JUNE-TASTIC!

Summer has started like a wonder whirl of adventure, sunshine, hard work, laughter and the great outdoors! June was one of the busier months I've had in a while... I've always loved traveling, but the more time I spend in Vermont the more I enjoy every day. To kick off June I spent the weekend in Long Island for a Capobianco family wedding. Jayson's cousin got married so we all drove down, took the ferry and spent the weekend together. Summer love and lots of family fun, we spent time at the beach, the pool, eating yummy food, giving hugs & kisses and taking lots of family photos!

Next was a trip to NOLA to visit the one and only Emma S-E. For five days we shared memories, drinks, outrageous scenarios, crawfish and loud music. Luckily we came up with an anthem, as we always do, listening to Blurred Lines enough to drive anyone crazy. I simply can't resist Pharell, and spending time with Emma was like traveling through time. I'm grateful to have such great friends, where picking up right where we last met is natural, full of love and a blur of happiness. We spent most of our time beating the heat, eating awesome southern cuisine (like fried chicken, ribs, crawfish, daquiris, etc), and enjoying an amazing vacation. New Orleans was perfect; full of life, lights, loudness, and love!

The ingredient of the month for me has been quinoa. On the next adventure of the month, Wanderlust, I brought a Greek inspired quinoa made with lemon juice and anything freshly local; peppers, cucumbers, garlic, onion, carrot, radish, feta?! I was lucky enough to spruce mine up with some freshly pick lemon-thyme from my brothers garden, yum. I also made another batch of black bean burgers using some quinoa to add nutrients an texture (I did not follow the recipe but used it as a loose outline)! Served up with kale and sweet potato it make a super-dinner that is so sexy and satisfying....

  

With not enough time or words to reflect yet on Wanderlust, I will leave you with some photos and lessons learned from one of the must amazing weekends of my life.

• Teaching Yoga with Horses is inspiring, exhausting, exciting, fun, invigorating
• Doing Yoga with Horses is breathtaking, challenging, uplifting, fun, beautiful
• Horses + Yogis = Harmony

We had a gorgeous weekend together in Stratton at the festival. A special thanks to the entire Yoga Vermont family and the horses! I can't wait to do it again... Lots of Love and Light.

Om shanti shanti shanti

Contemplating Paradise

After a nice vacation to Boca Raton, some promising weather of summer ahead and recent new of Maho Bay closing, all I can think of is white beaches, blue skies, clear water, sunshine and green, green life. This shores up next to a vision, notion or experience of what I like to call paradise. Whether or not your own paradise is lush, warm, bright and breezy I think most of us can appreciate this sense of vastness. Something about being by the water and under the sky brings on a certain sense of freedom, joy and vigor. Since my vacation in Boca Raton was filled with beach days, long walks, yoga, eating and drinking out, more long walks, I found a lot of time to turn inward and be quiet. The serenity and calm that go along with this rejuvenation is what I see when I look at pictures of Paradise.

So a few yoga photos from the beach... These are for you, MOM! She isn't on Facebook so she hears/sees these things second hand on a smartphone at work, it's just not the same.

And here is a memory of my first paradise, Maho Bay, St John, USVI. After a family vacation in my middle school years introduced me to this particular Slice of Life, I was hooked. The eco-friendly campground offers screened in bungalows connected by miles of boardwalk amidst the natural beauty of St. Johns hillsides; seriously , this is one of the most beautiful places I have ever experienced. After I graduated from high school, my best friend Laura and I both decided to take a year off. In September we flew to the Virgin Islands to volunteer at Maho in their work exchange program. We would do laundry, clean cabins, plunge toilets, pressure wash boardwalks for about 4 hours a day in exchange for a cabin for two. We were 18 years old.

I could go on for another 17 pages but I think I'll save it for my memoir... The most memorable times were spent on the beach enjoying the pure bliss of such a small piece of paradise which has now been sold for close to $14 million. Phew, that feels good to get off my chest, something I will continue to sit with for a long time. Contemplating Paradise.... To wrap things up with Maho I thank you for the skills I probably wouldn't learn anywhere else: hitch hiking, drinking warm rum, living on an island, windsurfing on the ocean, and loving every bit of every thing every where.


















In my life today, I'm spending time in the garden and planting seeds, my favorite thing to do this time of year. The newest to pop up are arugula, basil and thyme. I've also started some tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers and various flowers scattered around my tiny lawn and porch.

Yoga continues to thrive in my life, thankfully. I teach ten classes a week at the studio now, which is proving very fun and exciting every day. Students are so inspiring, and as a self-proclaimed "inspired student" it feels very right to be spending lots of time in the studio. And I'm heading off to class in just a minute so I'll finish things off there. Simply trying to fill my life each day with whatever comes my way.

Don't eat more than you can carry.
~Miss Piggy

Dear Laura and Tim

Two people have mentioned my blog in the past month and inspired me to start up again: Laura Sturgis and Timothy Perez. This is for you two, so I'm not going to keep it short...

