Melificent

Things I wish we had: Farmers Markets

Farmers’ Markets are usually a staple for most cities, but unfortunately, that’s not the case in Miami. I love looking through all my blogs and checking out what my favorite writers discover, whether it be fresh and organic food products or absolutely stunning flowers, often leaving me pretty envious of their loot. Thankfully, this has begun to change lately and some markets are starting to spring up around town. However, not many of these are year round and the majority are quite a hike from our home.

One in particular, the Pinecrest Gardens Farmers’ Market, isn’t too far from us and just opened this past Sunday. It runs until May so I definitely want to make it a sweet weekend date for the hubs and I. I have been dying to have some fresh flowers in the house (I think they brighten up the mood so much & lord knows I need mood brightening lately) and hope I can find some quality ones there!

For a full list of Miami Farmers’ Markets, click here.

What do you wish your city had more of?

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Credit: Flickr User Rayoom

…I just might give you cupcakes…

As most of you know, I work with therapeutic foster children as my full-time job. However, I used to (& still occasionally) work with autistic children. My time teaching them and being a part of their lives was a very special time for me and eventually, I would love to work with the population again in some shape or form. Aside from my personal experience, I also know many brave mothers (biological and foster) of children with autism that have shown to me what unconditional love and sacrifice really are. For these reasons and many more, I dedicate almost all of my charity work to Autism Speaks and this year will not be any different.

Well, maybe a little. Rather than doing the Broward Walk, I will be participating in the Miami 2011 Walk Now for Autism Speaks event, which will take place on Sunday, February 27th in Key Biscayne. I’d love to raise as much money as possible for the cause as well as get a large group to walk with me the day of. I’ve been lucky enough to receive very generous donations in the past, but hope that the amount of walkers can compete with those donations this time around! I am planning on making team shirts for us as well if enough people show interest.

So if you are one of those interested parties, please visit my team page: Team Melificent.
On that page, you can join the team as well as make a donation.

Weekend Highlights

Saturday afternoon the hubs and I met up with our friends and headed to South Beach with our bicycles in tow to attend the 2nd annual Beer Snob Bicycle Pub Crawl. The event was hosted by the Miami Bike Scene and we couldn’t have had a better time! The weather held up beautifully and although we did not make it in time for the first two bars, we were able to hustle and get there early for the last two, which really paid off. We visited The Filling Station in Downtown as well as an old favorite, the Democratic Republic of Beer. Although the Filling Station had a limited menu, we really enjoyed what they provided, especially the pulled pork sandwich and their amazing selection of beer (Blue Point Toasted Lager was the definitive winner). Unfortunately, it seems like it is closed on weekends which really is a shame because I could have seen the hubs and I doing many a date night there. The DRB seemed to have also upped their game as their food was a lot better this time around, especially their calamari.

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Weekend Highlights

Miami is finally getting the ball rolling when it comes to foodie culture and the lineup hand-picked by Burger Beast for the Fall for the Arts Festival on Sunday definitely gave all of us hope that we are moving in the right direction! Some of Miami’s finest food trucks were on site, allowing us to sample some of their gourmet cuisine on wheels, as well as other foodie favorites such as Totally Bananas (totally reminded me of Arrested Development) and Feverish Ice Cream among others.

We got there as soon as the festival began, which means we had to do a lot of waiting around for the trucks to actually begin taking orders. Unfortunately, I think this event should have been held a bit later in the year when the weather gets a little more tolerable because the intense Miami heat was beating down on us with absolutely no mercy. We spent the majority of our time under an air-conditioned tent, having to amp ourselves up to venture back into the face-melting weather and the only thing driving us was food.

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