Tag: family

Life Updates

It has been a long while since I have stepped into this space. I actually wasn’t planning on coming back here, but it’s funny how time and time again I find myself missing this page and craving an outlet for my thoughts. The past year has been one of the best and most transformational of my life. We welcomed our sweet daughter Grace to the world last February and have loved every moment of watching her grow. My son, Wesley, is 3 now (how?!) and they are the cutest little duo. He is so protective and so in love with her – I can’t wait to watch their relationship continue to develop and grow.

We received another amazing blessing from God when I found out in August that I was pregnant with Baby #3– due in April 2025. We do not take this for granted for one second and we cannot wait to hold another precious, perfect newborn in our arms and see how they fit into our family.

Amidst all of this joy, there has also been struggle. I feel like this year has really been focused on looking inward, personal development, figuring out who I am as a mother and a person versus who I really want to be, figuring out what is important to us as a family… and so much more. This has been a work in progress and has often been stressful and uncomfortable ~ mostly because it is so big and so important.

As someone who has always had a *plan*, I am feeling a bit like a rudderless ship lately as I try to figure out how all of my desires and dreams for my family fit into the reality that is my life. I feel like I have been on a hamster wheel going full speed ahead for the past decade+ and I’m so ready to get off. I want to live my life in a way that is simple and joyful and in alignment with who I truly am.

I’m well aware that this shift is going to take time, but I am realizing that it is going to be the most important thing that I can do for my future and my family so I’m going to take it slow. My goal for the month of February is to intentionally add one activity to every single day that brings me quiet joy. By quiet joy, I don’t mean the dopamine hit that often accompanies moments of instant gratification (i.e. shopping online, consuming sugar), I mean true joy that brings peace to my soul and even just a moment of clarity amidst the chaos.

I will be sharing these moments on Instagram each day if you want to follow along. As always, I’m so happy that you’re here – I’ve missed you!

xo,

Jaclyn

Friday Favorites

Yay for the weekend! Tomorrow is my big test and I am SO excited for it to be over with. Here are a few things that I was loving this past week. 🙂

1. This week I really loved some of the excerpts that I read from my book before bed. They all focused on having faith rather than planning for and worry about the future. They spoke about how God has a plan for us all that is already set and will be slowly revealed to us moment by moment.

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Some days I like the readings more than others, and this week I felt like they really were all things that I needed to hear.

2. On Thursday night my Dad and I went out to dinner in Hoboken to a restaurant called “Margherita’s Pizza and Cafe.” I had been looking forward to our visit all week! It was nice to get out of the apartment and spend some time catching up.

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I had a feeling that the food would be good here because each time that I previously walked by there had been a line out the door. The atmosphere was really cute and cozy and felt like your typical small family owned Italian restaurant.

They started us off with bruschetta and Italian bread and butter. Then for our main meals, my dad had chicken parmigiana and I had raviolis stuffed with eggplant, sun-dried tomato, and cheese. Both of our meals were fantastic!

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We then finished off our evening with a coffee and cappuccino before heading out.

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Overall we had a great time! We hopefully are going to try to do something like this once a month or so. 🙂

3. Lastly, two of my favorite things this week have to do with my bedroom coming along in my apartment. As of right now, the kitchen and living room feel nice and cozy, but the bedroom is a mess. For the past (almost) two months I have had no rug, curtains, or even a bedspread. Luckily that all changed this week!

My aunt had been working hard on a hand-made quilt for my bed for a little while now  and she just finished it!  I haven’t seen it in person yet, but it looks absolutely beautiful from the pictures.

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My grandma picked out the fabric for me when she was in Amish country this past summer and I immediately fell in love with it. I knew that it would make a beautiful quilt, but I’m not super confident in my quilting abilities yet so I decided to ask my aunt to make it for me. Luckily she said yes and it’s already one of my very favorite things that I own (despite that I don’t actually have it in my hands yet)!

 Even the small details are perfect!

To go along with this, I got a nice surprise from my Grandma telling me that she bought me a braided rug for the bedroom as a Valentine’s Day gift!

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Here’s the photo she sent me, but I’ll be sure to post actual pictures when I get it!

I had been looking at very similar rugs online for weeks now but hadn’t mentioned it to anybody. I was so shocked when she told me that she bought me one in the exact color that I liked!   I am so excited to get it into my bedroom and see how it helps things come together.

I will definitely be doing a post on the apartment in the near future to share my attempt at making this place feel like home!

That’s all for this week. I am so grateful for my fantastic family who truly made this week fabulous.

Have a great weekend!

xo,

Jaclyn

First Weekend Visitors!

So I’m a little behind here (per usual) but I wanted to fill you all in on the fantastic past weekend that I had with my mom and brother.

Before they arrived on Saturday morning, I woke up early and took a walk downtown to a cute little coffee shop called “bwe kafe.” I heard about this place through Instagram and I am so glad that I decided to go check it out.

They had the cutest little set up and I loved the atmosphere. I’m hoping to spent a few hours here this weekend catching up on some studying!

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I ordered a dirty chai latte, which was essentially a chai latte with a shot of espresso. It was so perfect and I have been craving one ever since. Though next time I do think that I’ll go with 2 shots of espresso!

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When I got home from the coffee shop, Anthony and my mom were here! We brought up all of the stuff that didn’t make it into my car during the first move and spent a few hours unpacking and chatting.

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By the time we finished, we were starving and decided to head over to Mom’s favorite deli – Fiore’s. We got roast beef and mozzarella subs and they were just as great as we remembered from last time that we visited there.

