The Great Big Wonder

May was a wonderful and a hard month all at the same time. From losing my cousin to visiting Walt Disney World and reconnecting with old friends, I’ve had a whirlwind of emotions swirling around my head. Nevertheless, I’ve made this post, and did my best to stay on top of my 52 New Things. Read on and see what I got up to.

#17 Ojai (Things to See)

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My friend and I were due for a lunch date, so we made plans to meet up and visit Ojai together. I had never been to Ojai before, although it had been on my list for a very long time. Needless to say, I love it. We dove into the valley and I admired all the farms and beautiful houses. For lunch we stopped at The Nest, a cute little cafe with drinks, fresh food and a great outdoor patio for eating. I ordered the fried chicken sandwich and I was not disappointed. They took a little long to bring me my food so they gifted me a strawberry shortcake and it was delish! So pretty and fresh.

After lunch we headed to Bart’s Books for some shopping. Bart’s is an old home converted into a book shop and honestly it’s so dreamy. The books are organized by genre making searching for books easy and painless. As we picked through isles and rooms of books it began to rain and didn’t let up for about 40 minutes. We purchased our books (including a rare book) and ran through the rain to the car. Overall, the day was wonderful and the atmosphere of Ojai was everything I want in a future home. I can not wait to get back to Ojai soon.

#18 Cinnamon Rolls (Food)

For my new food thing this month, I decided I wanted to make cinnamon rolls. I’m a sucker for cinnamon rolls, the sweet smells of fresh pastry and divine cream cheese frosting usually can wake me from a deep sleep or pull me like a zombie to fresh brains though the mall. I found this recipe on pinterest (duh) and spent a friday night making cinnamon rolls to enjoy on Saturday morning. I subbed most of the ingredients for all natural including the brown sugar. I used Trader Joe’s organic brown sugar and this was a mistake. It’s a super crunchy brown sugar that didn’t melt down in the oven. However, I was able to make my own dough and it actually came out really well, I’m so proud of myself as I’ve struggled to make my own dough and this was the first time that I was able to successfully raise a dough not once but TWICE! I apologize but I forgot to take a photo of the rolls with the frosting I made on them. I was too excited to dig in. They were delish and the family loved the end result, will make again next time I have overnight guests to impress.

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#19 Disney World (Activity)

We went to Disney World! Our time at WDW will be a whole different post so I’ll spare you from my musings this time around. I had never been to Disney World and I was blown away by how HUGE WDW is. Honestly it’s amazing how much space the Disney property encompases. My favorite park was Animal Kingdom, the whole park was immersive, exciting and the rides were life changing. The World Showcase in Epcot was very cool but the rest of the park left me a little underwhelmed. Magic Kingdom was spacious and I loved getting to ride the people mover and their version of Haunted Mansion. At Hollywood Studios I enjoyed the Slinky Dog ride and of course the Tower of Terror one of my all time favorite rides. My Friends and I stayed at the Carribean Beach Resort and I’m so glad we got to spend a week together. Walt Disney World was magical.

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#20 Painting in the Park (Outside)

The end of May was hard for me. In fact the whole later half of the month was hard. I lost my younger cousin and getting my new things done seemed way less important than being with my family. For my outside activity for the month I decided that painting in the park was a steller way to re-center and get outside. I’ve never painted in the park before, so I gathered up my inexpensive watercolors and headed to my favorite park for the day. I painted a few pages, things that I was inspired by and moments from Amsterdam and Portugal that have stuck with me. I’m not an artist, I’ll be the first to tell you that, but there is something so soothing about sitting down and drawing and painting for nobody but yourself.