Ever since getting back from vacation I’ve been trying to keep the happy hour vibes alive. It’s always hard getting back to reality and this week I’m excited to share a delicious cocktail recipe that you can use for your next happy hour!
Life can get so busy and sometimes the simple things (like the joy of happy hour with your girlfriends) can get pushed aside. Keeping in touch with family and girlfriends can be tricky – especially friends that have kids! To help, I’ve partnered with SunRype Slim on a fun #Take10 challenge. The goal is to treat yourself to a #Take10 moment – something that will bring you joy and make you happy. I’ve chosen a 10 minute “happy hour” over the phone for some good old fashioned girl chat and some delicious cocktails. This new Pink Grapefruit flavour is so delicious and only 10 calories per serving + no aspartame and no artificial flavours or colours! Pink grapefruit has been one of my favourite flavours for so long and not just because it’s pink 🙂
For my #Take10 moment I gave one of my girlfriends from high school a call that lives in my hometown and since I now live in Toronto, it can be tricky to get together. It was nice to catch up on recent vacations and what’s new with her kids. We both loved the flavour of the cocktail and it was nice to have a moment where we could both relax and have some “me time”.
Your #Take10 mission: Plan a date/time with a friend you haven’t seen in a while. Share a cocktail recipe and then ring up your favourite girlfriend on the phone (like the good old days) or meet over Facetime as you sip on something delicious. Be sure to check out my cocktail recipe below!
If you wish to try out this new flavour, you can find SunRype in the non-refrigerated juice aisle of your grocery store. They also have more cocktail recipes on their website!
Looking for more ideas to Take 10? Check out this fun RESET x REFRESH guide, filled with weekly wellness tips, recipes, seasonal beauty, fitness inspiration and more.
This post has been generously sponsored by SunRype, the opinions and language are my own and in no way do they reflect SunRype.
I’m so excited about this master bathroom reveal! It’s one of my absolutely favourite parts of my house. When we first went to look at this house before buying it, I fell so in love with this bathroom and joking around with my husband I actually got into the bathtub and had him take a photo of me in it (don’t worry, it hadn’t been used yet haha). It was just so perfect, I couldn’t resist getting in. I had no idea then that this would actually end up being our house!
We’ve been slowly decorating each room and it will be an ongoing work in progress for the foreseeable future. I want to take my time and it’s fun seeing the rooms come together over time. The bathroom didn’t need much added to it – it really just needed some great artwork, a few decor pieces and some plants to finish off the space. Art has been one of the hardest things to pick out for our new house. My husband and I have been able to agree on the big stuff – furniture, rugs, etc. But when it comes to the smaller decor pieces and art, we simply have different tastes. Much to my delight, I was THRILLED when my husband agreed to some cactus art pieces from Minted for the bathroom! I used Minted for all of my wedding invites and they turned out SO AMAZING and then I was surprised to find out that they also have a massive selection of incredible art. There is literally something for everyone. It was hard to narrow down my favourites, but I love how these pieces brought the whole room together and added some colour to the space. I spend alot of time in this bathtub and it’s become my little sanctuary at the end of a hard day.
Check out the reveal below and I’ll meet you on the other side!
The big cactus print you can find HERE. I got canvas is in size 30×40. I love the colouring and how modern it looks. The smaller cactus print matches perfectly and you can find it HERE. I got just the print in 11×14 and used my own frame. I love the calming effect that these prints have – perfect for a space where you are trying to create a zen/spa vibe.
The wood bench, towels and rug are all from Homesense. The wood bathtub caddy is Umbra. Adding some plants really made the whole space come together – as with any space. Plants are probably my favourite way to make a room complete. Luckily we have a window in this bathroom, so we were able to do a real vine. I love how it looks hanging off the shelf.
Since we didn’t do the bathroom reno ourselves, I don’t know where all of the big stuff is from. However, I’ve seen similar vanities at Home Depot and will link below to some similar items – some might even be the same exact items because I can’t tell the difference:
When it came to deciding where to go on our honeymoon I had one request – I want to just lay on a beach in paradise. I knew we would be tired after the wedding, so the idea of doing something super adventurous didn’t really appeal to me. I knew I wanted to just lay on the beach and relax in a beautiful setting. Although we did play around with ideas like Europe (I still haven’t been!) or Africa (we love wildlife and are dying to do a safari), we ended up landing on Tahiti – basically as close to the definition of “paradise” as you can get.
