Brunch with the ladies

This past Sunday I had some of my favourite Ottawa gals over to my place for a special brunch. All but one wasn't aware of my plan of going back to school and thus I prepared a menu to help tell them my plans.

What a great day! I was so happy with how everything turned out. If you know me well enough, you'll know that I love to entertain! So the night before I set my table and found a neat new way to fold my napkins.

The menu was served as follows:

• Homemade hummus with fresh veggies (cucumber, grape tomatoes, celery and carrots)
• Green monsters
• Shots of wild blueberry juice
• Fresh squeezed oranges mixed with sparkling mineral water and sweetened with agave nectar
• Granola over agave sweetened plain organic yogurt with blueberries
• Smoked salmon on brown rice cakes with dill sauce and capers
• Gluten-free pancakes
• Strawberries dipped in dark chocolate and hemp hearts
• Vegan no-bake peanut butter chocolate crispies with PB fudge  

Here are a few pics that I captured of some of the dishes. I have to get better at taking more photos. When I went to find my camera to take these the previous photos on the camera were from over a year ago... terrible, I know!

Suffice to say that everyone went home happy, full and healthy! And in return I got the support of my some of my favourite and closest friends for my new endeavour of becoming a Registered Holistic Nutritionist.

Bonus for all!

Me and my Amberlina

Do you have a friend that you can't remember your life without? I have one. She's my Amburger. We met on the playground in grade one, or maybe we met in playing in the neighbourhood. I can't remember because I was only a 5 year-old a the time. That's right, Bambs and I have been friends for 25 years! And while we don't hang out on the playground anymore, nor do we live 3 houses away from each other, she's still my bestie and always will be.

I've lived in Ottawa since the 2002/2003 time period. Up until late 2009, I would always get to see her when I went to PEI. However, in 2009 she took up and moved her life out to Calgary – and I haven't seen her since October 3, 2009! That's a really long time! So I'm thrilled that she will be my date to my witness my lil brother get married in just over two weeks from now in the sunny, sunny Mayan Riviera.

My smart, funny, lucky-to-have-him-as-my-brother brother is getting married to an amazing, equally-smart, lovely woman and members of my family are all going to be together beaching and partying for a week together in the sun, but in all honesty, I'm most looking forward to hanging out with Amber.

Love you and miss you!