Fortunate Fridays: Just Keep Swimming edition

Hello my loves,

Welcome to another edition of Fortunate Fridays! I am exhausted today but working away. The grind wont stop cant stop. I went out last night with some friends and didn't get home until 4 in the morning (the horror!). Thankfully this only happens once in a blue moon and I did have a great time.

So anyways, as I do every Friday-- I am here to share the top five things that happened this week which I feel fortunate for.

1. Zumba with my best friend {and a new found love for the workout}: Last Saturday my friend Christina invited me to join her at her gym for a Zumba class. The dancing started off a little slow at first but then things got "serious" and I absolutely loved every second.

Last (and only) time I attended a Zumba class was a long, long time ago almost close to the time when I first started this blog. Come take a ride with me down memory lane and check out that post here.

Anyways, I enjoyed this last class so much that it even made me consider becoming an instructor. Is that crazy? If there are any Zumba instructors out there, please email me. Would love to learn more about it!

2. A busy week working in what I love: This week I was off from my part time job at the kids center so I worked full time in my consulting business and I loved every single second. I was busy (and still am) the entire week and it really made me realize that a life pursuing our passion is possible and doable. There are some initial rearrangement and 'sacrifices' that must be made but is totally worth it and I know is part of the process. Thanking the one above.

3. Reconnecting with friends and making plans: A friend of mine I haven't seen in a few month reached out to me to catch up on life and we made plans to hang out soon. Cheers to friendships!

4. Family visiting from Dominican Republic: One of my favorite cousins and his family is visiting from my mother land so I've been spending some time with them reminiscing about the old days and just doing the 'tourist' thing in New York City. Lets see what adventures we pursue this evening.

5. Dinner and frozen yogurt with co-workers: My co-workers and I decided to plan a sushi outing for yesterday and it went great. We met up at The Jintan in the city and had a good time enjoying some sushi and just talking away. The place was super crowded so our waiter was a little slow with bringing us the check at the end of dinner and with serving us water, etc. But it was totally understandable and he was really nice. Oh! one thing I didn't like was that, although delicious, my shrimp tempura rolls were huge! Please serve me something I can fit in to my mouth. No one wants to sit there cutting sushi in half. Thank you.

After dinner we all went and had some frozen yogurt at Sixteen Candles:

6. Bonus: free access to Dropbox This is a bonus because it was a life saver for me this week. After spending wasting about 1 hour at a Kodak picture kiosk, I was unable to upload any of the pictures from my DR trip because after I finished sorting my pictures the store manager and I realized the Kodak kiosk was broken. Anyways, I came home upset but one of my friends recommended I use dropbox and it worked out perfectly! I was then able to upload all the photos on Shutterfly with ease and shared the album with all the attendees of the wedding. So glad that's finally done!

***

And that's all for today. One last thing I want to share- you may be wondering why is the theme for this post "keep swimming"? Well, there is something in the back of my mind, a situation with a certain person that has threatened (and succeeded) to make me miserable and upset in the past. However, I have grown up and learned enough to know that I control where my mind goes and where my mind wonders and I am no longer allowing negative thoughts to take over my life.

I have come to the realization that "whatever will be will be". So, I have made the choice to indulge fully in the things that I love, that make me happy, that keep me going and active and Ive decided to leave everything else to God's will. Sometimes in life we need to stop trying to control every aspect of a situation and just let the situation fly and take the course it is suppose to take. would you agree?

Anyways, that's all folks. thank you for reading and have a great weekend!

Tell me, have you ever used DropBox before? has it made your life easier?

Love,
Mabelle

Blast from the 90s!

This week felt good.

With the juggling of life as an "adult"; engrossed in graduate school, a full time job and following my passions I had been guilty of not keeping in touch or spending quality time with my real friends--the ones that I have been around as far as I can remember (ie: elementary school through high school). Dont get me wrong-- I have met amazing people after college whom I also value and consider REAL lifetime friends that will be around forever (Hi Lejla! :) but this post is dedicated to my "friends from the 90s" whom I had the pleasure of spontaneously meeting up with this past week. I am still missing a couple of people but I am motivated to reach out to them and spend some quality time catching up.