The only issue being that I hate flying, so I wasn’t too crazy about the idea of a long flight, but I knew it would be worth it when we finally got there and it 100% was. I would do it again and again. We split the trip up and went to California before and after for a few days, which helped to extend our trip and there was also less of a drastic time change once we got to Bora Bora, which was amazing!
It’s a 5 hour flight from Toronto to California and then we did an 8 hour red eye to Tahiti on Air Tahiti Nui airline. I slept the entire flight! Upgrade if you can afford it. The regular seats are super close together and the upgraded seats are beds and they looked incredible! They were unfortunately all sold out. Once we got to Tahiti it was another 40 minute flight to Bora Bora – basically the same size as a Porter flight from Billy Bishop. Once arriving in Bora Bora, our hotel picked us up in a boat to take us to our resort. This was one of the most exciting parts of the trip. You are so stunned by the beauty of everything that you forget all about the travel within a minute of landing. I have anxiety about planes and boats and I was totally fine the entire trip!
I’m so excited to share our photos and trip details with you because it was INCREDIBLE!
So here we go, officially married and at the airport waiting to board our flight to Tahiti! Wedding nails still intact 🙂
I know you might think this photo below is somehow photoshopped, but it’s 100% real. Upon arrival to our resort there was literally a crab holding a heart in the sand. I can’t imagine a better welcoming committee for our honeymoon haha.
As you can see, the views are absolutely breathtaking. We stayed at the Intercontinental Thalasso Spa Resort and it was perfection (not sponsored in any way). Be careful, because there a bunch of Intercontinental hotels there and not all are created equal. The Thalasso was incredible and the overwater huts are HUGE compared to some of the other resorts. I don’t have a single complaint about the resort. The views are unlike anything I have ever seen, I loved how big the huts were, the food was amazing and the entertainment was great. Staff went above and beyond to make our stay memorable. We had breakfast and dinner included in our package, which I highly recommend. Food and beverage is very expensive there. The spa was amazing!! We went our first day there and our last day there – so spoiled! Including more details below.
Our Hut:
As I mentioned above, the huts were a great size. Some of the huts at other resorts looked super tiny, so pay attention to size when you are booking. It’s always been my dream to stay in one of these overwater huts! It was so much fun being able to jump into the ocean right from your balcony and the view from in bed was so crazy! They gave us fish food and you could slide the top of the coffee table over and feed the fish! What could be better than that?
Below is a photo of the walk to our hut every night. I don’t think I’ve ever seen more beautiful sunsets in my entire life.
The view from our bed!
Just swimming under our coffee table!
The Resort:
There were so many amazing parts to this resort – I’m not sure we will ever top this trip. The resort felt empty in comparison to other places I have stayed. I think because alot of people just stay in their huts. It was so nice to feel like you had the resort almost all to yourself. It was very peaceful.
This hammock was one of our favourite spots. Snuggled up and reading during the day and then at night under the billions of stars. They are really in tune with their sea life in Bora Bora and every day at 2pm they would feed the sting rays. You could actually go into the water and swim with them! Feeding them helps to relieve their anxiety so that they would be less likely to sting people at the beach at the resort. Swimming with them was a little scary – we spent most of the time trying to dodge their tails – but it was so cool. What crazy creatures! They totally look like aliens. The water was so clear you didn’t even need a snorkel. you just had to look down.
Every night they would have a fire on the beach and we would watch the sun set behind the mountain. They would also have a different cocktail hour each night – rum punch bar, mojito night, margarita night – it was amazing!
The below is a photo of the dessert at one of our favourite restaurants. Homemade chocolates and gummy candies. The chocolate pops actually had gelato inside!
My handsome husband relaxing at the pool! We spent 99% of our time snorkeling around the resort and would occasionally come to the pool for a quick dip.
