On this Weekend Meanderings..making yourself a priority once fall and school season starts, skincare tips from a facialist, improving your sleep, a little about the charm of Salt Lake City, living in the French countryside and more..
It’s that time again for all the good things that we want to share with Elizabeth and Juliet.
We had a crazy week..We were in in Salt Lake City to help Griffin move into his first solo apartment for his junior year at the U. It started out a little rough though.. After hiking Mt Tallac in Tahoe, Grif was to drive the rest of the way to Utah with his full car. The night before, a mama bear, who has been roaming out Tahoe neighborhood with three cubs, smelled Griffin’s granola Max had made for him in the car. In their exhaustion from the climb, they forgot to check the car for food. They woke up to this..
Grif’s two side windows had been pried out and the passenger window broken. Bear paws scratched it all over the place. Needless to say, the granola was nowhere to be found, nor the extra banana I stuck in his side door! ( I know I feel badly about that.) Max and Grif had to push the window frames back to close, and they taped up the driver side window.
Grif drove seven hours back to Utah like that with limited visibility. At some truck stop in Nevada, he fortunately found noise cancelling earphones they sell for truckers!
We met him that night in Utah and spent three full days helping him move in, get his things out of storage, clean a grubby, but nice apartment with awesome views, and sort out the car repair thing, and a rental.
He took off Tuesday morning for a backpacking trip through Wyoming with pals, and we went home exhausted! He needs a table and a couch, but has a desk, a bed and a bike and a kitchen with all the necessities…He’ll figure the rest out as the year goes on. I’m excited for him.
The mountains and the church spire looks like Switzerland to me. I’m sure when they are snow covered it will be beautiful. He’s walking distance to the school and also has a bike and the city tram right below his place..
Mountains to the West, in his kitchen and to the East, in the corner..above.
Salt Lake City
Have you been to SLC recently? It’s a beautiful city with the most amazing mountain ranges on all sides. Things I really appreciate about it are the small little neighborhoods that are tucked into the town. Those little neighborhoods have cute independent shops and restaurants. Sometimes it’s only two or three of them, but it gives each little area a nice feel. You can always find an independent coffee shop to work in..And they aren’t in strip malls. It’s a thriving spot for small independent businesses.
I also adore the brick homes that have been left largely in their original state and just updated with paint and pretty yards. The streets are wide and they have big center strips with trees that make a hot area feel very leafy and green. Many homes have gardens and sunflowers in their front yards..
Eva’s French Bakery is always a must for us and it’s within walking distance to our go-to hotel, Hotel Monaco. The design of this darling bakery is like something you would see in Paris and you can get an authentic baguette sandwich and tomato soup, wonderful croissants and pastries..They also took over a vintage jewelry spot next door ( love that they left the marquee), and make their own crème glacée ice cream now too.
The airport is all new and the Delta terminal is beautiful with a stunning wall of glass that invites you to gawk at the goings on the tarmac and feels very jet age..I loved it!
The flight from San Jose is one hour and a half and most people come in the winter to ski all the resorts like Park City and others that are a short drive away, but it’s quite pretty in summer..and fall!
I wore my new Anthro blouse and my cord shorts from Carve to travel. I usually do pants in the airplane, but it was just too hot. I brought my J. Crew cashmere travel wrap (on sale now), in my bag and could lay that over my legs when the plane got chilly..
I love this Henley Popover shirt so much I am thinking of getting it in the stripe too.. Looks like the white is already sold out online, but may be available in stores.
Getting back to healthy eating – after travel
I am always so done with eating out after traveling. I really feel the need to sort of detox from all the processed and high sodium foods. I want nothing more than a fresh salad made at home from my own tomatoes. The night we got back we made grain bowls and then a salad with chicken the next..
When I’m over eating out, and I want a reset, I go to the grocery and get several boxes of different salad varietals, a roast chicken for protein ( mostly for Max), garbanzo beans, fresh berries, tomatoes, and avocados. I always have frozen brown rice and quinoa and we can make different variations on a salad for dinner with just that.
