey, a 5lb roast that we did in the Instant Pot and 10lbs of flank steak done on the grill outside. Pretty daunting for me since I’ve a) never cooked a turkey before and b) this was my first time using an Instant Pot.
This was my first time using my new oven and the turkey (which Leah (and her mom) helped me prep via FaceTime)) ended up taking a lot LESS time than it should have…ummm when have you EVER heard of a turkey taking less time?!!? NEVER! So sheer panic ensued and we had to ask a neighbor (read: good cook) to come over and help determine its actual readiness.
People brought their own beverages, but we set out a fun little bar. Hint water and Italian sodas, a few signature drinks – like the Dark and Stormy, and a mimosa bar with peach, orange and strawberry mixers.
Always important to have some non alcoholic beverages – and how cute are these sparkling grape juice options from Welch’s?
HUGE shout out to Whole Foods butcher department who walked me through cooking this beautiful winter warmer roast. The Instant Pot was a little intimidating at first, and I probably should have done a test run, but we were having party after party in December, and there just wasn’t any time.
We had some long tables set up for people who wanted to sit and eat dinner. I always like to have some sweet treats on the table – how cute are these little Lindt Snowmen?
Lindt also has these adorable seasonal truffles.
I love amaretti cookies during the holidays. They are beautifully wrapped and when the party is over I love crumbling them up and putting on things like mashed sweet potatoes or a bowl of ice cream. Not familiar with amaretti cookies? They are delicious Italian almond flavored cookies that are light and crunchy.
And how beautiful are these cookies by Bake?
Does your neighborhood have any fun traditions? Cookie Swaps, Yankee Swap, holiday parties, summer BBQ’s?
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February 4, 2020 Santa Claus is Coming to Town…
I didn’t realize that if you are interested in a private Santa, you have to be on that in like…July. My good friend gave me the connect to her favorite Santa, and I was glad to get on the list – but when I got to him in September, the only days he had left were Thanksgiving and the Sunday after Thanksgiving. Clearly I will have him on speed dial for July for this coming year. He was wonderful – the 30 kids we had over had a ball. First, Santa knocked on the door and greeted everyone. Then, he came next to the tree and sang a few songs with the kids, read ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas, and then proceeded to hand out a present to each child (that their parents provided ahead of time). Watching the magic of Christmas through your child’s eyes is a pretty amazing thing.
Let’s take a step back. While guests were arriving and we were waiting for Santa to arrive, we had a table set up with crafts – make your own frames or wreaths and a cookie decorating station that went over well. What goes better together than Santa and sugar?!?
We kept the decorations pretty simple, picked up these amazing snowflakes from Paper Source and hung them from the ceiling to make a little winter wonderland. Didn’t hurt that I was able to get them at a steal of a price!
We had a few grazing boards – this savory plate had brie, Harbison cheese (the round soft cheese in the middle – which I got for a steal at Trader Joe’s), blue cheese, honey from our hive out back, dried apricots, raspberries, green grapes, spicy soppressata, truffle salami, candied oranges, wasabi peas and Babybel cheese that had some fun Christmas cutouts (just use mini cutters and gently press through on the red wax).
This sweet board featured green cubze from Happy Chocolatier, Christmas tree cookies from Roche Bros. (they are my favorite and they can be found in the bulk cookie case), home made chocolate covered Oreos, white chocolate pretzel drops from Sukker & Sweet, gingerbread men from Trader Joe’s, peppermint truffles from Lindt, the green balls at the top were watermelon gumballs and the green balls on the bottom were mints from Sukker & Sweet.
I had this wonderful idea that I would make these gingerbread trees and make them into a 3D forest on a platter. Got a great pan and the quickbread mix from Williams Sonoma, but they didn’t bake up flat and I didn’t have time to trim each one, so we had them flat on a plate and sprinkled them with powdered sugar. Not what I had envisioned, but no one was the wiser…and they still tasted delicious.
I always like to have beverages for little hands, and I hate to do juice boxes – so Hint graciously gifted us some of their kid’s fruity water which was a big hit – they come in flavors like apple, watermelon, cherry and blackberry.