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We spent the rest of the afternoon curled up on the couch watching movies and napping. Around 7 o’clock, Anthony was starving so we ordered pizza and wings to snack on during the football game.

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On Sunday morning, we woke up early and headed into the city for a fun and touristy day, starting with Times Square!

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We went into the M&M store and the Hershey store, both of which were absolutely packed for so early in the morning. We had enough of the huge crowds after that, so we decided to head over to Rockefeller Center.

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On our way we stopped into St. Patrick’s Cathedral, which was just recently renovated. It was beautiful inside. I wish we could have stayed for mass!

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We spent the rest of our day walking down 5th avenue, visiting Madison Square Garden, and getting an awesome lunch at “The Counter.” We had huge cheeseburgers with french fries, which pretty much put us into food induced comas immediately.

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We headed back to Hoboken and spent the rest of the afternoon napping and hanging out.

Even after our fun weekend, I think my favorite part was coming home from work on Monday night to dinner on the table and all of my grocery shopping done for the week. I am so lucky and already can’t wait for their next visit!

I have a fun post coming up regarding some of the things that I’m loving lately, so keep an eye out! 🙂

xo,

Jaclyn

 

Happy Saturday!

Today is an extra happy Saturday because my mom and my brother came down to visit me! Anthony is working on a paper right now though, so I figured I would hop on here for a few minutes and catch up with all of you.

I am so proud of myself after this week for a few reasons. The main reason being that I finished my first full week of working in and commuting to NYC, as well as living in my very own apartment. I had been so nervous for this week for so long, but now I realize that I had no reason to be. It was a piece of cake…. well kind of. I struggled a bit towards the end just because I was so darn exhausted.

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Mandatory first day of work selfie!

The second reason is because I worked out this week every morning at 5:30 before work. If you know me, you know that I would be happy sleeping until 10:30 every single day. This was so hard, but I’m so happy that I forced myself to do it. I loved coming home each night knowing that I had already been active for the day.

Before moving to Hoboken, I did tons and tons of research regarding which gym would be the best for me to join. Unfortunately, fitness is super expensive in this area and as a new grad, I’m still trying to get on my feet. Eventually I hope to start taking classes here and there at local studios (they have barre, yoga, and spin classes that I can’t wait to try ) but for now, I figured a program that I could do for less money from my apartment would be best.

With this criteria, I decided to jump on the Beachbody bandwagon and sign up for a year of on demand workouts. This allows me to stream any workout that I want straight to my TV and includes a great variety. Some of the more popular ones included are Insanity, P90X, 21 Day Fix, and Core de Force. I’ve mixed it up a bit to see how I liked the different programs and I haven’t been disappointed yet.

Right now I’m fully committed to 21 Day Fix and have already finished Day 7/21! I’ve been sore every day and I LOVE that the workouts are only 30 minutes each. I’m not sure I could handle getting up much earlier than 5:30 everyday!

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My favorite post-workout / pre-work protein shake 🙂

Now I’m off to the supermarket to get some snacks and games for us to enjoy during the Patriots game. Go Pats!!

xo,

Jaclyn

 

 

Weekend in NJ

On Friday morning, I headed out to Westfield State to pick up my brother before we headed to New Jersey for the weekend. We had big plans to visit my dad and visit NYC to try and scope out places for me to live come January.

We arrived to my dad’s house around 3:30PM and we were tired. They went out hunting for a few hours and I stayed at the house to catch up with Peggy. Chatting with some coffee, snacks, and wine – what more do you need? We ended up spending the rest of the night relaxing and watching Netflix. We planned to head to NY early on Saturday, so we all wanted to be well rested. Including Sadie…

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On Saturday morning, I woke up only to take my first ever motor cycle ride with my dad’s friend. It was pretty cool – though not something I would ever want to buy for myself! The area where they live is so beautiful, so that was a perfect way to explore.

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Around 10 o’clock, we started out journey towards NYC. I had a few places in mind that I wanted to visit and Hoboken, NJ was on that list. It’s super close to the city and I had heard a lot of good things about it, so we decided to check it out.

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I ended up loving it! There were tons of restaurants, shops, parks, and young people. I really think this is a place that I could see myself spending a lot of time in future. Everyone that we met was so kind and I loved the small-town atmosphere despite being so close to NYC.

We stopped at a small diner called “Stacks “for brunch where I had the most delicious eggs florentine.

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Then we just roamed around the little city before getting back in the car and heading to Carlo’s Bake Shop.

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This is the bakery from the popular show “Cake Boss.” We waited in line for about 20 minutes but it was well worth it. We felt obligated to stop since we were so close. 🙂

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We ordered lobster tails, a mini cheesecake, and a cannoli. Everything was delicious.

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Next, we left Hoboken and headed into the city. I had intentions of looking around the Upper East Side and the Upper West Side, and we tried our very best to do so. Unfortunately, it was super chaotic and there were people everywhere. I give my dad so much credit for driving through there.

It was still great to see everything! While I think that I can adjust to city life during the work week, I’m not sure that I can see myself living right in the heart of all the craziness. After we left the city, we headed back to the hotel and we all passed out. It was a long day that took a lot out of us! Around 8 PM, we rallied and headed over to Buffalo Wild Wings to grab some supper and finish off the day.

On Sunday morning, we headed back to Hoboken so that I could get one last look around before going home. We stopped at O’Bagel for (pumpkin spice) coffee and home-made bagels.

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They were so yummy. 🙂

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We all piled back in the car and were able to make it back to my dad’s house in time for the Pats game! I was trying to multitask by studying and watching the game, but Sadie didn’t seem to want that…

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Overall, it was a great weekend!

xo,

Jaclyn