Manatee Kayaking in Crystal River Florida

Hello from Florida! 

We are here on a quick impromptu Southern Road Trip to visit my little sister. Today, we had the most memorable and amazing experience with kayaking in Crystal River Florida along the Three Sisters Spring. 

 I don't even remember how I stumbled upon this hidden gem of Crystal River, but it 100% deserves it's namesake. Since it's only about an hour away from my sister in Gainesville, I knew that we had to go. We loaded up the car right around 6AM this morning and headed towards Crystal River so that we could get on the water right at sunrise. We did a kayaking tour and it worked out that the other kayakers in the group cancelled, so we had a guide all to ourselves. We ended up being the first ones on the water today, which gave us a chance to kayak alongside manatees and alligators, as well as seeing so many species of turtles and birds. 

cooking tajine in Fes Morocco

There is nothing like dinner with a view and it's even better when you prepare the food for yourself. 

Throughout traveling Morocco, the food was amazing so one our last evening there, I knew that we had to do a cooking class to learn how to make some of these dishes for ourselves.

I found a family owned Moroccan restaurant that also offered cooking classes. We were invited right into the restaurant's kitchen and taught 3 different dishes...that we then enjoyed on the roof. This was the perfect last meal in Morocco and now we can recreated this authentic meal and experience for ourselves. 

friday favorites 05.17.19

What a week this has been and it feels so good to be back to sharing favorites after taking such a long blogging break. 

GRADUATION DAY

One last graduation post, sharing the actual day because is was a hectic hazy whirlwind. I had two separate graduation ceremonies (yes 2!) to attend all in one day, so it felt a little rushed to get everyone and everything organized. But we did it. 

grad school grad!

 I am so incredibly grateful for the overwhelming support from my family and friends throughout this long journey of achieving my childhood dream. I'm also grateful for the amazing teachers and dentists and staff and mentors and patients that encouraged me along the way. And believe it or not, I'm also grateful to all of you. Yes, you, the person reading this post right now.

I struggled and stumbled along this path more than once, but always found the resilience to keep going, and that is in major part thanks to everyone who supported me, including this online community. It sounds silly, but over the years of blogging, I have made some true friends that are also complete strangers. So to anyone who has been kind enough to read my rants, leave encouraging comments, and even reach out to me directly, thank you for your support. 

Doctorate of Dental Medicine

Let's just take a moment and talk about this for a second because you guys, I have a doctorate degree! 

first paddle

This weekend we went out on our first paddle of the season and it felt like the official kick off to what will hopefully be an amazing summer!  

We dock onto the Elizabeth River that comes off the Chesapeake Bay. It was so nice to drop in and since the conditions were so flat, we kayaked further than we have before in this inlet.

Bikes, Boats, & Brunch

Reminiscing about a rare perfect weekend that we had during these hectic past few months. It had been weeks of studying. We were in desperate need of an outing, no matter how brief so we decided to bike to brunch after an early morning study session. 

There is something completely magical about living in a harbor town with boats coming and going. 

life lately: I'm back!

Hi there! Yes, I'm still alive over here. I know that it's been a little sleepy around the blog as I inadvertently took a 3 month blogging break. Since I started this little space back in 2014, I've never taken a break. So what happened? Truthfully, I was overwhelmed. Finishing up my last term of dental school has been a challenge as I've been commuting anywhere from 2 to 4 hours daily, while studying 3-4 hours a day on top of putting in 8 hours a day in clinic. This left literally no time for anything else. But it was so worth it! 

I'll be catching up with blogging over the next few weeks, but here are some major highlights of the last 3 months with a few photos below...