Foods you need to try [Rhody style]

Saturday was my best friend's birthday!  Mike and I went down to RI for a visit, and in addition to great fun and friends, there was also fantastic food!

She has the cutest dog ever!!

Fresh quahogs on the grill: You probably haven't heard of quahogs before, have you?  Well, unless you watch Family Guy... but these guys were the real thing!  Shannon's boyfriend caught them that morning.  You just throw them on the grill for a few minutes until they open, then add a couple drops of hot sauce and enjoy!

Dorito salad: I hadn't heard of this one before, but it was AMAZING!  All it takes is a head of romaine, some taco-seasoned and cooked ground beef, black beans, shredded cheddar,  crushed nacho cheese Doritos, all tossed in Russian dressing.  It is so addicting!

Brownie and fruit kebobs: these are what I brought.  I actually found this recipe on Shannon's Pinterest page.  She wouldn't tell me what to bring, so I thought it would be fun to make something she had pinned.  Another great use of Pinterest - making people exactly what they want! 

Oh, and I didn't mention, in addition to Odin [her dog], my sister has chickens! Yes, she is the country girl and I'm the city suburban one.  How awesome would it be to never have to buy eggs again??

Wimp.com

Have you ever heard of Wimp?? Oh my gosh, neither had I, but now I'm addicted!  I actually saw that Pawalla posted a cat video from Wimp on Facebook [I'm obviously a sucker for cat videos], and then I just kept clicking "random video" at the top and COULDN'T STOP.  Especially on rainy days like today, I could seriously keep clicking for hours.  
Here are a few of my favorites so far:
Flash Mob on the set of Bing Bang Theory
Two kids play 'Let It Be" on the cello and violin
Two floppy disks play the Imperial March
The Muppets: Stand By Me
Baby Jaguar
Cookie Monster auditions for SNL

The Best Week of TV Ever

Just an FYI, there are spoiler alerts in this post.  I wrote each tv show in big, bold letters so you can scroll and read the ones you want to, if you'd like.  I also didn't include any spoiler photos, so as you scroll through quickly, you shouldn't be too surprised.  Then again, if you are anywhere near social media, everything has probably been spoiled for you - so watch the shows already!! ;)
Sunday: Revenge - season 2 finale

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I usually don't watch shows from the very beginning. I jump on bandwagons once they're on and I know they're good, but Revenge was one of the very few I watched from the start.  I remember seeing this trailer in the summer of 2011, and for some reason it just drew me in.  It's been two seasons now.  I really enjoyed season 1 [maybe because it was the first tv show Mike and I watched together, living together]; I loved how the whole season was done in flashbacks, and Emily VanCamp is just amazing.  Then, with season 2 everything changed [including Takeda haha].  I feel like they only planned for it to be a one and done kind of series, but everyone just loved it, so they had to keep the plot going.  I watched season 2 religiously, and I can honestly say that it's getting a little ridiculous with the number of plot lines.  However, the finale was fantastic: Emily finally told Jack that she's Amanda, poor Nolan, Declan, and Takeda, and what is going on with the "Initiative"??? Monday: HIMYM - season 8 finale

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I love HIMYM [but you probably knew that]. I started watching it a couple years ago and have gone though the whole series 3 times on Netflix... plus every time it's on FX or any other cable station, I watch it.  I was soooo excited to meet the mother, which we did on Tuesday.  She is so cute!! I'm still convinced that Craig and Carter [yeah, we're on a first name basis], didn't think there would actually be a season 9, so that's why the finale was so short.  I didn't think it was a great finale, and it didn't really tell us too much, but seeing the mother in the last 10 seconds was well worth it!
Tuesday: Arrested Development - season 3

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Alright, so maybe this week hasn't been all new tv, but this is in anticipation of new tv!  In case you didn't know, Arrested Development is coming back for Season 4 in a little over a week.  I AM SO EXCITED.  This is one of those shows I didn't watch until it was off the air, but in the last month, Mike and I have watched seasons 1-3 a couple times through.  We are rewatching season 3 now, and we watched a few episodes on Tuesday night, mostly because I'm ridiculously jealous of my friends in the NYC area who I've seen at the Bluth banana stand!!! #ADWorldTour is in full swing [it was even at Yankee Stadium on Wednesday!!!], and if they were still in NYC this weekend, I was planning on dropping everything to go... seriously.  But alas, it is moving on, and I will have to make my own frozen bananas this weekend.  
Wednesday: Alright, I didn't watch any television, but I did see The Hunger Games for the first time.  Going in I knew nothing, and somehow I basically still knew the whole plot line.  It was a good movie, but not the spectacular event I imagined.  
Thursday: The Office - series finale

