This was my first year at Chelsea (Hampton Court flower show has been my floral fix in previous years) and as expected it was a real inspiration. Think i'll just let the photos do the talking...
My favourite...'A Monaco Garden'. I'm normally all about the wild, natural looking gardens, but the clean lines, orange trees and inviting pool had me day dreaming of summer holidays. i also love the continuing trend for roof gardens, seen here with a lavender top.
Eureka Garden from The Times and Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew
RBC New Wild Garden..another roof garden example. love the sustainable wall detailing...
The Daily Telegraph Garden
The Cancer Research Garden
Irish Sky Garden
The B&Q Garden - this is the tallest ever Chelsea garden, giving hope and inspiration to high rise occupants, who long for green fingers. love the 'living wall'!
Not only is model and actor Ibrahim Baiith absolutely stunning, he is a work of art, wow wow wow. He's perfection, mind blowing in that suit (wiping small pond of drool). But he's also an insanely talented artist and New York city has been aware of his art for a long time. He's creative, politically and socially aware and also very charitable. My God, that's my kind of dream man. He's also the co founder of Artists Republic. To find out more about this exquisite creature, click on the links below.
There's something about someone baking treats for you that just has the feel good factor. Whether it's cakes, brownies, muffins , the fact that it's been made in someone's kitchen gives you that warm, lovely feeling. So if you know someone or people who deserve something good and you like cooking, I think this is a sweet way of showing some appreciation.
I realize I have been back for a few days now, but I was still on vacation mode and did not feel like posting anything. I realize that today is Memorial Day and everyone is outside having cook outs and whatnot, but I am going to give you the highlights of the trip to North Carolina.
The Trip Down We left Altoona on Saturday after I was done with work at 4:00, also we had to drop my car off to get inspected. Our start time was sometime after 5:00. We went for a few hours and then finally got so hungry that we had to stop outside of Winchester at the IHOP (I apologize Aunt Lori, I should have called, but it was pretty sudden when we decided to stop and eat).
Lindsey drove the entire way down because I was so tired. I managed to stay awake though and be the navigator. I want to point out that Virginia feels like it never ends. We finally made it to the house at about 3:30 a.m. We went straight to bed because we were exhausted.
Beach Days I forgot that I am no longer 18 and that because of The Place That Shall Not Be Named, and since I no longer see the sun, I need more than SPF 30. I laid around reading and then playing bocci. Needless to say, by the end of the day, I was pretty damn burnt.
My chest, knees, and feet were unbelievably burnt. In fact, I am pretty sure my feet turned purple. The next few days I had to wear a t-shirt on the beach and keep my feet covered up.
We went and purchased some SPF 75 after that, it definitely seemed to help.
The rest of the days on the beach were spent mainly reading or taking long walks. Lindsey and I walked two miles south one day and then three miles north the next. The beach there is not like Myrtle Beach or Ocean City. There is not a boardwalk, plus since the beach is relatively small, there are not tons of things to do. It is a very beautiful place and it would probably be a great place for a family vacation, or for a beach wedding (hey, that was why we were there).
Beach Nights We went out to eat a few times at this place called Rick's. It was pretty nice (it was supposedly a Steelers bar, but they also had other team stuff inside, especially a Ravens jersey), the food was really good. I had this delicious Monte Cristo with crab-meat. Also, at this other place, Lindsey ordered scallops wrapped in bacon, which were slightly fried. So damn good...everything should be wrapped in bacon.
Gather around children, it is time for a funny story. I know you like funny stories. On Tuesday night, we went out to this place called Lo-Rei-Lei's for karaoke. Thad (the groom) and I played pool with these guys. And this other dude started talking to us and buying us shots of Petron (I swear that stuff will be the death of me someday). We head back to the house and I head to bed, very drunk (I honestly do not remember coming home or the last few moments at the bar).
Apparently, I got up to piss and never came back to bed. Lindsey looked for me, but I was nowhere to be found. In the morning she hears people talking and goes up to find me on the pull out couch. Unfortunately, another couple had been sleeping there. I went up there and crawled in bed with them, but the funny thing is they did not know it. The guy (Brett) put his arm around me and cuddled with me all night. He woke up and kind of freaked out when he realized he was spooning a guy. He yelled at me to get out of his bed and took the covers away, I guess I grabbed them back and rolled over to sleep.
Needless to say, I got made fun of pretty much the rest of the week for that one. Oh well, I am pretty sure I have done that kind of thing before. A couple of other nights, Lindsey and I went out on our own to have a few drinks. And some of the others were spent at the house just relaxing.
The Wedding
Most of you know that I am not someone who thinks of weddings as beautiful or anything like that, but maybe it is me getting older (or maybe it has something to do with my beautiful girlfriend), but this wedding was very beautiful. Also, I believe I have used the word beautiful in this post more times than all my other posts combined.
I half expected Lindsey to trip coming down the steps, but she did a fantastic job.
The Return We spent some more time at the beach on Friday, but I was starting to blister and getting lightheaded, so I went up to the house and took a cool shower. I then packed up and after awhile, Lindsey came up and she got ready and we made our way back to Pennsylvania.
Remember how I said Virginia felt like it lasted forever? Well on the way back, I felt like we were never going to make it out of North Carolina. The directions from Google Maps said we only had to go up this one road for 21 miles to hit the interstate, BULLSHIT! We drove for about an hour, through some very undesirable areas (Mt. Olive is a scary town). At one point, there were two guys out of their car about to fist fight. So weird.
We left around 2:30 and made it home by about 1:30 (we stopped for dinner for about an hour). As much fun as I had, I was ready to be home and in my own bed. I woke up the next day and saw that my chest, shoulders, and arms were peeling like crazy.
Yesterday was the actual wedding reception up here in Pennsylvania and it was a great time. We drank, we danced, we ate good food...
Below are some of the other pictures from the trip that I thought were cool:
I took this on the way down and it was of Lindsey with my phone on negative mode. She looks like a zombie ready to eat me. Very scary.
The first day there, I took this picture and did not realize the camera was still in negative mode. Looked pretty cool though.
This is what the beach actually looked like.
This was Lindsey on the last day as we prepared to leave. Doesn't she look hot?
Again, this is her before we leave.
This is the girls at the bar, pretty hot and pretty drunk.
We were pretty drunk at this point.
How funny is it that Brett had to escort Lindsey? At the reception, during the bridle dance, I went up and danced with Brett, everyone had a great laugh.
Lindsey and the bride.
A bunch of pictures of us together. We are such a hot couple.
This is a video of two of the guys in our group trying to sing Ice, Ice Baby. They were pretty bad, but also funny since they just kept cracking up because the words went so fast.
