Happy Friday, friends, cheers to the weekend! See Happy Friday, friends, cheers to the weekend! See also: I was influenced by an IG ad and I’m ok with that. ✨
This is 14-1/2. I love that her half birthday come This is 14-1/2. I love that her half birthday comes as we wrap up family summer birthdays so she is included too. 🥰 She loves lululemon, fountain Coke, and long hugs. She is a fiercely loyal friend, is the best debater I know, and sleeps later than I ever did when I was a teenager. 😂 She is quiet and loud all at once and is forever the biggest cheerleader her brother and I could ever have. My rainbow baby is growing up before my eyes and I love it and hate it all at once. Love you to the moon and back kiddo. 💛
“Everything good, everything magical happens bet “Everything good, everything magical happens between the months of June and August." Jenny Han
The disco ball was hung there temporarily for a ho The disco ball was hung there temporarily for a hot minute but when it starts showing off at sunset, how could I move it anywhere else? ✨
Did the lyrics to “Sitting on the Dock of the Ba Did the lyrics to “Sitting on the Dock of the Bay” just run through your head or are you young? 😂 I despise Parkway traffic in the summer but love that our kids get to have a Jersey shore summer just like we did when we were their age. 💛
Any time my kids ask to have dinner with me, I con Any time my kids ask to have dinner with me, I consider it a win… dinner date with my oldest at Cava to close out the weekend, perfection. 🥰
The five grandkids recreated one of the candy boar The five grandkids recreated one of the candy boards from @ainttooproudtomeg’s cheese board deck. They may have eaten about half as much as they arranged, but that’s the point, right? 😍
We hope today made you as happy as this little chi We hope today made you as happy as this little chippy who hit paydirt with a $100,000 grand candy bar he found. 😍 (he actually had found himself TWO candy bars from we don’t know where, but we squired one away bc that felt like a sugar coma waiting to happen 😂)
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Food and Life

Visit: The Van Vleck House & Gardens {Montclair, New Jersey}

May 11, 2015 · Narrative

A beautiful public property to tour, the Van Vleck House & Gardens in Montclair truly celebrates anyone with a green thumb.

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Mother’s Day was definitely all about basking in the great outdoors. We started with a 1.41 mile hike through the Bonsal Wildlife Preserves (spoiler alert: we saw no wildlife), and with the humidity, it was a sauna-like steam bath, but fun (and good exercise to boot!). After that, we did a picnic in a small, quiet park, and then visited the Van Vleck House and Gardens in Montclair. A six acre, now public property, it originally started as a private home 140 years ago when the Van Vleck family wanted to escape the hustle and bustle of the city in favor of something more along the lines of a “country estate.” Over the years, there have been three different generations of the family staying on the property, and in various buildings, but since 1993, the heirs of the family gifted the estate to The Montclair Foundation. Since then, volunteers have meticulously maintained the property, and the private gardens have been open to the public 365 days a year. The house itself has been reserved for educational purposes, retreats, and special events.

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There are a number of different gardens that you can walk through (you can see a full map here), but the highlight is the gorgeous Chinese Wisteria that winds its way around the perimeter of the building, which was originally planted by Howard Van Vleck in 1939. Many people brought lawn chairs and picnics to just sit and enjoy the grounds.

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Review: Beyond Pita, Montclair, New Jersey

February 28, 2012 · Narrative

Beyond Pita - outside
Over the weekend, we were watching an episode of Guy Fieri’s Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives.  One of the restaurants profiled were serving up falafel.  And all of the sudden, it was all I could think about.  I suggested to Mystic that our Sunday outing includes a stop at a falafel place.

I can’t say he was completely on board for a first taste of falafel, since chick peas are on his weird and wonderful little list of things he doesn’t like, but he was more than willing to help me satisfy my own absurd needs for it.

A few early morning text messages with friends to find the best place to go, and we were on our way to Montclair to get my falafel fix.  Beyond Pita is a little blink-and-you-miss-it place on Church Street; small doesn’t begin to describe it, but isn’t that how some of the very best places are?  There is a little one-person-wide counter where you can place your order, and a tiny spot for about four people to wait comfortably for their food.  No place to eat there, so this is a grab and go type of joint.  Or grab and sit in your car across the street, which is what we did.