Once Santa had left, the presents had been opened, the kid’s bellies had been filled with pizza and snacks, it was time to go home. We sent each kiddo home with a holiday cracker (which I ALWAYS stock up on at the end of the year when they are on sale for 50% off – it’s always a good idea to plan ahead). My kids just love popping them and hearing the sound, I think it they were empty, they wouldn’t even notice. 🙂
We also sent them home with these adorable cookies from Tuesday Spoon Baking Company. Lisa is located in Sudbury, MA and she makes individual cookies that she drops at Duck Soup, but also takes custom orders. How adorable are these pickup trucks with trees in the back. Not only are they beautifully decorated but they TASTE delicious too.
Tags: candy, christmas, grazingboard, holiday, party
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February 2, 2020 New Year, New Baby!
Don’t worry mom, not my baby.
We ended 2019 with a whirlwind of parties. We went right from Thanksgiving to a baby shower, then a kid’s holiday party with Santa, a neighborhood adults only party where I cooked for 40 people, Christmas Eve with the cousins and Christmas Day with good friends. I needed most of January to recover.
We have one of the best neighborhoods – summer block parties, holiday parties, Thirsty Thursdays – I couldn’t ask for a better community for my kids to grow up in. So, when our new neighbor found out she was having a baby, I wanted to give back and host – since the other ladies of the neighborhood were kind enough to throw me a shower (for my third no less).
I hosted with another young mom/friend in the neighborhood and she loves a good theme for a party. We decided to go with blue and gold.
I had been waiting for just the right moment to order macarons from Mac Lab, an amazing bakery in Georgia. These geode macarons come in a variety of colors and are almost to pretty to eat. They are mailed individually wrapped, so you don’t have to worry about them breaking in the mail. The gold macarons are hand painted and are coffee flavored.
I’m a big fan of candy boards – just a fun thing for the guest to pick at while they are gathered around the kitchen island. This time I chose blue rock candy lollipops, blue fruit slices, Jelly Belly jelly beans in a few different colors, sour laces, blue cubze by Happy Chocolatier and prosecco balls from Sukker & Sweet.
While the candy bar is fun, I wanted guests to be able to take home soem treats too – so I added some Lindt chocolates to the table as well. The sequin runner was from amazon and I made the baby letters using wooden letters from Michaels, spray adhesive, scrapbook paper and an exacto knife.
My friend who made the cake also made these delicious chocolate covered pretzels. They’re my absolute favorite!
Don’t worry, we did have real food at the shower as well. Keeping with the board theme, I went to my favorite cheese shop in Wellesley, Wasik’s, to pick up some things for the charcuterie board. We went with a Bavarian Blue from Germany, a Brie de Lyon from France (cow cheese) and Ossau – Iraty from France, a sheep milk cheese. I added blueberries, mixed olives, spicy soppressata, truffle salami, dried apricots, raincoast crisp crackers, and Effie’s Oatcakes.
I love edible (or drinkable) favors for parties. We went with LaMarca prosecco, blue and gold paper straws attache with some cute blue heart washi tape.
5 Things to Bring in Your Hospital Bag
I packed all of my things in a Sea Bag XL tote, it was big enough to hold all of my things and if it got dirty, you just wipe it down – no muss, no fuss!
- Phone Charger: Seems obvious, but buy an extra one to just leave in your bag so you don’t have to race around looking for it when you go into labor. While you’re at it, download some shows to binge watch while you’re at the hospital!
- Snacks: There will be moments when you get hungry and the cafeteria isn’t serving meals – and all the nurses station has is saltine crackers. But also, line up those friends to bring in sushi or cheese or whatever you’ve been craving for after your delivery!
- Your Own Towel: When we got married, the woman who helped us register told me I HAD to get the bath sheets – you know, those enormous towels that you can only put on in the washer? Never used it…until I had a baby. The towel that they provided was like…the size of a face cloth…and that’s not what you need right after you’ve given birth.
- The Most Luxurious Bath Products You Can Find: That first shower after you have given birth, for me, was life changing. I think I stood in the shower for a good hour, probably using up all of the hot water. I turn to look for soap and they have one of those hand dispensers with that “hospital smelling” soap in it. Trust me, enjoy this moment with the nicest smelling things you can find.
- Clothes: Bring that cute matching outfit for you and the baby for that Instagram photo, but bring a couple of extra outfits for the baby. Also, bring clothes that you don’t mind throwing away…because after giving birth, things can get messy.
Tags: 5 things, baby shower, cake, candy, grazing board, macaron, party
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October 23, 2019 Eastern Standard Provisions Co.
Disclaimer: This is a sponsored post. I was provided samples of Eastern Standard Provisions Co. pretzels and salts. As always, all opinions are my own.