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The end of an era.  I loved The Office! I started watching it during season 2, when I was in high school.  I'm a sucker for love stories, so Pam and Jim were a very good part of the reason I watched every week.  When they started drifting apart [and coincidentally the plots got worse] in the last couple seasons, I wasn't as invested and sometimes episodes on the DVR sat there for a good month before I would get to them.  
Well, not only was there an hour and 15 minute finale, there was also an hour retrospective beforehand last night.  I loved hearing Jenna, John, Ed, and Rainn talk about their characters as well as the making of each season and even the casting.  One of my favorite parts was watching John's casting video, where he was told to look "sarcastic" and made the first ever "Jim face."
Then there was the finale.  The first 40 minutes were pretty standard: they brought all the cast members together, as it took place a year after last week's episode, and then Jim started with his pranks.  Then, as Jim tells Dwight he can't be his best man, Michael Scott enters.  [Let me just say, Steve Carell is DEFINITELY a silver fox.]  His only line for the first 5 minutes or so is "that's what she says."  He doesn't take over the episode, but you know he's there, and as an Office fan, I am so happy he was.  Mike and I teared up through most of the last half hour, and it was just a fantastic way to end a great 9 season run!
For another fantastic take on last night's episode, Alyssa's post is great! 
  
And as if all of those things didn't make it the BEST WEEK OF TV EVER... this week Fox announced that JACK BAUER IS COMING BACK!!!! 2014 cannot get here fast enough.... see what I did there?! ;)

Inside Out Chocolate Cupcakes

Last Friday was my boss's birthday. As you can probably assume, when baking needs to be done, I'm the one who gets called. Well, as you can imagine with my whole "coast to coast healthy" thing, I haven't baked lately.  I don't want to look at Pinterest, I don't want to see what I'm "missing," I just don't.  So, I told my coworker to scour the Internet and choose literally any recipe ever. She found these great chocolate inside out cupcakes, and they were amazing [yes, I had one]! 
This was my first time ever baking with a vinegar recipe, so of course Mike and I spent like a half hour researching it.  I love the science behind the vinegar + baking soda combination and might try altering some of my own recipes to make them fluffier.

Also, because the "frosting" was on the inside, it made the cupcakes so moist.  I sort of forgot about the second batch [because we were watching last week's The Office] and left them in for a good 6 minutes extra.  They were still delicious and you couldn't tell a difference.
Here is the recipe!
Ingredients: 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour 1 teaspoon baking soda 1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa 1/2 teaspoon salt 1 cup white sugar 1/3 cup vegetable oil 1 cup water 1 tablespoon vinegar 1 teaspoon vanilla extract ~~~~~~~~~~ 8 oz package of cream cheese [softened] 1 egg 1/3 cup sugar 1/8 teaspoon salt 1 cup mini semi sweet chocolate chips
Directions: - Preheat oven to 350 degrees. - Line cupcake pans. - Sift together flour, baking soda, cocoa powder and salt, and set aside. - In a large bowl, whisk the 1 cup sugar, oil, and water until blended. Stir in vanilla and vinegar. - Beat in flour mixture until incorporated, and set aside. - In medium bowl, beat cream cheese, egg, 1/3 cup sugar, and salt.  Stir in chocolate chips. - Fill muffin liners 1/3 of the way with chocolate batter. - Scoop a heaping tablespoon of cream cheese filling into the middle of each cup. - Bake for 20-25 minutes.
original recipe

Top 10 of My Day Off

10 newly painted nails

9 rooms vacuumed

8 floored scrubbed

7 unmatched socks from

6 loads of laundry

5 blog posts planned

4 hours of Law and Order

3 miles run

2 fish sandwiches for lunch with Mike

1 pair of ridiculously comfy Christmas Cookie Monster pants

It's been two weeks...

Checking in! 

Last week's goals:

1. Still no snacking - check!

2. Drink 8-10 glasses of water per day - I think I'm finally in the right place with water intake

3. Complete Week 2 of Insanity - My leg has STILL been killing me, but I have my back under control, so I'm going to try again this week.  I did walk and play golf twice this week though so that's 1400 calories burned each time [How awesome is that??]

4. 1 minute of planks each day - I got this.