Beyond Pita - dashboard dining

Beyond Pita - Menu board

Not knowing if he was going to like falafel, Mystic went with their beef kebabs to play it safe.  These are not your traditional kebabs on a stick, though.  The meat is stuffed into a pita, along with a dressing, lettuce, tomatoes, and onions.  In fact, as we were opening up the packages, I actually thought his was mine, because aside from the main component, they look pretty much the same.  The beef was pretty tender (even though he gets his meat super well done, nothankyou), but although the meat was not high-flavored, it had a slight hint of something sweet.  The most ridiculously messy sandwich to eat, it was one of those that once you pick it up and start, you’re not setting it down until you’re done.  The pitas are soft and fluffy, but really do fall apart too quickly.

Beyond Pita - beef kebab

Beyond Pita - food prep

My falafel was stuffed into a pita with the same dressing/veg combination that Mystic’s kebab was, as well as the addition of crisp pickle pieces.  The fritter was crispy on the outside and warm and soft on the inside.  So.very.good.  I could have definitely gone back for a plate of the chick pea fritters on their own after that.

Beyond Pita - falafel
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Happy Friday, friends, cheers to the weekend! See Happy Friday, friends, cheers to the weekend! See also: I was influenced by an IG ad and I’m ok with that. ✨
This is 14-1/2. I love that her half birthday come This is 14-1/2. I love that her half birthday comes as we wrap up family summer birthdays so she is included too. 🥰 She loves lululemon, fountain Coke, and long hugs. She is a fiercely loyal friend, is the best debater I know, and sleeps later than I ever did when I was a teenager. 😂 She is quiet and loud all at once and is forever the biggest cheerleader her brother and I could ever have. My rainbow baby is growing up before my eyes and I love it and hate it all at once. Love you to the moon and back kiddo. 💛
“Everything good, everything magical happens bet “Everything good, everything magical happens between the months of June and August." Jenny Han
The disco ball was hung there temporarily for a ho The disco ball was hung there temporarily for a hot minute but when it starts showing off at sunset, how could I move it anywhere else? ✨

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Happy Friday, friends, cheers to the weekend! See Happy Friday, friends, cheers to the weekend! See also: I was influenced by an IG ad and I’m ok with that. ✨
This is 14-1/2. I love that her half birthday come This is 14-1/2. I love that her half birthday comes as we wrap up family summer birthdays so she is included too. 🥰 She loves lululemon, fountain Coke, and long hugs. She is a fiercely loyal friend, is the best debater I know, and sleeps later than I ever did when I was a teenager. 😂 She is quiet and loud all at once and is forever the biggest cheerleader her brother and I could ever have. My rainbow baby is growing up before my eyes and I love it and hate it all at once. Love you to the moon and back kiddo. 💛
“Everything good, everything magical happens bet “Everything good, everything magical happens between the months of June and August." Jenny Han
The disco ball was hung there temporarily for a ho The disco ball was hung there temporarily for a hot minute but when it starts showing off at sunset, how could I move it anywhere else? ✨
Did the lyrics to “Sitting on the Dock of the Ba Did the lyrics to “Sitting on the Dock of the Bay” just run through your head or are you young? 😂 I despise Parkway traffic in the summer but love that our kids get to have a Jersey shore summer just like we did when we were their age. 💛
Any time my kids ask to have dinner with me, I con Any time my kids ask to have dinner with me, I consider it a win… dinner date with my oldest at Cava to close out the weekend, perfection. 🥰
The five grandkids recreated one of the candy boar The five grandkids recreated one of the candy boards from @ainttooproudtomeg’s cheese board deck. They may have eaten about half as much as they arranged, but that’s the point, right? 😍
We hope today made you as happy as this little chi We hope today made you as happy as this little chippy who hit paydirt with a $100,000 grand candy bar he found. 😍 (he actually had found himself TWO candy bars from we don’t know where, but we squired one away bc that felt like a sugar coma waiting to happen 😂)

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