to new adventures: tour de fat

So the biggest thing that happened this summer was Tour de Fat. 

If you are unfamiliar, Tour de Fat is an epic event hosted by New Belgium in a few cities across America every summer. It's like a carnival with beer and games and lots of bike love.

The focus of the event is presenting the city with their bike trader.  A bike trader is a badass individual who gives up their car (donated to charity) in exchange for a new bike with the commitment to live car-free for a year.

Sound familiar now? Ashley was the Durham trader last year and has been chronicling her adventures here. 

And this year, Jonathan took the leap and said goodbye to the echo and hello to a jamis.  His blog (yes he's blogging!) is here. 

So in June, New Belgium came to Durham and we celebrated the bike! 

Even Chloe made the trip:

The day's events: 

The crowd:

The stage:

Jonathan being presented:

Jonathan post presentation: 

A jumbo game of connect-four:

And just general hanging out:

 

A couple of days after the event Jonathan went and picked out his mate -- a brand new jamis from the great team at oak city cycling:

(this was his test ride - he of course, always wears a helmet!) 

Thanks New Belgium for this incredible adventure! 

xoxo

family fun

Also this past summer, jonathan and i made our way south to the great state of Arkansas for some time with my family and friends, and to celebrate America! 

On the drive we stopped in Nashville, one of favorite cities I've decided, and explored some neighborhoods and offerings for the night.  

Of course, we had to go to Prince's and get some Hot Chicken.  

If you don't know Hot Chicken, you haven't lived -- it's fried chicken that has marinated in a cayenne bath and then has a cayenne breading too.  Served over white toast with pickles. 

 

Per the usual it was delicious. This skin was hot and crunchy and the meat was tender and juicy.  Incredible. 

But that was just first dinner.  After a bar with a delicious porter (yes it's july, yes we don't care), we had second dinner at Chuy's my favorite maker of tortillas. Seriously, I don't know what they put in their tortillas, (though I have a guess I just don't want to confirm it) but they are the best. So of course, I ordered a side of them. And I'm super pumped that Raleigh is getting their own location in October!

 

We headed to the lake the next day and hung out with the family for a few days and enjoyed all the usual fun - swimming, eating, playing cards, and more eating.

Then we went to Little Rock to meet up with the gang and take over Jake's house.  Emmy was pleased.

 

We celebrated the Fourth and America at Jake's parent's house with some solid pool time and grilling. 

It was a lovely vacation with my people and time away from work for a whole week!

xoxo

p.s. did you see this American can? epic. 

summer salad

this was made a while ago, but it was delicious if i do say so myself:

watermelon, chickpeas, cucumber, feta, lemon vinaigrette. 

winner winner summer salad (so the rhyme doesn't work so well there...)

xoxo

but first

casey, ashley, jonathan and i have been known to have many a fabulous outing.  and of course we've had a list of some things we wanted to do together.  having a picnic was one of them.  

but casey had to leave us and move to DC for grad school, or something silly like that. so suddenly we were running out of time to do the things on our list.  so we had our picnic, 

with ashley's fabulous picnic basket,

and the boys cooked because they are so sweet and we were crazy stressed with studying for the core,

and made a fancy cocktail, in a beautiful jar,

and it was all so delightful.

xoxo

it's always summer

when you have basil.  And lucky for me I have Trader Joes, and they always have basil.  So what's a girl to do with all that basil?  Well I whipped up some basil vinaigrette of course. 

It's pretty straight forward, basically think of it as a thinner pesto.  Cut up about two cups of basil and add some red wine and balsamic vinegar, olive oil, a little dijon mustard, salt and pepper and put that immersion blender to use. 

You may have to play around with the liquid amounts so taste it as you go.  

xoxo