Beidler Below Boston: Part 4 (The Final Day)

Sick of Boston pics yet?! I'm not...

I cannot believe I have not posted about Emily's new love and best friend in Boston, Phoebe. As soon as Emily moved up north, I got a phone call from a cat shelter asking if Emily would be a responsible and loving cat owner, and I honestly could not thing of any one better for the job than Em. After years of listing future cat names and dreaming about them at night, Em finally got her own cat! As most of you know, I am NOT a cat person, but I must say Phoebe was sweet and I'm glad she takes such good care of our friend.

Em loves cats so much she had to stop and take a pic of this one on blades...

Anyway, our third and final day began with another bike ride through some cool neighborhoods in Boston on the way to the Fine Arts Museum. We even had the chance to see where JFK was born...such a cute house and I absolutely loved all the beautiful houses on this street.

After having a delicious lunch (I had fish tacos!) we continued on our way to the museum.

I'm not much of an art museum person, but I must say I thoroughly enjoyed seeing the special exhibit Chihuly exhibit. He created all this glass artwork and it was amazing, in parts of it I felt like I was in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.


After spending a couple hours in the museum, we headed back because Stacey had to catch her flight. Meanwhile, I went and met my good friend Jill for dinner by the harbor.


Jill just graduated from Gordon Conwell (where Luke is taking classes) and is currently the Director of Admissions there. I met her when we both worked with the youth at our church in Greensboro one summer. She is a great friend and it was a joy to see her and hang out while we had yet another great meal (I had the best clam chowder in the world!!).

On Monday morning Emily, Lindsay and I all headed out early. Em had to head to work (doesn't she look thrilled?) after a tiring weekend of hosting and being a tour guide, while Linds and I went to the airport (no troubles this time). We had a blast and writing these posts has really made me miss these girls and want to go back to Boston sooner than later. Next time I want to take Luke with me so he can experience everything too.

Hope you guys enjoyed this Bostonian adventure :)

Beidler Below Boston: Part 3 (Cambridge and Little Italy)

I think our day exploring Cambridge was my favorite during our visit to Boston. We decided to ride bikes over to the area because there was an awesome food/music/art festival going on. I was quite nervous about the bike thing. Being a country mouse, even walking in a big city is hard with all the crosswalks, traffic, etc...so riding a bike would be a challenge! Luckily, Emily and Lindsay ride a lot and were able to help me along the way. I got the easiest bike and the best helmets were given to the two without health insurance (me and stace, haha). No worries parents and grandparents, I'm covered now :)

Anyway, we biked along the Charles River and it was so much fun!

During the Festival I wanted to eat Bostonian food, so I had a Lobster Roll and boy was it DELICIOUS.

And as always, I had to have something sweet after my meal. All day I was walking around seeing people with a chocolate covered strawberry stick and I HAD to have one. Too bad it was not good. I got tricked because the strawberries were frozen...and the chocolate was not so great either. Dur.

After exploring the festival we went on Harvard's campus and walked around there. The whole time I was thinking about The Social Network. The highlight was seeing the dining hall. It was MASSIVE and looked like a church. There were statues of important people lining the tables. It was also cool to see a University that so many influential people in our world had attended...I felt smarter even being there. haha.

It was good luck to touch the shoe of the statue of the first Dean of the University.

"Take a picture of me looking smart in front of the library." Don't I just look more intelligent?

After exploring more of Harvard and Havard Square, we headed back to Alston and had yet another free wine tasting across from Emmi's apartment. Later that night, Emily treated us to an amazing meal in Little Italy. Afterward, we headed to Mike's, a famous place to grab a Cannoli. I wasn't sure if I would like it, but it was really tasty! Then it was off to a cute bar where we hung out and laughed together. We even watched the news and danced at the same time. Also, we may or may not have started a conga line.

Boston Interruption: Cinnamon Challange

So, I had to interrupt my Boston blogs with this amazing video that was taken Saturday night. There wasn't much going on in the small town of Harrisonburg, but there was a lot of commotion and laughter in the house of Big Love.

Ashley, Jess and I had just spent the day at the city pool (haha) and decided to make enchiladas for the evening, followed by cards and hang out time. After eating a fabulous dinner, we played an intense game of Nerts and debated what to do next. Would we watch the Beiber movie? Would Katie and her new boo, Jeff, come over? Would Lauren come hang out? Etc...

So, Katie and Jeff decided to come over and in the meantime Jess and Ash went upstairs to do something. Picture this: I am sitting at our kitchen table having a beer and eating chocolate while trying to build an awesome house of cards and listening to music ALONE. Then Katie and Jeff (her bf who I had never met) bang on the door and find me doing this. It was hilarious! I wonder what Jeff's impression of us is (especially after this next part).