5. Fruit/veggie at every meal - I bought tons of grapes, bananas, carrots, and green beans early in the week and have been loving the healthy eating

This week's goals:

1. No snacking

2. Redo Week 2 of Insanity 

3. 1 minute and 30 seconds of planks each day

4. Protein with every meal

5. Run 10 miles

This week's product:

Ever since Influenster sent me Secret Clinical Strength, I've been interested in trying other scents.  Well, apparently "sport" means manly, and I don't mean like sort-of-neutral-but-really-men-only-wear-it manly, I mean I'm smelling like Axe. Seriously. I guess I don't smell, but I can't really tell over the manly scent.  I guess I'll try again when I'm done with this [and using all my perfume to cover the smell haha]. 

Jeff's Margaritas

If you follow me on Instagram [which you should if you don't ;) ], you would have seen my Cinco de Mayo celebration. When I got home from work last Sunday, I was handed one of these. My roommate Jeff loves his alcohol is a great bartender. Here is his [not so] super secret [anymore] margarita recipe:

Ingredients*:
- 12 oz can of frozen limeade concentrate
- 1/2 cup sour mix [we used Master of Mixes]
- 16 oz can of Mike's Harder Strawberry Lemonade
- 1 cup tequila [or more or less depending on alcoholic preference...a cup made them fairly strong]
- a few handfulls of ice

Directions: 

Put all the ingredients in a blender and blend until smooth. This recipe makes 3 very good size margaritas.

*FYI ours weren't actually measured out, these are just approximations - but how can you go wrong with these ingredients?

Oh, and of course we had tacos too! And in case you were wondering, black olives are an acceptable side dish.

I think we'll make some of these for our Mother's Day cookout tonight!  

Happy Mother's Day to all the mommies out there!

My day off with Titleist

I had a really cool opportunity on Tuesday.  One of my college teammates has a friend who works at Titleist [Have you ever heard of Titleist?  If you are a golfer, you probably have... as it is a golf brand.  Even if you're not, you've probably seen it written in cursive on a baseball cap somewhere haha.].

They were looking for young people for a photo shoot and luckily my friend thought of me.  As you might know, Tuesdays are my day off, so I drove up to Massachusetts to participate.  I arrived in time for lunch and a briefing; the other 3 girls there for the shoot with me were a lot of fun.  We were given clothes to wear: a couple polos, awesome golf shoes [they don't have laces, they click on the back to tighten], a glove and a hat.  

My first outfit /// Model release!

We got to just practice on the range for a good hour with the brand new clubs we were shooting with.  Seriously, these clubs were awesome.  After that, we went out on the course and started shooting.  We posed with different clubs, hit a ton of shots, did a lot of the same things over and over [haha].  The whole shoot was about 4 hours.  

That's me in the purple

At the end we were given new Titleist backpacks and 2 dozen golf balls as a "thank you."  Seriously, we got to hang out and play golf all day AND get presents? Best day ever!!! Oh, and we got to keep everything we wore, too.

the day's goodies!

In case you didn't know, practically all of my golf clubs are already Titleist, so now with this new wardrobe, I'm going to be representing big time.  Thank you so much to Titleist for this amazing opportunity!

Borrowed Heaven gets POPPin'

Oh hey! Notice something new around here?  Like I said last week, I decided to have the lovely Jane from Poppiness give my little blog a new look.  Have you checked out Poppiness Designs before?  If not, you definitely should.  She is very easy and quick to work with!  I absolutely love the warm, happy feeling this blog now emanates!  Thank you so much, Jane!
So, stick around, grab a button, and enjoy the all new Borrowed Heaven!

<div align="center"><a href="http://myborrowedheaven.blogspot.com/" title="Borrowed Heaven"><img src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-cZTC8yc33eg/UYqjeHDc0tI/AAAAAAAAJG0/yr0kZYIP83g/s1600/200x200+button.png" alt="Borrowed Heaven" style="border:none;" /></a></div>

Hometown Hop: Hurricane Sandy - 6 months later

I cannot believe it's been 6 months since Hurricane Sandy.  You probably heard a lot about this hurricane, probably about New York or New Jersey, but my poor little hometown was destroyed in the storm.  Rhode Island starts basically at Long Island's eastern point.  That's the reason Connecticut has [no offense] ponds and rocks for beaches and Rhode Island has great waves with smooth sand.  The downside of this?  Rhode Island gets pelted with weather.

Westerly is a small town of 23,000 or so during the winter, but in the summer, the town swells to over 50,000.  Tourism is the main industry.  Growing up, all of my friends worked as life guards, beach parking lot attendants, food shack cooks and servers, and at little boutiques.  Almost all of that was destroyed.  