October means fall is here. Think sweater weather, football games and Oktoberfest. Bring on the beer and pretzels. Eastern Standard Provisions Co. makes artisanal pretzels with all natural ingredients. They come in the mail SUPER fresh – ready to eat that day (or throw in the freezer if you’re saving them for a later date). The pretzels come in a variety of shapes and sizes, pictured here is the Wheelhouse (left), Slidepiece (top right) and the Turnbuckle (bottom right). They have a larger size of the Wheelhouse, called the Topknot and a larger version of the Slidepiece, called Fourseam. I have to say that I liked the sidepiece and the turnbuckles the best.
I might be one of those weird people who actually likes pretzels plain. More times than not, I just like a hint of salt. So if you’re a purist, Eastern Standard Provisions Co. has traditional pretzel salt. Feeling a little more saucy? Try the chili lime salt or the truffle salt. Sugar your thing? Try the French Toast sugar or the raspberry lime sugar. 1oz. packages of these salts and sugars will be available on the website soon!
The pretzels are hand rolled and once you get them, you just need to brush with a little butter (or olive oil or water) and sprinkle with your topping of choice. The bigger pretzels can take up to 20 minutes to bake, and the smaller ones can take as 3 minutes to heat up.
I love a good sweet and salty combo, so I put together this fun ice cream sandwich. Cook up the pretzel according to the directions. I topped this one with the French Toast sugar (and let me tell you, we put this on anything we could get our hands on it was THAT good). Slice Slidepiece in half. To get ice cream to perfectly fit inside the bun, we sliced some vanilla ice cream with a knife and then cut the perfect circle out with a cookie cutter. Place on pretzel and roll in your favorite sprinkles. Salty and sweet perfection in…4 bites.
For more information on how to get your own delicious pretzels, visit Eastern Standard Provisions Co.’s website here.
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October 9, 2019 (Family) Road Trip: Mystic, CT and Greenport, Long Island
Sponsored Post: I worked with Cross Sound Ferry, who graciously gifted us round trip travel tickets. As always, all opinions are my own.
I had been wanting to take the kids to the Mystic Aquarium all summer, and we finally went last weekend. We couldn’t have asked for better weather all weekend. So we piled up the car with our 8,000 bags, the stroller, the pack and play, snacks for the ride and floaties for the pool. We survived the 2 hour road trip with a promise of stopping halfway for some munchkins!
The aquarium was our main reason for going to Mystic. We arrived Friday, late morning, and headed straight there. You can bring your own lunch – they have tables outside for you to eat at, or they have a restaurant where you can find the usual suspects: pizza, chicken fingers, etc. After filling our bellies, and making new friends with a very friendly duck, we went on to explore the aquarium. My kids loved the Beluga whales, one of them was particularly photogenic! We looked at penguins, jellyfish, touched string rays, and even caught a sea lion show (get there early for a front row seat and you will be able to get up close and personal with them when the show starts!). We bought our tickets ahead of time to get the best prices!
After the aquarium, we checked into our hotel and went exploring. I always like to check out the local shops and bakeries in any city we travel to. Before dinner we went to the Lighthouse Bakery, a little bit tucked away from the main road. There weren’t a ton of options since it was late in the day, but we walked away with some very delicious treats, including tiramisu (not pictured) and some AMAZING raspberry bars.
Dinner came from a recommendation from a friend, the Engine Room. They weren’t accepting reservations that evening, but we went early and didn’t have to wait for a table. They have a cute little patio out front if the weather is nice, and high top tables and high top booths inside. The decor was definitely Instagram-worthy, the service was friendly, and the food was delicious. I wanted one of everything on the menu and could have definitely come here two days in a row. Everything was flavorful and we walked out full!
They have a kids menu that includes: Grilled Cheese, Chicken Tenders, Cheeseburger, Hot Dog, Mac and Cheese and Pasta with Butter. I was afraid that the kids weren’t going to like the Mac and Cheese, because they really only like Annie’s, and this was house made, but they licked their plates clean. That should say something to you right there.
After dinner we walked around a bit to work off dinner. There were a bunch of cute shops that we walked by (that were all closed), that I will have to visit on another trip here. FYI, we could have used one more day in Mystic, just to visit shops and wander around town.