So eventually Lauren joins and the rest of the girls come down to hang out and meet Jeff. Luke was at bachelor party and I was telling them how they made Chad (the groom) do the doughnut challenge (eat 12 donuts, run a mile, and drink a gallon of milk-I think they added the milk part). Ashley then begins telling us about the Cinnamon Challenge and how hard it is. How can swallowing cinnamon be hard? Right. We thought it would be easy too. So Jess said she would do it if I did, I said I would if Lauren did, etc...and Jess, Lauren, Katie and I all decide to do this. The challenge was to see who could swallow a spoon full of cinnamon the fastest.

Here is the video to see what went down. Disclaimer: There really was not much drinking going on, we had only had one beer each. We just simply had the middle schooler in us come out on this particular night.

Cinnamon Challenge from Jessica Miller on Vimeo.

Now that Jeff saw all of this on his first night meeting us, what do you think he thinks of us?! HAHAHA!

Beidler Below Boston: Part 2 (Harpoon and Prudential)

Following our afternoon of sight-seeing, walking, shopping, etc...we decided to head over to the Harpoon Brewery, close to the Boston harbor. Every day at 4:00 they have a FREE beer tasting for a whole hour. It was a blast and we got to learn a lot about the company and their products. Prior to this visit, I had only had 1 or 2 of their Hefeweizens on the rooftop of Dave's, so I was looking forward to trying more!


We had a blast together and trying different brews. I will definitely be buying/ordering Harpoon next time I get the chance.

After the tasting, we headed to dinner and then went up to one of the tallest (I think?) buildings in Boston, the Prudential. We had amazing views and wonderful (and not cheap) cocktails.

Fenway Park

After our Day 1 adventure, we were exhausted and headed home pretty early for bed! We were excited for the next day in Cambridge!

Beidler Below Boston: Part 1

Emily was thinking about starting a blog and calling it "Beidler Below Boston." She never started it (even though we are all encouraging her to!) so I thought I would use it as the name of this blog series! Emily and Andy just moved to Boston in October and live in a basement apartment in Allston, a sweet little neighborhood.

Our adventure started on Thursday when Linds and I drove to DC for our "quick" and direct flight to Boston. Turns out it was not so quick...the flight was delayed and then we got on the plane and the engine was having problems. We were supposed to get there around 4 and I think we finally arrive to Emmi's apartment (with special treats awaiting us) around 10 or so. We spent our first night playing cards, singing Lady GaGa and looking over our schedule for the weekend:


Day One was jam packed with history and sight seeing. We started our adventure with bag lunches at Swan Lake in the Public Garden. Lindsay even got her toe bit by a mean duck!


Then we walked around and saw different historical sights in Boston. I really wished I would have brushed up on my American history beforehand. Good thing Linds is a teacher and gave us some good info on the American Revolution and what not.

This the graveyard that is home to Benjamin Franklin's parents, Paul Revere, and Samuel Adams.

A sweet little stroll somewhere close to Newbury Street, famous for lots of shopping!

How crazy that Lisa was also in Boston the same weekend! It was fun to see her for a few minutes while doing some shopping!

Next up is our fun at the Harpoon Brewery and the Prudential...but they deserve their own post!

Weekends with the Girls

It is rare to have a group of best friends that you have known since middle school. I feel so blessed that Emily, Lindsay, Stacey and I have an amazing friendship that has lasted throughout all these years. We are all so unique and add different things to the group, and nothing beats our annual girl trips.

I think the trips officially started our Junior year of college when we went on a road trip all the way down to Delray Beach, Florida and back up through Jacksonville, Savannah (well, kind of), Edisto Island, and Charleston. Two words for this trip: Mooch Fest. Here are a few great pics I found from that first trip:

Stacey received her title as Ground Dweller

The next trip was Lindsay's surprise (well almost a surprise, stace) bachelorette trip in Savannah, GA. What a weekend! No pics of that one...but it was quite unforgettable.

Post-graduation we headed to Asheville on Labor Day weekend for camping a few nights downtown. I think we would all say we didn't quite get this one right. We were all a little off and going through a lot of life transitions...but none the less we enjoyed spending time together!

We were really into wigs that weekend for some reason

The following year Stacey won a " Christmas cubicle decorating contest" at her work and won a free night at the infamous Great Wolf Lodge, any middle schooler's dream. It was a resort catered to kids with an indoor pool. The kids in us came out and we had a great time! We explored Williamsburg and the next day we headed to Bush Gardens. We had a blast and definitely named this our most adventurous trip!



Last year we had a simple, sweet and fun trip to Blacksburg to stay with Lindsay. We had a campfire, went hiking, had a few delicious meals and went tubing! It was great spending time together because Emily was about to move to Boston and Stacey was going to be moving to Oregon for a few months.




Finally, the most recent trip... and probably our biggest and most amazing trip yet (don't we say that every year?) was to Boston to visit Em in her new urban lifestyle. Look out for all the fun posts ahead. Our trip was full of sight seeing, culture, art, food, great conversations, wonderful food/drinks, and just fun times in the city! I absolutely had a blast and miss these girls so much!