I always add some kind of nuts like walnuts or sliced almonds or pepitas and I shake in hemp seeds, chia, and flax too. I also like red onion slices or with the strawberries, fennel, which has a wonderful smell and taste..I find the fastest and easiest dressing is to just squeeze a lemon, a shake of vinegar, a drizzle olive oil and a little salt..
I love these O Vinegars in the citrus, orange blossom and pomegranate versions are my favorite and just a shake of them with this California Olive Oil are what I always have on hand and so good. I never buy dressings.
I also revert to water, water and more water. I’m always parched from traveling and from Utah, especially so, though I am hydrating non-stop. I pretty much drink water for all my liquids except my morning oat latte for a few days after returning. I love spring water for the minerals and try to buy a few bottles to supplement our purified tap water.
Skin and Dehydration- and Facials
The other thing I did to recover from three days of shopping and cleaning for the college kid, was book a facial for myself when I returned. I haven’t indulges in one for many moons and I thought after a summer of catering to everyone, this would be a good way to start back to taking care of myself a little better. If you haven’t had a facial for a while, it’s a nice thing to do for yourself after the kids are back in school, or just to reset for the fall. My aesthetician says a good way to care for your skin is to book a facial once with every change of season. I love that as a reminder! You can also do a home facial too!
One tip I learned from her today is that dehydration is almost always the biggest problem with all skin types, and especially as we age. Since I have rosacea and am sensitive, I am always wary of breaking out and probably do not hydrate enough for that reason. I shy away from thicker cremes and oils, but if they are good quality I should not. I also get blackheads and that is related to dehydration as the dry flaking skin, clogs the pores. I did not know that.
She recommended adding a few drops of my night facial oil to my day lotion, to amp up the hydration. I also need to use my hyluraonic lotion more, and not cleanse, but just splash with water in the morning. As usual… she told me, drink more water and eat better! I’m sure my high sodium food, dry weather and not enough water was showing, not to mention poor sleep.
Better sleep habits
On the Delta flight back to San Jose, I was wiped out from a few nights of rotten sleep and thought I’d zone out on the free streamed shows. I noticed there was a Master Class on sleep by author, and sleep expert Matthew Walker, so I blew through seven short episodes of his class while on the plane.
Matthew is professor of neuroscience and psychology at the UC Berkeley, and has written a best seller, Why We Sleep. I got so much out of this Master Class, though doing it while exhausted!
The biggest take aways were always go to bed and wake up at the same time, even on weekends. Drinking and caffeine are the biggest disrupters of healthy sleep and you should try hard to regulate your caffeine intake to morning.
If you’re sleeping after drinking, you’re not really sleeping per say, but are sedated, like surgery, and your brain and body won’t give you normal reset that it does with sleep.. You’ll wake up sleep deficient and your body can’t repair itself or download our memories, like it does during normal sleep. Also everyone needs at least 7-8 hours a night. Routinely sleeping less demolishes our immune systemand those who go with less actually have high incidences of cancers and other diseases like dementia. H
e has a lot of tips for sleeping better in his book and this little clip I found on YouTube had a lot of what I heard in the Master Class… He’s funny too, but his research is groundbreaking and this is something we should all care about if we want to live a healthy life..Matthew says,’Sleep is the elixir of life and mother nature’s best key to immortality..’
One bonus of kids out of the house, its I can’t stay up so late worrying about them!! It’s out of my jurisdiction now..
A beautiful and fun book..
While in Carmel last week, I bought, Coming Home, The French Art of Countryfication, at the Earthbound Farm Stand. I was enchanted with the photos, but I also love the content. There are recipes, decor, style and home tips and much wisdom and inspiration here..
This book documents the stories of Parisians who left the city for the country, how they adjusted and what they love about it.
A great book for anyone who dreams of moving to the country or is a Francophile…It really made me want to move to the country.
Well that is my weekend meanderings for this week.. Please check out Elizabeth and Juliet’s blogs to see what good things they are sharing…
PINECONES AND ACORNS
MAKE MINE A SPRITZER
Thank you for being here! Hope your weekend is wonderful.
Kim
If you missed last week’s meanderings I shared some fun ideas for Carmel day trips, an easy ladies’ lunch you can pull together, Sienna Miller’s English cottage and a great white shirt for your wardrobe for now and in fall..
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