Shops to stop at next time include: Trove, Mystic Sweet Shop, Fat Face, Sea Bags, and the Candy Shop (to name a few). Vault Coffee Roasters was also on my list, and if you go on Saturday or Sunday at 8am you can catch the Deviant Donuts pop up!
Even though we were stuffed from dinner, there is always room for dessert. We stopped into Mystic Drawbridge Ice Cream for a little treat. It’s hard to tell what the kids enjoyed more, hanging out at the drawbridge or having ice cream. I tried the white pistachio and strawberry ice creams, both were very tasty. Other original flavors include: Mystic Mud, Chocolate Chambord, Lemon Chocolate Kiss, Chocolate Mint Oreo, Seaport Salty Swirl, and Mystic Turtle to name a few. They also make shakes, smoothies, and New York egg creams!
We decided to stay at the Hampton Inn, right near the aquarium. The hotels in the area were pretty booked, as Mystic gets a lot of overflow when there are shows at the casinos. We weren’t planning on staying at the hotel except to sleep and swim, so it didn’t really matter where we stayed as long as the rooms were quiet and clean (which they were). Pools are key with our kiddos to tire them out 😉 . Breakfast was included, so we filled up on waffles, eggs and yogurt before we packed up for our day trip to Long Island.
We picked up the Cross Sound ferry in New London, about a 10-15 minute drive from Mystic. We arrived about 30 minutes early to get our tickets and square away things since we were driving our car aboard. My kids were super excited about the idea of driving a car onto a boat! The process was smooth and everyone was loaded on quickly. It was a beautiful morning to be out on the water. I always love taking boats places when we can – another favorite thing is taking the water taxi in New York. The boat had upper and lower decks, so it wasn’t super crowded anywhere. There is a snack stand on board in case you get hungry, with plenty of tables both inside and out. The kids loved exploring all the decks of the ferry, we didn’t even have to break into our bag of tricks to keep them occupied. The ferry takes about an hour and 20 minutes, while the passenger only high speed ferry takes about 40 minutes.
Side Note: Cross Sound Ferry also offers a wonderful lighthouse cruise. Read more about it here.
If you’re traveling with kids, you know that they get hungry about every 12 seconds. I know for a fact that at school they have ONE snack between when I drop them off and when they have lunch, so how come whenever they are with me all day, they are hungry for snacks 8,000,000 times a day?!?! But in our house, being hangry is a REAL THING, so we stopped into Blue Duck Bakery for a treat (note: the kids had a muffin, I didn’t feed them cookies first thing in the morning. Although, truth be told, it has happened on occasion in our house). There were a lot of delicious cookies and pastries, top choices of ours included the sour cherry danish and the Linzer cookies.
There is also another coffee shop next to the carousel, across the street from the Blue Duck, Aldo’s Coffee Company .
The carousel was a big draw for my kids – they could have stayed here all day and their afternoon would have been complete. The carousel is located in a beautiful park with lots of grass for the kids to play on, and it overlooks the water.
The carousel is 100 years old and it is open year round. In season it is open daily and off season it is open on the weekends. The carousel features 36 horses, and while it says that you can grab rings (like the one on Martha’s Vineyard), it was not working when we were there.
There is two hour street parking right across the street from the park and public restrooms nearby.
Staying out all day can be tricky. One of my kiddos still takes naps – so when we got to lunchtime, there was an EPIC meltdown (to end all meltdowns). I took the other kids for lunch at Crazy Beans, a very family friendly place, while my husband handled the tantrum outside. Crazy Beans can get very busy (and the tips are cash only), so make sure to get there early.
There were so many cute shops right in town that I would have loved to check out, but didn’t have time due to said EPIC meltdown. Here are a few places I’ll check out next time: Goldberg’s Famous Bagels, Flavors Dessert Cafe, Kate’s Cheese Co., Sweet Indulgences, and Hampton Chocolate Company.
Side (kind of funny) story: when we came out from lunch, kiddo #1 was still having a meltdown. I carried him over my shoulder kicking and screaming, because we were way past the point of no return (if you have kids, you know just what I’m talking about). Now, you know that when your kid is having a meltdown in public, the last thing you want to do is have to deal with strangers who are a) trying to ‘cheer your child up’, b) trying to tell you a personal story about their own kids when they were young, c) trying to tell you that you should enjoy the kids while they are young because they grow up so fast, etc. or d) just trying to talk to you in general while you are trying to deal with your screaming child. An older man came up to me and said, “I’d be remiss if I didn’t ask you if you were kidnapping this child…” and proceeded to just stand there are stare at me. Ummm….yes, if I was indeed kidnapping my child, I would have totally marched him down Main Street where hundreds of people could see me and I would totally admit it to you when you asked me just now. Meanwhile, my husband, who is Caucasian, walked up and the man takes one look at him and say, “oh, you’re together, ok then” and proceeded to walk away.
