tamarindo costa rica travel guide: part 2

we certainly did our fair share of eating in costa rica. isn't that the best part of vacation?! we had breakfast most mornings at our hotel. breakfast was brought out by the lovely coco: granola with bananas, watermelon, mango, and pineapple. it was served with a pitcher of milk and some of the best coffee i've ever had. just a little slice of heaven.
for lunch we sort of wandered through the streets and sought out what sounded good. we loved eating on the beach, but felt like some of the prices were a bit steep. we had the most fantastic tacos at nogui's sunset cafe. to.die.for. also, we had such a great time at eat at joe's at witch's rock that we went two nights for dinner. they have great sushi and awesome nachos. richard, the owner of arco iris recommended la baula pizza bar for dinner and it was awesome! the place was packed and the pizzas were perfect and woodfired. so good. erik got the sausage hot dog pizza which was hysterical. it was literally an oscar meyer hot dog chopped over a pizza:/
our hotel has one of the best restaurants in the city: seasons by schlomy. the atmosphere was so fun on the tiny patio by the pool. there was live music and on my birthday sam had the mariachis serenade me with a love song. such a sweet memory. speaking of my birthday, for lunch sam and i had a little date and took a taxi to barcolo playa langosta. what we didn't know is that the hotel is all-inclusive. we found this out when they asked for our wrist band. lunch was a $20 buffet for visitors. we didn't want to turn right back around (we were starving) so we stayed. the food... let's just say i ate a roll, some fruit, and a scoop of really generic neopaliton icecream. we weren't discouraged though. we had several glasses of water wine and beer to make the trip worth our while. we ended up walking back to the hotel on the beach and it is one of my favorite memories from the trip!




check out more restaurant reviews here.

hello airport

{emma and emily, 1. happy luggage, 2. shiny cloud luggage tag, 3. cheeky laptop case, 4. passport cover, 5. beach bag made from sails}

first of all, how cute is emma watson? i think she pulls off that pixie cut like no other. second, i've decided that putting together collections of things i love is like free shopping. third, we booked our tickets for costa rica! i haven't flown or been inside an airport since sam and i had our one-year anniversary (we're coming up on our sixth), so the thought of packing my favorite things in a cute carry-on is pretty irresistible. we don't travel enough to splurge on fancy luggage, but i've had a crush on that orla kiely travel series for ages now.

what's on your wish list right now?

Fancy Pants

Motherhood is the most beautiful experience I've ever had. All of the bad hair days, body issues, nights in, early mornings are completely worth it. I love Matilda more than I ever thought possible. She literally makes me gush. My friend Brittany says I have a crush on her and it's true! All of this to say that although my life is as full and blessed as its ever been, I'm craving some glamour these days.  I find myself fantasizing about romantic nights out with my husband and exotic trips. A vacation is really long overdue, and because Clark Howard mislead us about tickets to Hawaii, we're rethinking our plan and looking at Costa Rica. 
Have you been?





{united planet}



{aid abroad}



{national geographic}



{our surprising world}

I want to be wearing this during the day.





DVF Resort 2010

and this at night:



Diane Von Furstenburg

Was she inspired by Aretha?



LC

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