The ceviche was next level! We got this for lunch almost every day.
We would stop on this bridge and look into the water each time because there were hundreds of fish just hanging out here. We would also snorkel here and in the little lagoon on the other side of the bridge. As part of our honeymoon we got a canoe breakfast one morning. While they set up breakfast on your hut patio, a man takes you out in the canoe to serenade you. Definitely a highlight of the week!
The Spa:
As always, one of the highlights of the trip was the spa. After the wedding we were ready for all of the relaxing and that’s exactly what we did. We got to the resort and immediately went to the spa. The massage rooms have glass floors so you can watch the fishies swim as you get your massage. How do I go back to regular massages after this?! Seriously!
What I Wore:
I was way too busy with the wedding to really think about the honeymoon until we were actually on it, so my outfits were put together pretty last minute!
Had to with this “Wifey” bathing suit, because why not?! It’s from Forever 21.
Poppy & Peonies also sent over this adorable “Wifey” clutch, which I used on wedding day and throughout our honeymoon.
The Rainbows:
Due to the time change, I kept waking up super early every morning – which ended up having MAJOR benefits. On our first morning there I woke up to a double rainbow. There are some moments in life that stop you in your tracks and this was one of those moments. I immediately woke up Mike (even though it was SUPER early) because it was unlike anything I had ever seen in my life. Part of me wanted to go knock on every hut door and tell them to wake up and look at the sky! I can’t believe beauty like this exists in the world. I’m still pinching myself that I got to experience this first hand. Then, on our last morning I woke up to another rainbow – this time no double rainbow – but a full rainbow that stretch over the mountain and the whole sky. I’d be lying if I said it didn’t bring tears to my eyes.
The SHARKS!!!
Swimming with sharks in Bora Bora was one of the most incredible moments of my life. I LOVE marine life and just animals in general. I love watching animal shows on TV and I’m obsessed with Shark Week. So when we found out about the swimming with shark excursions in Bora Bora, we could not wait to do it! The excursion we did had 3 parts – one was snorkeling at a beautiful coral, then there was a visit to the shallow water to swim with reef sharks and sting rays and last they took us to the deeper water to snorkel with the reef sharks and lemon sharks. I thought I would be more scared, since you are literally being circled by like 30 sharks and some are even below you, but I surprisingly wasn’t. There were so many fish swimming around and the sharks didn’t seem to really care that we were there. It was seriously incredible being that close to them. Our guide even went down to pet them and feed them. As I mentioned, they are very in tune with their marine life. the clarity of the water made for some great go-pro videos! Check them out below:
If you ever get the chance to visit Bora Bora, take it. I would recommend this trip to anyone. It’s incredibly expensive, but it’s 100% worth it to save your pennies and take this trip.
Decorating for the holidays is one of my favourite things. As soon as Halloween is over I’m itching to get my tree up (much to the horror of my husband). He prefers that we wait until much later. This year is our first year in our new house and the first year we have been able to do outdoor lights and decorations. We’ve never decorated outside when living in a condo and townhome, so I was excited to finally have some outdoor lights, garlands and a wreath to hang on my front door! To help get me started, I partnered up with Home Depot for all of the essentials. They always have a great selection of outdoor decorations and I’m always impressed by their indoor decor options as well. The decorations are something we will work on and add to year after year, but I think we got a cute start!
The outdoor lights wrapped around our pillars and roof are all from Home Depot. I thought we would need two rolls of lights, but we only needed one! The pre-lit garlands were really well priced and ended up looking amazing! I love the look of garland around the door frame. I added a wreath with rose gold accents to the door and made some rose gold glitter bows for the garland. It looks especially beautiful at night!
On the inside of the house I got these white fur stockings from Home Depot as well as the stocking holders. It’s hard to find cute stocking holders. I love how these one’s look. This white tree used to look so big in our condo and townhouse and now looks tiny in our new house. We kept it up for this year, but next year we will have to get a bigger tree. I have my eye on the 7.5″ flocked tree from Home Depot! I love the look of the flocked snow on the green tree. I wish we could get a real tree, but we are both allergic.