I do have to say one thing about my little town, it sure is resilient.  The washed away dunes are rebuilt, the beach shops and restaurants are almost complete, and the town is advertising for a Spring Festival [this weekend] and Memorial Day Weekend [the unofficial start of the season].

Here are a few photos from my recent trips back home.  If you want a real look at Westerly immediately after the storm, watch the video at the bottom from the day after Sandy.

my favorite mini golf course, across the street from the beach

yes, those are people next to the sand brought in to rebuild the dunes

sifting through tons of garbage 

dune rebuilding

and creating tons of walls along the beach for future protection

Hurricane Sandy - Misquamicut Beach from Chris Walsh on Vimeo.

- Those images for the first minute and a half with the bulldozer and man running? That was a road. 

- See where the water is at 3 minutes? There used to be dunes there, and the water is usually back another 500 or so feet.

- That's a house in the middle of the road after the 4 minute mark.

- At 4:12, look at how low the stop sign appears to be to the ground - that's how much sand is on the road.

Here are some photos from my hometown newspaper over the course of the storm.

Linking up with Heather and Ashley for Home Town Hop today.

One Week In...

So, here's the deal. I wrote this post on Saturday.  Yes, I know, I was predicting I would reach my 5 for Five early, but I was on a roll.  Then that roll hit a brick wall.  I've had a lot of back pain for about 2 years [but haven't gone to a doctor because I'm stubborn it seemed silly to just go for that] and now on top of that I've had a killer pain next to my shin.  I finally went to the doctor this morning and I have tendinitis in my back and knots from my plantar fasciitis [a tale I will tell eventually...] in my leg.  Basically, I need to slow down for a couple days.

However, it seems silly to get rid of a perfectly good blog post, so I will amend it in purple to how I'm feeling today.  

Well, it's been one week since I embarked on my coast to coast journey to health.  In case you didn't see on Wednesday, the reason I'm calling this journey coast to coast is because I will be completing the second half of my Run Disney "Coast to Coast" medal in November [I ran the first half in California in January], and I hope that between now and then, I will create a new, healthy lifestyle.  

One thing I realize I forgot to mention was how I will be working out each day.  Have you heard about Insanity?  Well, I happened to stumble upon their infomercial last weekend [it was on the Golf Channel - so it was  fate], and I fell in love.  Everyone in the infomercial seemed real, saying how hard it is, but how much it pays off if you put the effort in.  After reading reviews on Amazon and a few other sites, I decided to give it a try.  Well, it really is INSANE.  Each workout is really hard, but I hope to see results in 6 weeks!  Check out a video about the program here. 

Now most importantly, how did I do on my 5 goals?

1. No snacking between meals or especially after dinner - I did it!
2. Exercise once everyday - I skipped Sunday, but that was because Insanity told me to.
3. Drink 8-10 glasses of water per day - I think I was a bit low Thursday, but I do always have a bottle with me!
4. Bring my lunch to work everyday [so I can control what I eat during the day] - We went out to lunch as a group on Friday [and I ate poorly], but other than that I was good!
5. Only one Starbucks drink - I didn't have any! Alright, fine, I got one on Sunday when I was feeling like crap - but it was a LIGHT frappuccino ;) 

And now my goals for next week:
1. Still no snacking [Just an FYI, I know snacking can be good for you, but my problem is that once I start, I cannot stop, so once I get my body out of the habit of constant food, I will begin taking in healthy snacks.]
2. Drink 8-10 glasses of water per day
3. Complete Week 2 of Insanity - I'm going to try on this one, but I will do at least 45 minutes of some type of workout today if my body won't allow it. 
4. 1 minute of planks each day [I'm starting small, I know]
5. Fruit/veggie at every meal

Finally, I've decided to do a little something extra for myself.  When I go to stores: grocery stores, pharmacies, gas stations, almost anything... I used to buy myself a candy bar or a treat.  Well, not anymore!  Now I am going to treat myself to one little something a week and review it for you.  It'll be something body or skin related, most likely, to keep me feeling good on the inside and outside!

This week I didn't even have to buy anything.  My wonderful friend Heather sent me a few of her Dickinson Witch Hazel wipes.  I used them at the end of the day, after I had been in the sun giving golf lessons for a few hours, and the wipes definitely brought my face back to feeling soft and smooth [not oily] like it was in the morning.  

I will definitely be purchasing more with those $2.00 off coupons!

I promise, future RCC Monday posts will be waaaaay shorter: 5 for Five/Insanity update, product review, and maybe a photo or inspirational quote.  Happy Monday, y'all!!

And memo to self: do not jinx yourself and write posts ahead of time anymore.