I have been through times in my life when I've come to realize that at the end of the day, family, friends, loved ones are the people that will always be there for you and those are the relationships that we should all nurture and maintain. I am talking about the people that will see you no different whether you are homeless or a billionaire. The ones that, even if you loose touch or stop speaking for months or even years, you're still able to pick up right where you left off and it feels like time never went by. Im about to get mushy for about half a second but I just want to point out that REAL FRIENDS and loved ones are perfectly described in one of my favorite bible verses/poems: 

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.  It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.  It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. 1 Corinthians 13:4-8

Wouldn't you agree? :)

So, as I was saying. My meet ups started this past Thursday when I met up for amazing sushi at one of my favorite sushi spots on the West Side of Manhattan: Nomado. Let me just rant for a second about how delicious their sushi is. And you better believe I've had my fare share of raw fish rolled up in rice! I dont know what they do to their sushi (I am not sure I want to know) but is so delicious. So anyways, back to regular programming--- I met up with my friend Guildia and we had an amazing time:

We had some serious girl-talk catching up on boys, work, careers, traveling, school, our upcoming birthdays, fitness, and personal finances (she calls me her financial adviser and makes it a point to tell everyone every chance she gets lol. Gotta' love her). I met Guildia in the 5th grade and went all the way through high school together! She was one of the very first people I met when I moved to NYC from the Dominican Republic back in 1993 and we've kept each other in our lives ever since. In college we kinda' went our separate ways as we attended two different state schools. However, we kept in touch and I actually talk to her through text almost every single day. I'd say that's the friend I am able to keep in contact with the most. Gotta' love technology. We also formed a "Virtual fitness group" where we motivate each other to wake up and run every other day. She recruited about 5 other girls and we're all doing great but that's a topic for another post!


Moving over to friday; after I was done with an exhausting day at work the last thing I wanted to do was go home and be bored to death (I have to note that is super rare for me to feel that way considering that I am a MAYOR homebody and any chance I get I am usually at home. relaxing.period.) Anyways, I decided to take advantage of my "random urge" to go out and ended up making plans with another good ol' friend. 

This is Yosie. Ive known her since 1995!! We met in junior high school and then parted ways after that (went to different high schools and colleges). I have to give Yosi credit that she still in my life this day. I remember in high school I went through a phase of not calling anyone much left keep in touch. However, she was one of those friends that would always call to check up on me and see what Ive been up to. As time went on, I got better but I'll never forget that she's pretty much responsible for keeping our friendship alive and strong.

Finally, this past Saturday (last night) I reunited with Dr. Christina Lopez. I have known her since 1997. We met in high school and have been very close friends ever since! I think a mayor reason why we have such a strong bond is that fact that we also went away to college to universitites that were VERY close to each other. I was constantly at her dorm and at one point I had more friends at her school then I had at my own! We kinda' transitioned in to adulthood together considering we were there for each other during those years where you go from high school-to college- to the real world (and everything that comes with each one of those phases!). We have memories to last us a lifetime and everytime we get together there is never a dull moment! Theres also never a moment when we dont recall one of our past college experiences and start just laughing about the good old days and all the fun times. 

 

 Below is us outside of the lounge at the end of the night. The other gals are Christina's younger and older sister. Ive known them for as long as I've known Christina. One of them is married (the baby) and the other one is married with a baby! We were chatting about how I was there for her (older) sister's 21st birthday. Time really does fly!

 

Christina has a PHd in education and is the only one of my friends with a doctorate degree. I am very proud of her as I remember how incredibly difficult and overwhelming those doctorate school years were for her but she did it!!! I always give her props for that.

So there you have it! It feel GREAT to catch up with good friends specially when you dont get to see them on the regular. Phone calls and texting are okay and texting usually makes our lives easier but there's nothing like actually being in the presense of the people that means so much to you!

I have a few more people on my catching-up/re-bonding radar and im looking forward to making it happen.

Cheers to an amazing upcoming week!

Tell me, how often do you catch up/see YOUR close friends?