The Gap Year

When I promise, I deliver. So here are the restaurants you MUST eat at in Downtown San Antonio, and the best places for the best Dia de los Muertos decor.  First things first, If you make a trip down to San Antonio, you ABSOLUTELY have to visit Mi Tierra Cafe & Bakery right in the heart of the Mexican Market. Every trip of mine to SA has had a dinner or lunch date at this go-to spot. With authentic Mexican cuisine, and a lively atmosphere with bright colors and Mariachi bands, there's literally no downside to the place. Once you're done eating, you can stand in line for some of their delicious pastries, or walk down the streets and window shop all of the different vendors.  Speaking of window shopping, the best place to find Dia de los Muertos decor is located very close to this restaurant! For dresses and different outfits, flower crowns and masks, you can check out Produce Row (conveniently where Mi Tierra is located!). For home decor and more, be sure to stop at

Record scratch. Freeze Frame. Let's start the trip from the beginning. I'll explain how we got here in a minute. If you follow my Instagram (thegapyearstory) you know I've made my way down to San Antonio this week for some much needed adventure.  Luckily for me, the hotel I'm staying at is pretty close to some of the nicest shopping centers I've ever seen. I made sure to stop into some stores I've never been in before. The first one I went in was Charming Charlie's, which my sister-in-law described to me as "Claire's on crack" and boy was she right. The entire store is organized into color coded sections, with items ranging from tiaras, to dresses, to matching ghost necklaces and earrings. It was super adorable , and the first thing I did when leaving was look up one closest to where I live. There was another store I had never been in called Macy's Backstage. It is Macy's version of an outlet store, and boy can I say I w

When you're always traveling, packing can be more of a beating than it is anticipation for your trip. Coming home and unpacking a suitcase just to fill it up again the next week starts to feel pointless, you realize your makeup bag is going right back in it's designated side anyways, and as long as socks and underwear get taken out and washed, they can just be put right back in, right? WRONG! Don't live out of a bag just because you're lazy! Trust me, if there's anyone who's guilty of this, it's me.  I always found myself overpacking things I wanted and under-packing things I needed. How will I know if I want to use Modern Renaissance or Full Exposure until the day of?! Maybe I'll want my grey socks instead of my pink ones?  I did this to myself every time it was time to go on a trip. The worst part was, I waited until midnight the night before my departure to do it. So not only was I overthinking what I needed, I was rushing myself in

This weekend I did my first ever fall mini sessions. I had the pleasure of working with some gorgeous children and families!  It was always a struggle to accommodate for different size groups, older kids and younger kids, and the lighting for the time of day. Being on yearbook for 3 years and a photographer for 4 years during high school definitely equipped me with the skills to accomplish this task.  I loved setting up the props to use, and thought they turned out really well during the sessions.  The individual shots I got of everyone turned out great too, since I was able to shoot in my backyard where the lighting wouldn't get in the subjects' eyes.  It was almost intimidating to see young children dressed way better than me. But the cuties totally stole the show.  My favorite thing about one of the individual shots posted above (I will post below this again) is that the girl in the photo had such a big smile because she was telling m

On Saturday, September 16 I had the pleasure of accompanying my sister and her coworkers as they worked a tent at Dallas Pride for their chapter of the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. I have attended Pride in Dallas before, but never like this.  It was so amazing to meet the different people that are walking around and see the different vendors that were set up in the area.  Experiencing the event behind the table, instead of being a spectator, gave the event an entirely new feeling. Sarah and her very nice and friendly coworkers set out all kinds of treats and some freebies for people who wanted to stop by.  A lot of people stopped by the table to volunteer and check out different things that the foundation had to offer.  It might have been a hot day, but I wouldn't have changed it for anything else. It was a great day of learning and experiencing. I highly recommend making it out to a Pride event at least once in your life. It is

Every Wednesday night, my family and I make our way out to Plucker's in Plano to play 8 rounds of intense trivia (Well, it's intense to us. We could be overreacting.). There are 8 different rounds with 10 questions each. There is always a sports round, movie line round, typically an audio round, and a round that is voted on the previous week.  Last night, the voted on round was "Celebrity Yearbook Photos," and it was harder than expected. Who would recognize Steve Buscemi in middle school? I mean, really? With no male presence to help us out, we didn't do so hot on the sports round and the sports broadcasting round. However, we did pretty good on a round called "Ye Song Lyrics," where they read aloud a modern day song lyric re-written in old English. See if you can figure some of them out here. Answers are at the bottom of the post! 1.  She was from a herald village, and found herself quite lonely. 2. If you are not inebriated, I w

Today I had a bit of a 'trial run' of starting my 5 day a week journey at the gym. Since my brother will be going out of town tomorrow, he won't be here to train with me for the rest of the week. We went today at 8 a.m. (despite my love of sleeping in), and did what he called a "full body workout." And I can testify it was indeed a full body  workout. My arms feel it. My legs feel it.  My stomach feels it. My feet feel it.  Everything hurts.  I had to lift weights. I used machines I'd never seen before. I spilled my water all over the floor (accidentally). But it was worth it. I've been productive for the rest of the day and while my body is sore I want to feel this way again and again and again.  We plan on getting into a regular routine of going in the morning around 8 a.m. five days a week, sometimes taking classes and trying something new. Since he used to work at a gym he was extremely helpful with calming my nerves an

