Scenes from a Trip : Philadelphia, PA

This weekend I was in Philly! I headed to the city to visit Kim and her beau Brian. I've been lucky enough to hang out with them in NYC but this time they were able to show me around their home city. I picked up Melissa after work for the road trip and chatted all the way to Philly. A few short hours later I dropped her off and headed to Kim's. Kim and I went to dinner in South Philly at a BYOB place with one of my favorites, Lisa from Tree and Kimball. Lisa and I have been talking for the past few months and I'm so happy we were able to make last minute plans. She is such a warm person and even though we'd only just met in real life it felt like we'd known each other all along. After dinner we went to her house to admire her vintage stockpile, play with her dog Atlas, and snoop around. We drank Root with Eggnog, had tea, looked at her wedding pictures and chatted about everything. I wish we could have spent more time together. 

Saturday morning we woke up late, lounged around the apartment for a while and then finally decided it was time to start the day. Brian whipped together some poached eggs with from scratch home fries. It was delicious. I've never had a runny egg before, and I have say Kim and Brian might be right, I may not ever go back. The problem now is just figuring out to make them. By the time we picked ourselves up and got ready to attack the day the first thing on our minds was more to eat and drink. I've been to the city a few times, but I was always passing through and never had the chance to really experience it. We walked down to center city on the quaint old brick streets. I was checking out the scenery the whole time. I certainly understand the appeal of a smaller city. It was so much more relaxing to meander down to the coffee shop. 

We ended up at La Colombe coffee shop near Rittenhouse Square. I'm glad we decided to have our coffees in house because the mugs were all different, which I like. Post coffee buzz we walked through Rittenhouse Square to take pictures. While we were sitting there newlyweds came through, a bold squirrel ran all the way up to us, and some other people look curiously on as Kim and I scoped out our spots to take pictures.  

We spent the afternoon zig zagging around town checking out a few stores (including Anthropologie) and getting groceries to make dinner. Brian once again whipped up an amazing meal. While Brian was cooking up a storm Kim and I got ready and snacked. Then glorious dinner and time to pirate-ize ourselves.

A friend of Kim and Brian's came up with this idea to have a sort of scavenger hunt / bar crawl / pirate night out in Philly. It just so happened that this was the same weekend Melissa and I could go to Philly so it worked out perfectly. I wore every piece of Clyde's Rebirth I owed. Luckily I was able to untangle everything and step out of all the harnesses at the end of the night. Each pirate clue was sent via text and then we were off to the next location. I think what was the most fun was seeing peoples reactions to a bunch of pirates casually showing up at the bar. Everyone was interested and really loved that there was seemingly no reason we were all dressed up. I think they may have even recruited more people for the next time. 

Oh and guess what else. I "won". He had hid a skeleton key at the last bar and the plan was that when the key was found it would be open bar. And while that's not exactly the order everything went in it still worked out great. I'm glad I came for the pirate party it was nice to be doing something different than the norm and was a great way to see the city at night. Good times, great people, and a wonderful day in Philly. Arghh. 

Photos by Me, Kim, and Brian Letizia

I left Philly early Monday morning and headed straight to work so I'm a little behind. I'll be catching up on Philly posts for the rest of the week! Huge thank you to Kim and Brian for letting me stay at their place. I cannot wait until I can return the favor. And I'm excited to have more time to spend with Lisa in the near future.