Weekend Visitors

One of my best buds from the States and her hubby came to visit over the weekend. They could not have picked a WORSE weekend. It was SO cold here. I use to have a long commute with no problems through New England's snowy, sleety winters. Now... a drop of snow has me huddling underneath my blankets.

We DID manage to enjoy some Irish culture (ie, Fireplaces with pubs) and did the tinest bit of walking to give them a taste of the seaside.

Dun Loaghaire Pier 

We ditched the boys for a couple of hours.

 I took her to my favorite cocktail place and forced her to have one of my favorite cocktails. 

Buddies! 

My date and I 

Matching!

They are off to Galway to experience what I'm sure will be more snow and ice, and then I'll meet up with them one more time before they head back home. 

Happy 2013!

Did you have a lovely New Year's Eve, dear readers?

We meant to go low key (just a couple of drinks with friends) which turned into a late night- filled with Gin cocktails, champagne and some bad 80's dancing.

Here's to an amazing 2013!

Gin Cocktails in tea cups

The Gang

Castlemartyr

Over the weekend (after the crazy flight home from SF), Hubby and I headed to a good friend's wedding at Castlemartyr. This was our second wedding at this venue this summer. It was a lovely affair   and the lucky newlyweds are heading to South America for their honeymoon (JEALOUS!).

Cows at Church 

The Gorgeously Happy couple! 

The ladies! 

Hubby and I after a LOOOONG night of dancing! 

Congrats!!!

To my dear friend and her new hubby!

Gorgeous and adorable! 

I was in Boston this weekend to celebrate their wedding and it was such a blast! I'll catch up on the remaining Italian posts and my weekend in New England throughout the week.

Engagement Celebrations!

Congrats to our dear friends M & J who recently got engaged. We went out to celebrate on Saturday, rainest day this year so far. It was good fun even with the dreadful rain. Looking forward to your wedding next year!  

Only M (floral dress on the left) is in the picture. No idea where her fiance is :) 

One Month!!!!!!!!

YEAH!!! Only one more month, until I get a hubby. So excited!

I'm ready to be done work and ready to fly to the US to get the little wedding things done. Thankfully, I'm able to fly home earlier then expected to work from the Boston office so only 2.5 more weeks in Ireland until the wedding.

This past weekend, BF and I attended our friends' engagement party. It was so lovely to see an amazing couple at the start of their wedding planning. Lots of champagne was passed around and all kinds of shocking things happened!

First, BF proposed to my friend Gina. What the heck?

Wait... you're already engaged!  

Then BF proposed AGAIN to my friend Davey.

How come his ring is sparklier then mine?!!? 

Then the guest of honour decided to give BF kisses. Out of control!  

Me and the guest of honor  

After the party, Kieran and I were walking down Baggot Street to find a Burger King  grab a cab and we ran into Anne Doyle out on the town at 2:00 in the morning!! Anne Doyle is a news reporter for RTE. I tried to chase her down to no avail. Surprisingly, she didn't show up for the Sunday evening news...must have been a rough night for her! :) 

Cluck Cluck

This weekend was my HEN party!!!! YEAH! BF's friends was forced by me conveniently also organised his stag this weekend as well. They headed to Kilkenny - the stag and hen capital of Ireland. I heard the safe and I'm sure censored version of the weekend on Sunday but I do know they put him in a terrible costume which looked like this. I have ONE picture of BF in this outfit but I think he would seriously hurt me if I posted it online...

The Only Gay in the Village- A character from Little Britain 

My hen could not have been more lovely! It started off with a lovely and lazy balcony lunch at my friend Michelle's. We grabbed some sandwiches at Donnybrook Fair (which carries PopTarts!) and sat soaking up the sun until the other gals arrived at her house. We had a lovely makeup artist come by and do all of our make up. She was awesome! Way better then my last make up trial. I wish I could pack her up in my suitcase for the wedding.

Getting my face done

She did a good job on the make-up, no?

My lovely come dine with me pals! 

The gals bought me a LOVELY purse pinata (Prada, of course) so we spent some time trying to break it while my poor friend Sarah offered to hold it (BRAVE) because we couldn't hang it anywhere.

Courageous Sarah

 A lovely surprise in the pinata

Willies! 

After getting ready, we headed to Diep le Shaker for some amazing Thai Food. It was sooo good! Even though my sister couldn't be there, she and baby Carson sent over bottles and bottles of Prosecco for my friends and I. That baby is such a lush!

After dinner the gals then held a Mister and Missus game. If you're not familiar they asked BF tons of questions and I had to see if our answers matched. Even after almost 10 years, I didn't get all of them right. EKKS! I also embarrassingly outed myself on some really terrible nicknames!

So embarrassed! 

Really funny funny game! Highly recommend for all Hen parties! 