A lot of people think that because I am not going to school, that I don't have a lot of things to do, I sleep in, eat whenever, shop whenever. And to an extent some of that can be true. Recently I have been able to sleep in to around 9:45. But I still do a lot of things each day. Every day I am expected to: 1. Write a new blog post 2. Edit photos 3. Schedule photo sessions 4. Update planner 5. Create posts for blog/photography page 6. Watch my nephew twice a week 7. Come up with new and creative ideas for blog posts 8. Keep on top of always changing chores/errands And so on and so forth. But please, don't think I'm complaining. I love to do every single thing on that list and that is why I have so much drive to complete them. Starting next week, I'm going to add going to the gym 5 days a week at 8 a.m. I've been desperately wishing I had the energy to get in a routine of going to the gym. Now that my brother is living at home, I have someo

Today, I keep it short. Here are a list of resources you or anyone you know can use to fight depression, anxiety, or thoughts of suicide. Anxiety and Depression Association of America- 1-240-485-1001 or  www.adaa.org American Psychological Association- 1-800-374-2721 or  //www.apa.org National Alliance on Mental Illness- 1-800-NAMI (6264) or  //www.nami.org The majority of Americans battle with their mental health. Don't let yours overtake who you are.

As I laid in my bed having finished work and chores for the day and mindlessly scrolling through all forms of social media, I sent my sister a text. "Can I ride with you to go get Jackson and we can stop at Chick-Fil-A or maybe Sonic on the way back? I'll pay." In all honesty I was bored and just a little thirsty. But her response changed the entire course of the day. "Sure that's fine, but after I picked him up I was gonna take the boys to the park. Is that okay?" A free moment to take pictures of some cute kids? Yeah. It was okay. With the weather having cooled off, it wasn't bad to chase them around as they experimented with all of the different pieces of the jungle gym.  Jackson even decided the workout equipment on the other side of the sidewalk looked like it needed played with too.  Brooks wanted to explore everything too, but didn't find much enjoyment in the swings.  We only stayed for about 20 minute

Tuesday, September 5th was made for a sibling day. And with my nephew getting an extra day off of school on this holiday weekend, it was bound to be fun. After finishing up everyone's chores, we headed out for the Perot Museum. Traffic was a little long like it normally is heading to downtown Dallas on a work day, but we eventually made it. Only to see a big sign that said "Museum closed for maintenance."  In our defense, NOTHING was stated on their social media saying they would be closed. We had every idea to believe it was open. Now, we were in downtown Dallas, zig zagging our way through traffic, trying to figure out, what are we gonna do now? After google search, Facebook search, and simply driving around, Sarah had an idea that would save the day. "What about the Aquarium?" None of us had ever been, it was great for the kids, and would provide entertainment for us as well. After verbally letting out our frustrations about the museum being closed,

It's always been a tradition in my family that Fall decorations can come out Labor Day weekend. Today is Labor Day, so naturally we pulled out all of our totes, boxes and bags and got to work.  Some Halloween decorations came out,  some Thanksgiving,  and some just Fall themed.  We were also sure to decorate the outside, however we are still very far from being done.  It was a lot of work, and we are hardly close to being done. But for now, we will enjoy the company of neighbors and some good food, and get up early to do it all over again. ---xoxo, Bryn Mar

Growing up, there are a lot of dos and don'ts you hear from your parents, siblings, grand parents, aunts, uncles, etc. Particularly as a kid in the South, there are just things you know don't fly. 1. If your Mama says lets go, it's time to go. If she's walking out the door, you better be grabbing your shoes and running out after her unless you want to be left behind. She'll have no problem going out to eat without you, so it's more your problem than hers. 2. If you fix yourself a glass of tea and put the pitcher back in the refrigerator empty, you're in for it. Go ahead and start brewing a new pitcher when you pour yourself a glass to avoid the trouble later. Nothing goes right when there's no sweet tea in the house. 3. When you wake up on a Saturday morning to blaring country music (whether you like it or not) it's time to get up and start cleaning. If you don't, you're just risking the fact that your Mama may walk in with the vacu

DIYs are not always the easiest for me. Because of that, I typically try and stray away from anything on Pinterest that requires too much handiwork, knowing I won't like the way it turns out if I attempt to do it myself. However, after my boyfriend surprised me with flowers the day before he left for college, I got the perfect moment for a DIY that I knew I could pull off.  DIY dried out roses placed in a shadow box. It was perfect. And since my flowers were perfectly dried out, and shadow boxes were on sale at Michael's this weekend, I had to act. After picking Cristian up from the airport, I took a quick trip to Michael's to get the supplies I needed. The reason this Pinterest project was so easy? All I needed was the $10 shadow box.  The only thing I had to do was trim the roses off of their stems, open the frame, and strategically place the flowers where I wanted them. Then, after popping the back on again, I was done! It was that easy. To make mine uniquely

When I began planning in my 365 Happy Planner a couple of weeks ago, I wanted to implement all of the Pinterest ideas I could find. One of the things that I did was insert a page to create a bucket list at the beginning of every season. I also inserted a page to create my travel bucket list. As I slowly started to make my fall bucket list, my travel page came together very quickly. As many people close to me already know, I plan on traveling in different areas of Europe in early Spring next year. Other than that, I have plans to go to Maine, Connecticut, New York, Washington D.C., Disney World, San Antonio, Arkansas and hopefully many other impromptu trips throughout the rest of the year and early next year.  This has been the biggest blessing of my gap year so far and I can't wait to see where I end up. I am sure that most of these travel plans would not be possible without my family's support. My life bucket list is much larger than anything I could ever hope to acco