Last night, I had a nice little week night treat.  One of my bridesmaids, Taryn, came over for dinner with Brian and I!  Because our schedules are both crazy right now (her sister is getting married soon!!) it has been a while since we have seen each other, and it was great to catch up.

Taryn surprised me with the cutest gift!  A hanger that said “Mrs. Rochford” to hang my wedding dress on.

How adorable!

For dinner we enjoyed a big salad of spinach and lettuce mixed with fresh basil, tomato, cucumber, salt, pepper, olive oil, and balsamic vinegar.

We enjoyed some quinoa patties with a little kale added to the mixture.

And we ended the evening on a sweet note with Chocolate Covered Katie’s Zucchini Brownies.  These were very dark chocolatey, so I really enjoyed them but Brian did not care for the bitter taste.  He still ate his piece though!

It was such a great way to spend a Monday night, and I am so happy Taryn and I were able to catch up after so long 🙂

Now, on to the good stuff…

Bachelorette Weekend Day 2

Bachelorette weekend Day 1 was an absolute blast and left us all feeling a bit tired at the start of bachelorette weekend Day 2, I guess that means it was a success right?

We started the day by fueling up with food from the hotel’s delicious breakfast buffet.  I was so happy to see plain oats, yogurt, fruit, and peanut butter 🙂

After breakfast and a little caffeine, we were all feeling MUCH better.  We spruced ourselves up, made a couple of drinks and got ready to spend the day at the beach.

Brenna had these cute little cups for each of us to put our delicious beach beverages in.

We also had some time to work on our flexibility and practice the splits…

Beach bound and ready to go!

Look at those beauties!

The beach was just a 30 minute walk through the city.  It was so perfect!

I knew that Lake Michigan was in Chicago, but I never realized that people went to the beach the same way that people go to the beach in Florida.  It was so cool to have the city skyline behind us and the beautiful water in front of us.

We laid out, some girls played volleyball, and really just relaxed for the day.  The temperature was perfect.  We weren’t sweating and too hot, but it was definitely warm enough to lay out in just our bathing suits.  We couldn’t have asked for better weather!

After the beach, it was time to head back to the hotel to shower up and get ready for dinner and a big night out.

All of the girls wore black dresses and I wore pink.  I must say…we all looked pretty darn good!!

Dinner was at a delicious Thai restaurant called Star of Siam.  It was literally just a couple of blocks away from the hotel, so we were able to get there in no time at all.

We each started with a fun and fruity drink.  My drink was a delicious French martini that had a refreshing raspberry flavor.

Brenna chose a classic pina colada.

The food was delicious and filling, so we all ended up having leftovers (which was great for later in the evening!).  I opted for the Spicy Eggplant Stir Fry with brown rice and shrimp.  YUM!

Once dinner was finished, we headed back to the hotel to unwrap some presents and more drinks.

I got some super cute items from the girls!  😉

Whitney decided that we had to have toasts with each drink, and somehow she had all of these “toasts” memorized.  They were great!!

After a few drinks at the hotel, it was time to head out to the bars again.

We started at a speakeasy bar called Untitled.  It had such a cool atmosphere!

We eventually had to leave and go to the late night bar so that we could continue the fun.  The night was full of dancing, chatting, drinking, and just having a great time!

It was the perfect and best bachelorette party that I could have ever asked for.  I can’t thank my sister enough for planning this event, and I can’t thank my friends enough for coming to this amazing weekend.

It was everything I have ever imagined!