There’s a nasty rumor that weekends are for resting.
Rest… such a mysterious word…
My version of resting is seeing how many non-work activities I can cram into a couple of days. It turns out that number is pretty high!
The weekend started out strong with the Atlanta TECHmunch Conference. These are held across the US, but this was the first one in ATL. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but when I heard it was to be held at one of my favorite local breweries I had no choice but to sign up!
Monday Night Brewing hosted ~100 bloggers, and was to kind as to get us tipsy after the day’s learning ended. Before the boozing, we had pumpkin donut holes, snacks from Beyond Meat, and lunch catered by my favorite MetroFresh.
The holes were ok… I’m more of a Krispy Kreme gal. The Beyond Meat was really impressive – those beef crumbles are scarily similar to the real deal. And MetroFresh was amazing as always. Somehow I still managed that red velvet Sprinkles cupcake.
In addition to stuffing my face, I pitched a cookbook idea (and almost puked from stage fright) and learned some great tips. For instance, did you know that you should add “recipe” the the title of your recipe posts for better SEO? It seems s(e)o obvious now…
My favorite beer was a saison called Gun Show (obv). It is a spicy Belgian-style golden ale, infused with pears and brewed using champagne yeast. The champagne influence was most obvious in the carbonation – it was slightly effervescent. Pears mean more residual sugar… which results in 8.0% ABV. No question why it’s my favorite…
You’d think I would have still been full, but I came home ready for dinner. It had been hours since lunch. I don’t know why I don’t make more frittatas. They are so quick and easy!
Easy Veggie Frittata
- 1/2 C roasted peppers and onions (from the TJ’s freezer section)
- 1 jalapeño, diced
- 1/2 C mushrooms, chopped
- 1/2 C kabocha squash, pre-roasted and diced
- 1/2 C chopped kale
- 1/2 C egg whites
- 1 tsp Mexican spice blend
- 1/2 C chopped kale
In an oven-safe pan, sauté peppers, jalapeño, kale, mushroom, and kabocha. When nearly done, sir in kale.
Meanwhile, whisked egg whites with spices. Pour over the top of your veggies in the pan. Cook a 2-3 mins more, until egg begins to set.
Place pan in the oven under the broiler for 3-4 mins. Transfer to a plate and top as desired. I used cilantro and a fig-balsamic glaze.
Saturday morning I went to the gym as usual, but instead of my usual farmer’s market trip I raced home to shower off for a wedding.
I got ready in under 45 mins… which gave me plenty of time to sit in traffic and take post-workout selfies.
The wedding was by a beautiful lake outside of the city. My friends Silla and Candace tied the knot by the water as the sun was setting. The brides and the setting were stunning!
This was one of the most heartfelt ceremonies I’ve ever been to. You could feel the emotion, the gratitude, and the love in every element of the wedding. Silla said “20 years ago I never thought I’d be able to do this.” I may have teared up… nah, it was just a drop of sweat. 😉
I must also say I appreciate a wedding with good food. They had a little of everything: siders, shrimp pasta salad, caprese bites, grilled chicken, fried chicken… and cake. There were yellow, red velvet, and strawberry layers, which I inhaled that too fast for a picture.
I swear I didn’t just come for the food… I came for the wedding favors! Kidding… but how funny is this?!
PSL: Pumpkin Spice Latex.
Sunday you’d think I’d sleep in, but I got up and did my cardio before batting practice. Half of the softball team was at the wedding… hungover batting at it’s finest. Then I grocery shopped, got a massage, meal-prepped, brewed kombucha, realized I forgot sugar and went back the the grocery store, made dinner, and typed this post.
And I stared at my Garnish & Gather recipe some more. It’s so cool to see something I created being sold. For money. By a real company. I’m a dork.
***
Sometimes I think the weekdays are my rest time. It’s all marvelous.
How much do you cram into weekends?
What’s the most memorable wedding you’ve ever been to?
CONGRATS on your winning recipe – no, you are not a dork!!! That’s pretty cool stuff there!! And, Lady – it was so good to meet you in person at TECHmunch – loved your cookbook pitch – I hope you do go ahead with it and did you sell your slogan “spooning leads to forking” to the Beyond Meat peeps? 🙂
I used to have a boss who used to joke that I came to work to get some rest, when I used to try to talk her into me needing a weekend to recover from my weekend…and, now I wish I had THAT wedding cake for breakfast!
Thank you! It was so nice to see you at TECHmunch. We need to get together more often. 🙂
Pumpkin Spice condoms? That is just so wrong.
PLS condoms. I have no words. Or the ones I have I can not say out loud here 🙂
The wedding looks beautiful!! I love weddings. For the free drinks and food. Ok, not only 🙂
I love packed and active weekends but just as much I love my lazy ones. One wouldn’t believe it but I love to not babble all day long sometimes 🙂
Hahaha – you bought them in bulk, didn’t you?
…..those condoms did NOT happen. I am amazed. Hahaha.
What a jam packed weekend and what an epic sentiment to state- so so true and what a great thing to experience.
Now that frittata looks genuinely faceplant worthy.
More proof that Americans will pumpkin spice anything.
ahhh here?
MONDAYS ARE FOR RESTING.
(shhhhhh :-))
What a beautiful wedding!
And that frittata looks amazing. I’m so jealous you have kabocha squash for sale where you live right now!
We have it year-round! Do you have an international market? They usually keep it there.