I just got back from a glorious trip to Orlando where my Aunt has resided for 7 years now. It is very much a place I can now visit for a retreat of sorts. Her back yard has a private pool and a bird feeder that attracts not only birds but squirrels, lizards, cats and, a first time sighting for me this trip, rats! We all know that Orlando is great for food, drink, theme parks, gators, conventions and combinations of all of the above, and I of course have been known to enjoy a margarita or two, a bottle of wine (or two), tacky miniature golf and gourmet cuisine. This time around when I wasn't spending time with my dear family, I really took time to chill. Mostly, I'm broke as a joke and have no cash for crap like that (I got a free flight using my Jetblue miles!)...

 How can it be that a bright, young college graduate working a minimum of 40 hours a week still scrapes by on a monthly basis? Oh I dunno, here are a few ideas: my cat, my yoga obsession, my love for extracurricular activities (this season these include snowboarding, snowshoeing, cooking and the occasional social soiree)...

Lola is the cat I've dreamed of owning since I first lived on my own on Mansfield Avenue in Burlington. She is sweet, soft, cuddly, playful and a source of constant love and entertainment. Not that my lovely. live-in boyfriend Jayson isn't all of those things, it's simply a void no person will ever fill. I am trying to get her onto a raw food diet and she uses pine pellets that turn into sawdust for kitty litter. Fascinating, I know. Yesterday was her five month birthday and most of the big expenses are out of the way now, phewf.

Lola in a cardboard box...

Sure, the yoga has sprung me into ultra awareness about my place in the world and what I'm eating/consuming on the day to day, but I've also just finished a book I think you might enjoy that is helping me to stay on track. It's called The Mindful Carnivore by Tovar Cerulli. For the record I still eat frozen pizza and Chinese food so it's definitely a baby step thing for me, it's much easier to force my kitten into a healthy lifestyle than myself.

I received my yoga teacher certification just before Christmas and have registered with Yoga Alliance, you can look me up on the directory. This experience has not only been a whirlwind of a dream come true, but still proves to be life changing just about every time I go to teach a class. BTW Laura, Tim has you beat here because he came to class when he visited in January, just sayin'. There will be much more talk about yoga in my blog posts to come. I am now training towards my 500 hour certification, nexxxxxxxt level ya'll!

Ok, extracurriculars... The winter hasn't been the best for outdoor sports and shenanigans but I've found my way onto snowshoes a few times and to the mountain a handful of times. Here is a picture of fungi on a tree covered in snow especially for you Tim:

And cooking has always been something I enjoy, but now that I'm trying to be more health conscious it also seems like a way to control what I eat. I recently made black bean burgers that came out fairly gooey yet delicious, a lentil-bacon-veggie soup and homemade loaves of bread. The crock pot and cookbook I got for Christmas have only aided my desire to be in the kitchen. Totally off topic but Jayson and I got a tent for Christmas, VERY AWESOME, can't wait for summer!

 BBQ Chicken Pizza

I've been home from Florida for about two hours now and had to get up at 3:30 am for my flight so excuse me for being sporadic and mild, I hope you liked it anyways. I promise that the posts to come will be more entertaining and insightful (maybe). The cat is asleep on my lap and it's snowing outside...

I thank you both for inspiring me to write again, you guys mean the world to me!

"The yogi's life is not measured by the number of his days but by the number of his breaths."
-B.K.S. Iyengar

San Diego, Day One

The weather today was unbelievable. I was lucky to leave Vermont in the midst of a dismal and slushy haze on Friday morning thanks to the dedicated driving of my father, Thanks Dad. A four over layover in JFK was the least of my worries so I chose to have a quick massage followed by a manicure and then a luxurious lunch. I got to San Diego just before 8 pm on the West Coast so Anna and her boyfriend, Karl, picked me up and we went to a great restaurant for beers and some really good eats. The best part was the CoCoNut Porter I had for dessert that came from a brewery in Hawaii. After a few drinks and some food I was pretty exhausted but found myself oozing with conversation and reminiscence. Once the mattress was inflated I threw in the towel and fell asleep in the clothes I had worn all day.

Anna lives right next to the airport so the airplanes overhead are pretty spectacular. We slept in very late until we were finally hungry enough to shower and face the day. Sitting outside at a real cute cafe we had caffeine and breakfast. The sun was shining and a nice breeze was blowing all day long. It was 75 degrees when we left the house this morning. Her studio apartment is a great size, big enough for two to enjoy, and the balcony on the second floor catches the sunshine as it sets across the bay. My first California sunset tonight was accompanied by a cold beer and peaceful air.

With Anna at work until later tonight I'm staying in, eating dinner and maybe even watching a movie or something. We spent the entire afternoon outdoors walking around Balboa Park snapping photos and watching the locals. The culture here is so rich and lively, not to mention the city lifestyle. Fashion is rampant but the beach town vibe is laid back and easygoing. A great mix of flavors, sights and sounds is present everywhere I went today. Can't wait to enjoy the Southern California sunshine again tomorrow and explore more of the San Diego scene! Peace Out, Girl Scout...