Valentine's Day for the Single Girls

This time of year is always rough for the single girls. Being single on Valentine's Day (aka Singles' Awareness Day) sucks. Especially when it seems like everyone else has that someone special.

This year, instead of dwelling on your single status, get together with your fellow single girlfriends and have a girls day! Here's some ideas of things you can do, all involving wine, because let's be real, wine makes everything better.

1. Get dressed up and go to a vineyard for the day and taste some new wines.

2. Grab a bottle of wine (or one for each of you) and have a gossip sesh.

3. Cook dinner together. While drinking wine. Lots of wine.

4. Throw on your yoga pants, have a movie night, grab a bottle of wine, and play a drinking game together.

(Bridesmaids or Mean Girls are two of my personal favorites)

But in the morning, try not to feel like this.

#MANCRUSHMONDAY: Olympics Edition

Every two years, my favorite world wide event occurs: the Olympics. The Summer Olympics will forever and always be my favorite (I grew up swimming and playing soccer so it's only natural), but the Winter Olympics hold a special place in my heart.

With each Olympics comes a new batch of snow hotties for us boy-crazy girls to lust over, so to celebrate the Winter Olympics, and another #MCM, I thought I'd share a few athletes from my favorite winter sport: snowboarding.

Shaun White

Greg Bretz

Louie Vito

Nick Baumgartner 

Nate Holland

#selfies

Admit it. You've taken a selfie once or twice. We're all guilty of it. Sometimes it's a cute one for instagram, other times a goofy one to snap chat to a friend, whatever. But at one time or another, we've all been there and taken a selfie. (Heck, I'll admit it, you can scroll through my camera roll and find a series of 5+ selfies, all on the same day, at the same time, just trying to get the perfect picture.)

Like most girls, tweens, teens, and young adults alike, I'm self conscious about my appearance, about my personality, about everything. It's a love hate relationship when it comes to myself. Especially when it comes to pictures of myself. It's like they say, you're biggest critic will always be yourself.

I was scrolling through my newsfeed on Facebook and found an article posted by Cosmo that intrigued me. The article was entitled "The Campaign on #Selfies That Will Make You Cry." What I found was an eight-minute video, which recently premiered at the Sundance Film Festival, that was commissioned by Dove as part of their Real Beauty campaign's 10th anniversary. The video showcases how a group of girls take selfies and the affects todays' standards of beauty. This video is heart warming and eye opening to how the standard of beauty create these insecurities in young girls everywhere.

Check out the video below

For more information on Dove's Real Beauty campaign, visit their website here.

Redifining what #beautyis

Wine Wednesday: Chateau Ste. Michelle Riesling

Let me preface this post by saying: 

I L O V E wine.

When I say I love wine, I genuinely mean it. Not just drinking it, but I love learning about it too. (So much that I took a course on predominantly wine last semester and I'm currently taking a course to prepare me for taking the Certified Specialist of Wine test in April.) 

Like every other college girl, I went through the "I only like super sweet wines a.k.a. I only drink Barefoot Moscato," phase. Thankfully, I've finally grown past that phase. Don't get me wrong, Barefoot wines are great when you're on a budget! (I mean, you can't beat $9 for a 1.5L!!) And sweet wines are great when you're just starting to drink wines. But as I've gotten older, and through tasting 100+ wines last semester, along with working in catering & events for the last three years, I've finally broadened my horizons into the realm of wine.

A few things I've learned about wine since turning 21:

1. I love white wines.

2. And with that, I still hate red wines.

(As part of my 101 in 1001, which you can find here, I am working on finding one I enjoy.)

And finally,

3. I really, really, really like Chateau Ste. Michelle Riesling. It is by far one of my favorite wines.

(Which I'm drinking as I'm sitting here writing this...)

I stumbled upon this wine while completing a wine tasting assignment for my aforementioned course in wine last semester. I was tasked with finding a Riesling from Washington State for my group to taste. That's when I found this particular wine, and ever since that day, I've been hooked. 

Chateau Ste. Michelle is located in Woodinville, Washington, part of the Columbia Valley. According to their website, “Our Columbia Valley Riesling is a blend of Riesling from throughout Washington’s Columbia Valley. We craft it to be a refreshing, off-dry Riesling vintage after vintage. The wine delivers ripe white peach character with subtle mineral notes. This is our ‘every day Riesling’ that is a pleasure to drink and easy to match with a variety of foods.” With its flavors of peaches and pears, this wine is not too sweet, but also not too dry, making it the perfect wine for any occasion. It's a wine that pairs well with a nice fruit and cheese platter, but also goes well with a light seafood or chicken dinner. It's also a great wine for those 'Wine Wednesdays' when you're sitting around with friends casually drinking while chatting it up and watching movies.

CSM produces three difference Rieslings for you to choose from: Sweet Riesling, Dry Riesling, and Riesling. All three are excellent choices, though I personally like the dry or normal options better, as I prefer dryer wines to sweet wines.

So the next time you're in the mood for a nice bottle of wine or want to try something new, pick up a bottle of Chateau Ste. Michelle at your local grocery store. The price usually ranges from $9-12, depending on where you purchase it. If you try it out, let me know what you think!

2014 Addictions: Green Smoothies

Now that I am finally back at school, I'm trying twice as hard to be healthy. Ya know, the whole, "new year, new me," thing... So the first step of that for me is breakfast. I've never been a huge fan of breakfast and I usually never eat it. I've used every excuse in the book. "I don't have time." "It makes me feel sick." "I hate eggs." If you've heard it, I've probably used it. So I found a solution. 

Green smoothies. 

I love spinach on a salad, but I never thought I would like it in a smoothie. And boy was I wrong. I've found that this simple, healthy breakfast on the go is a great start to my day. To find the right smoothie, I did some research looking up multiple recipes, saving the ones I thought sounded appetizing. I found one in particular calling for pineapple and banana, my two favorite fruits, and thought I would try it by putting my own spin on it. If you'd like to try it out, check out my recipe.

(Makes about two servings)

Ingredients:

1 cup pineapple, chopped

1/2 banana

2 handfuls spinach

1 cup almond milk (I use Almond Breeze Original)

1 handful of ice (6-8 ice cubes)

Directions:

1. Put all ingredients in blender.

2. Blend thoroughly.

3. Pour into cup, add straw, and enjoy.

Like anything else, this smoothie is best when drank right away, but if you're like me and don't have quite enough time in the morning, it is okay to make it at night before you go to bed. Just make sure to seal with an airtight lid and keep refrigerated. When you remove the drink, some ingredients may have separated, but just mix it up and enjoy!

OOTD: Last First Day

Having an 8 am class is rough. Having an 8 am Monday-Wednesday-Friday is even worse. It's easy to roll out of bed and throw on a pair of sweats and a hoodie, but I'm a huge believer in "the better you dress, the better you do in school." So how does one manage to make it to class on time while still looking put together (read as not a hot mess)? Keep it simple. I like to pair an oversized sweater with a pair of leggings and my favorite riding boots. It's cozy on a cold day, easy at 7 am, and still cute enough to be seen out in public!

My tip: Pick your outfits out the night before. I like to lay my clothes out before I go to sleep so that in the morning I'm able to throw them on and spend more time doing my hair and makeup, as well as making a healthy green smoothie! (Expect a blog post on my new smoothie addiction some time this week!)

My First Day OOTD

Sweater: Loft

Leggings: Victoria's Secret PINK

Boots: Sam Edleman

Watch: Michael Kors

Bracelets: Alex & Ani

Ring: David Yurman