So after we get the kids into the car, we decide to drive around to see if we can get them to nap in the car (and avoid any more meltdowns). We drive by some amazing looking farm stands and an insane amount of vineyards. A few years back I came to Greenport and did a little vineyard trip with some girlfriends. If you come without kids, you may want to check them out – see more about my previous trip here. We drove by an old pickup truck with the bed overflowing with ripe tomatoes, a place selling fresh roadside oysters and there were more charming places than I could count.
We just drove down Main Street to see where it would take us, and happened upon North Fork Doughnut Company. I ran in while the kids were snoozing and picked up a half dozen for the road. How cute are these handmade doughnuts? They’re made with local ingredients, so just another reason to love them more.
The glazed and the cinnamon sugar doughnuts were delicious classics – fluffy and light. The Samoa tasted almost exactly like those delicious cookies, the closest I’ve tasted so far. The apple fritter just tasted like fall, delicious and sweet. The black raspberry jam filled doughnut did not disappoint, and they didn’t skimp on the jam.
When I was growing up, we didn’t have sugar cereal, except for special occasions. I loved Frosted Flakes and Apple Jacks (but only the orange ones – not the green ones). Fruity Pebbles were never my thing, but I bought one just for fun (it would look good in photos). The glaze on the cereal doughnut was delicious and I actually liked the Fruity Pebbles, well done!
After naps in the car, we head back into town and have some ice cream and one last ride on the carousel. We stopped at Greenport Creamery for a cone and I had just enough time to pick up a vintage bag from Sea Bags.
After a full (and eventful) day on Long Island, we took the ferry from Orient Point back to New London. We took a different boat, so the kids were again, happy to explore.
Did you know that the ferry offers a rewards program? They also have casino packages if you are coming from the Long Island side – your choice, Mohegan Sun or Foxwoods.
There is something so calming about being on the water. The evening boat ride was exactly what we needed at the end of the day. When we arrived back in New London, we were off the boat in under 10 minutes after we docked – perfect timing to grab a quick bite to eat for dinner.
Another friend had recommended the Mystic Diner. It was just what you would imagine it to look like on the inside and very family friendly. Let me just say three words: BREAKFAST. ALL. DAY. Either that or just skip straight over dinner and have pie!
Looking for pet friendly restaurants in Mystic, try Sea View Snack Bar, a cute outdoor clam shack with picnic tables that overlook Mystic Harbor. You might also try Pizetta, Pink Basil or Dog Watch Mystic.
We had the pool to ourselves Sunday morning and got all our energy out before our car ride home. The good news is that the hotel is right near the ramp for the highway, gas stations, the aquarium and bonus, there’s a Dunks right next door!
There were two bakeries that I wanted to check out before we left Mystic. The first was Li’s Bake Shop. This is the kind of bakery that reminds of you things your grandmother used to make (nostalgic baking). You can taste the love (and butter) in every bite. The buckeye brownie was my favorite – but you can’t go wrong here. Also pictured: whoopie pie, chocolate chip cookie, Mystic cookie, peanut butter cookie, croissant and lemon bar.
Sift Bake Shop reminds me of Paris. Adults turn into children as they drool over towers of pastries behind the glass. They have a large picture window so you can see the pastry chefs mixing up all the delicious treats in the back. The picture above does not do that sticky bun justice. It is big enough to share, but trust me, you aren’t going to want to. That caramel and pecan topping will make you think you’ve died and gone to heaven. I love macarons, not to be confused with macaroons, and these ones were just perfect. The shell had a little bit of a bite to them, but they melted in your mouth. We tried vanilla, pistachio, Meyer lemon and key lime.
So that was our weekend in Mystic. We stopped in RI on our way home to see if they had my favorite jam, but we were too late in the season. We will have to come back earlier in the season next year!
Tell me all your favorite things to do in Mystic, CT!
Tags: bakery, casual dining, dessert, family friendly, hotel, ice cream, restaurant, road trip
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- Posted under Restaurants, Trips