PSL condoms – my mind is racing with funny things to say….none of them appropriate for the internet! 😉
Rest?! What’s that?! The past 8 weekends have been full of appointments, soccer games, wine tasting, friends, etc. I have loved every minute, but this next weekend I am relaxing!
Awwwww… we welcome any and all commentary here. 🙂
That beer does sound pretty fantastic. I used to cram in as much as possible on the weekends, but I really like taking at least one day to just totally decompress and relax. It feels so indulgently lazy!
You’re right – I did that one day after the conference and it felt like a gluttonous pleasure. 🙂
Congrats on the recipe, thats amazing but not surprising since your recipes are fantastic! Would love to see you get a cookbook deal. I’ll be in ATL next month and I’m taking your brewery recommendation 🙂
You’re coming here?! Please let me know if you need any recs at all!
i’ll be staring at that hair, the condom, and your recipe… hehe. Now rest up bro!
Ha! Always a good time over here. 😉
no dork – so SO awesome about your recipe!! and the cookbook pitch – when do you find out if they chose you? I love Beyond Meat – at Expo West they had a “taco bell” set up, giving away tasty tacos. Mmm.
sounds like a perfect weekend – I definitely need my down time, but my weekends are usually packed too. downtime is sleeping 😉
They didn’t choose me… boo! But he did say to stay in touch. I really do like their product!
This last weekend was insanely busy…and today and tomorrow will be too. Oh goodness, moving…
And that condom. ohmygod that is hilarious.
I love beyond meat products and use them a lot. They are so good aren’t they?
The wedding looked beautiful! My weekends are normally so busy I don’t stop until 9pm Sunday night, but Saturday I drank waaaaay too much and had to cancel all of my Sunday plans so I could spend the entire day in bed. Whoops.
You and I–If we had a weekend together it’d be beautiful.
We’d take out our waffle grills and open a bakery.
Is that PSL condom a real thing? Is it bad that I could actually be interested if it is? Don’t answer that.
OMG. Pumpkin spice latex…. I LOLd at work. How absurd!!
Congrats on the published recipe! That is so exciting!
YUM! That frittata sounds great. Heck, ANYTHING with kabocha sounds great to me!
What a full weekend! Sounds like everything – even the shopping and cooking and prepping – was fun! I love cramming things into my weekends too, and then every now and then I so appreciate nothing on the calendar…this was one of those weekends. 🙂 Have a great Monday!
Sounds like you had a truly marvelous weekend!!!
Gorgeous pictures of you headed to the wedding and the wedding itself sounds like a beautiful occasion!!!
Haha – you know I like a good weekend crammed with fun! Sounds like you had a great one. 🙂 Our trip to the mountains wasn’t too shabby, but also involved a 1AM move to a new hotel. That’s another story…
Weekends are DEFINITELY more for adventure, not resting! 😉 Your food looks awesome and that scenery? STUNNING! As are those brides! I can’t wait for my fiance and I to have a beautiful equality wedding like this…. So exciting to think about!! Thanks for sharing 🙂 <3
I would need a rest day from that weekend. Or at least glass of booze or maybe even a PSL condom. Matter of fact, I’ll take all three.
I just shared that Pumpkin Spice condum with my boyfriend. He has yet to share his thoughts. That’s hilarious. I haven’t been to any weddings that have blown my mind. Your weekend wedding looked beautiful. I can cram a lot into a weekend, though recently, I’ve been lazy as hell. I get my workouts in, but I haven’t done anything supremely productive. I need to paint my 2 bathrooms and update my blinds (when I moved into my new house, all of the blinds were crappy mini blinds). I need to upgrade to plantation blinds or bamboo. Those are fall projects for the weekends. But for now, I’m going to the beach on weekends or taking uneccessary naps.
So many amazing things you packed into your weekend! I used to do that, then I got old and now all I want to do on weekends is nap. haha. And maybe make your frittata. Looks amazing. I have no words on the pumpkin spice condoms. I mean, seriously?
Please. You aren’t old at all! I’m always amazed by your energy and all the fun things you do with your kids.
Oooh, a Laura cookbook. How awesome! Your latest WIAW looked pretty stellar! Bring it on! 🙂
That means a lot coming from you! I didn’t win, but I think it would be a fun project. 🙂
I always marvel at how much you accomplish during the week/weekends! I try to balance my week out so that every day is somewhat equal, with the weekends being slightly more productive.
And what a beautiful wedding!
Ummmm… I just read your weekend recap. You made me look lazy! 😉
The most memorable wedding I’ve been to was this past July. It was a Croatian wedding of 2 good friends, and my boyfriend was the Best Man, which is a VERY big honour to be in this culture. The food buffett was out of this world… those amounts of food!! There were like 50 entrees, 100 main dishes and about 1000 desserts 😀 (kinda exaggerated but nearly…). There were so many leftovers that we even got something to take with us. Yay 🙂
That sounds lovely! I would have taken a doggy bag too!
Selfies during traffic is genius!
Uhhh if you know anything about me and my love for…… Then you know what is currently filling my bed side night stand………………………………. I like to be SAFE because, uh… I HATE those little shits *kids*
Your love for pumpkin, you mean? You keep a pumpkin in your nightstand? Creeper…
Love how you threw ‘recipe’ into the title of this post and I never have used recipe in a title, but you’re right – genius!! I haven’t tried Beyond Meat, but I’ve heard really good things about it. Must find! I’d like to think that my wedding was memorable (for everyone) haha, but jokes aside, my friend’s last year was really awesome!
Gotta use what you learn, right?! And I’m sure your wedding was fantastically memorable. 🙂