Mindfully Modern: Life Lately: Around the Bay

Crissy Field

The past few weeks have been filled with a little of everything: a visit from my brother when he was finally introduced to the glory of Philz Coffee; another tubing trip down the Russian River when I got a little too much sun; a visit to Everlane; a viewing of Beautiful the Carole King musical, which I had been wanting to see back East on Broadway but was pleasantly surprised to learn had actually started in San Francisco; a day at a beautiful spa with girlfriends; and of course outings around San Francisco (finally) enjoying our Indian summer. Here's a round up:

18 Reasons

Good meals and drinks at new-to-me restaurants:

The Perennial - Checked this out with an old friend who was in town. We went not only because it's one of the best new restaurants in the country and one of the most sustainable, but it also offers a rare weekend happy hour. Ate a corned beef cheeseburger and their amazing brown bread (made from perennial seeds), and marveled at the design of the place.
Alta - This opened a couple years ago and I finally went since it is close to The Perennial. Sat at the bar and had deviled eggs and drinks (they have my favorite tequila).
18 Reasons - It's not actually a restaurant but a cooking school (owned by Bi Rite) that also schedules sit-down meals on their calendar. I became a member earlier this year and finally got to check the place out for one of their special community dinners.
Alice's Restaurant - My husband and I were dogsitting down in Woodside and we went to this roadhouse tucked away in the hills. We had lunch at the counter (they have even more room on their deck) and walked around their yard.

Everlane Transparency Talk: Everlane has been working on building community (or #community as they put it) with events at their HQ. Over 200 people showed up to hear local photographer Pei Ketron and VSCO co-founder Greg Lutze discuss photography on social media. I appreciated hearing how tech really changed their careers, and how driven the VSCO founding team was to build their new business. As I've mentioned in a previous post, I have a few Everlane items so it was cool to see the company open up its doors and expand the conversation from just their products to other creative endeavors.

@ Everlane HQ

Osmosis Day Spa in Sonoma County: The outing to this spa has been almost a year in the making. Last year for my birthday, my husband was being thoughtful and gave me a gift certificate to a spa up in Sonoma. It was a place he'd found online and I'd never been there. Though I am never not excited to get a massage or practice any self-care, I was a bit thrown off by having to figure out the logistics since this wasn't a Muni or Lyft-friendly destination. I decided to go for a group package, so there was a lot of back and forth with the spa, and continuous crossing of fingers that my friends and I would all be available on the same weekend. (Modern champagne problems, I know.)

In the end it all worked out wonderfully - we stayed at a friend's family's house sort of near the spa on the night before, wandered around a cute downtown wine country town, then went to the spa and got to enjoy North America's only cedar enzyme (foot) bath before getting massages, and then hung out peacefully in the spa's meditation garden (the spa itself feels like it is in the middle of nowhere). Afterward, we bought ourselves treats at a nearby bakery before coming across a tea room in the nearby town, where we had a delicious late lunch. This is probably the longest I've waited to use a birthday gift, but it led to a really fun experience with friends, and it was another great opportunity to explore the Bay Area.