Life's a picnic

Hello bloggies! I’m posting in a hurry before heading off to my friend’s 21^st birthday party. She’s the first of the friends I graduated with to hit the milestone, so it should be fun!

Breakfast this morning was the standard cereal bowl with TJ’s High Fiber cereal, frozen blueberries and chocolate almond milk:

Today’s workout was 45 minutes of intervals on the elliptical while watching the latest DVR episodes of The City and The Hills. Recording my favorite (trashy) shows for the elliptical always gives me something to look forward to!

For lunch, I had plans to have a picnic with a few of my friends from high school at Valley Forge Park. I had an apple with Maranatha almond butter to hold me over during the drive:

And I packed a salad beast with spinach, carrots, cucumber, tomato, onion, falafel balls, and mustard, plus a sliced mango (I also had some tortilla chips and salsa that my friend brought):

Unfortunately, I got lost on the way to my friend’s house when Mapquest gave me directions to the wrong street, so I was forty-five minutes late in meeting them L Can you believe that in nearly four years of driving, I’ve never really gotten lost? I usually have a really good sense of direction, so I was definitely irritated! They eventually had to drive to come find me before we headed over to the park.

Our picnic was a lot of fun; it’s always good to catch up with old friends. I’ve known these girls since I was in sixth grade! I think it’s interesting that childhood friends are often the ones we have the closest bonds with. After all, a lot of the time our parents choose these friends for us, and it’s inevitable that our personalities will change as we get older. There’s something special about growing up with someone- even if you take completely different paths, you’ve seen each other in your worst phases, and there’s a sort of unconditional love and understanding that goes along with that. Looking back at pictures of the chipmunk-cheeked, uber-nerdy and painfully shy preteen that I was, I’m lucky they stuck around J

 

There were four of us, so we had to take turns taking the picture!

After over two hours of chatting, I headed home. Dinner was small and basic, since I know there will be plenty of food at the party tonight:

Naturally Nutty vanilla almond butter on millet bread with an apple and a few squares of espresso dark chocolate

The dark chocolate was my favorite flavor of Newman's Own chocolate yet!! Rich but not overpowering, with ground espresso beans throughout. Perfect for a pick me up before a night out!

I’m bringing Skinny Bitch’s vegan dream bars with me- I’ll post the recipe tomorrow if they’re well received! Hope you all have a fun-filled Friday!

How’s your sense of direction? Do you get lost easily, or can you figure your way out of anything? I’m usually great at figuring out where I’m going, but once you’re lost on back country roads, it’s tough to get back on track!

Do you still keep in touch with friends from childhood? Who do you consider your “oldest friend”? Most of my friends date from middle school and back, but my oldest friend is my parents’ best friends’ daughter- our birthdays are exactly a month apart, and we’ve known each other since we were born!