Crumb Cake

One of my first baking memories from my childhood was making coffee cake with my parents and younger brother. We used to buy this box mix that requires no clean up at all. It’s perfect for kids, because you put all of the ingredients into a bag and mush it all together to and it’s so fun, done in minutes and it’s very delicious. We buy it every now and then for old times sake, but this time I decided to make the real thing. I found this recipe and I’m completely obsessed. I clearly made more crumbs than the recipe recommended, and this was so simple and yummy!  

A Week in Pictures

[The sparkling snow after Nemo] [Enjoying some wine and candlelight during the storm] [Beautiful orchid decorating my office]
[Crumbs birthday cupcakes for one of my best friends!]

One Year

A year ago today I started Meet Me in Paradise. My own little slice of the Internet pie. I originally started this blog to regain some creativity in my life, but what I have gotten out of it has been so much more than that. I have met and made connections with people from around the world and back, I have the perfect way to look back on the past year of my life that has been documented here, and I have remembered to do one of the most important things in life, to cherish the little things. Thank you all for reading and letting me share my life with you!

Playing in the Snow

I have a love/hate relationship with the snow. I love snow days, snowmen, snowball fights, snowboarding etc. but, almost everything else about snow, I can live without. This past Friday the weather started getting really gross around noon. I left work early (always a plus) and went home. I spent the rest of the night baking and hanging out with BaDing*. I was set on waking up early and going straight to my parents house to build a snowman. I can’t go through the Winter season without building a snowman. The next morning I woke up like a kid on Christmas and ran to the window to see over 2 feet of snow outside! It wasn’t snowing anymore which made it perfect snowman-building conditions and my street had already been plowed. I practically threw on my snow pants and dragged Ruben out the door.

I love my parents house in the winter. The backyard always looks so perfect covered in fresh snow. Obviously the second I arrive I’m stomping all over it and having snowball fights, making it not nearly as nice to look at. Even though it wasn’t ideal packing snow, we still had the best time building our snowman, Cedric.  

iVillage, DIY Wall Art

I’m a little delayed, but one of my posts was recently featured on iVillage! For those of you who don’t know, iVillage is part of the NBC Universal Women & Lifestyle Entertainment Network Group. It is basically an online magazine where you can read articles about anything from health, to entertainment, beauty, food, fashion and even the occasional DIY.  iVillage reaches over 30 million people per month! I was completely honored when they reached out to me to see if they could include one of my posts in a home decor segment. Go check out 25 gorgeous, simple and relatively free ways to spruce up your blank walls here, and don’t miss #16 :).

Calzones

I love all Italian food. BaDing and I had a craving for calzones the other day and decided to try to make some ourselves. We used this recipe and watched multiple youtube tutorials, but making the pizza dough into the shape we wanted was the biggest challenge! I have a whole new respect for the guys at the pizza parlors and I’m baffled by how easy they make it look to mold that dough into the shape they want. Our calzones came out so good (much better then we expected), but we definitely need to learn the proper dough techniques! Anyone have any tips??