 After dinner we headed to the Baggot Inn for some more cocktails and dancing

Always trying to work out! 

Convinced the gals to do lunges too! 

Finally, we headed over to Buck's which is a late night club. It couldn't have been more fun. There were a group of 25 to start, and most of us managed to keep it together even at this late hour.

Standing Strong- similar to what our vision was like after all the cocktails! 

It was an amazing night with AMAZING friends, and it makes me even MORE excited for the wedding! 

Happy July 5th!!

So I don't have a grill (which is a BIG point of contention in the red door house) or American friends so didn't have the opportunity to celebrate July 4th. However, there was a CDWM dinner at a pal's house last night and even though she is Irish through and through, she decided on an American themed dinner. SWEET!

We had lovely steak sandwiches and homemade fries -YUM! and the piece d' resistance... Dessert!

USA! USA! 

Congrats!!!

I woke up this AM to some fabulous news... one of my good, great, amazing friend got engaged over the weekend. I know she reads my blog religiously sometimes... so a huge congratulations to her and her newly acquired fiance (and bling!!).  She's in the west coast at the moment so the time difference has prevented me from hearing the story. GRRR!!!

Here's the lovely lady herself. This was a pic in London a couple of years ago where we ate and drank our way through the city before heading to Harrod's and cheekily trying on fabulous jewelry (which may or may not have included an engagement ring or two !)Wish I was there to toast you with a glass of wine (and maybe some pho!) xxx

Sunny Dinner party

It was my turn to host our group dinner party this week, and I was TOTALLY uninspired. I love looking at food blogs and have a back log of recipes to try out, but my energy was sapped with the entertaining of the future in-laws.

Lucky for me, the work on the garden paid off because the gals barely noticed the food since we were able to sit out in the sun on the deck -sipping lovely glasses of wine (and mint water - with fresh mint from the garden!)

How bright and sunny? Lucky for us, the deck is a sun trap as it was quite chilly in Dublin yesterday. 

The menu for my dinner party included steamed shrimp dumplings (delicious and easy since I bought them pre-made from the Asian supermarket) and beef lettuce wraps -also really easy to make and so healthy. To make up for the lack of carbs and sugar, dessert was a make-your-own banana split extravaganza. This was my best genius moment! I was so lazy, I tricked them into making their own desserts :) 

Tequila!

On Monday, after picking BF up from his friends house (He was in NYC for a boy's weekend), we met up with our wedding officiant to have dinner and talk about the wedding ceremony. The officiant is actually my best friend from high school (CUTE!) and so it was a lot more talking and eating then actually planning the wedding.

We headed to Lolita's Cocina and Tequila bar which just recently opened. It was really cool and hip inside and really entirely too dark (signs of old age?). We were greeted with this loveliness upon sitting down:

A steaming container of tequila. How cool is that? 

Dinner was great. Tacos and shrimp were eaten and when the bill came, a big ol' ball of sour apple cotton candy came with it. It was sprinkled with pop rocks too. YUM! 

Friends and cotton candy! 

Day Drinking

There's nothing I love more then day drinking and what better way to start it this past Saturday morning then at brunch with my favorite ladies at our favorite restaurant, Saba. We eat there so often that they start making our favorite cocktails before we even order them. We had a lovely meal, then left to find a pub to watch the rugby match.

We ended up in Sheehan's which I had never been to. My friend M from America was in town this weekend so she met us at the pub as well. We ended up moving from bar to bar (obviously to give M a good tour of Dublin). Finally after drinking (ourselves sober!) all day, we ended up in the most Irish place possible... TGI Friday's. HA! Who says I'm not a good tour guide?!

My Lovely Ladies


Irish Flair at TGIF

Come dine with me Christmas Edition

Our last Come dine with me dinner for the year was of course Christmas themed. Since our friend Mags was the only one with a table that would fit all 7 of us (the usual crew plus our friend Sean who was home for Xmas from Australia), it was agreed that we would have dinner at her place.

Instead of a gourmet home cooked meal like we normally do, we decided to have our buddies Mark and Spencer help out so we would have more time to chat with each other. We had lovely appetizers and a full Christmas dinner (Ham, turkey, veggies, potatoes and gravy.) Yum! It was such good fun, and we were laughing so hard and talking so loudly that the neighbors CALLED THE GARDAI!! Can you believe it?

We seriously weren't drinking very much (for once) and was in the process of sharing strawberry tarts and tea when we hard loud knocks at the door. Ut-Oh! Flashbacks of my college days went through my head, but they quickly left when they realised we seriously were just having tea and dessert.

Look at these innocent faces...would we cause any chaos?

We also had a Kris Kindle. I bought a lovely gift set from Bath and Body works for mine (taking advantage of the good exchange rate over Thanksgiving!) and I got a pilates DVD and an exercise ball. My Kris Kindle knows me so well!

What did ya get me?!?