Happy Valentine's Day (belatedly)!

I used to not care about Valentine's Day, but then I was single.  Haha.  Not saying I go crazy about it now, but it is fun to get a little caught up in the red hearts, the roses, and the roses glow.  I started the day with a home-grown Valentine's manicure.  It turned out great, and then I put on a top coat and my cute red hearts ran...don't look closely. 

Then I was trying to figure out what valentine to make J.  Last year I made him one with candy nerds that teased him for being Nerdy, but this year he's on a health kick so I decided to do something non-candy related.  I had this foam dragon from a project with the kids I babysit, and I thought it was too cute to not incorporate.  Initially I was trying to think of a pun with the word "dragon/dragging" but there's nothing romantic with the word dragging...so I went for the slightly non-sensical message. 

J  brought me amazing roses, and a card! I was actually most impressed by the card because he doesn't believe in them.  Haha.  We've had many a discussion about how cards are important, while he contends, they're just a way to give hallmark money.  I love cards though, especially knowing how much he was going against his principals to buy the card. It's the little things.

We don't have a single vase in our house so I took the label off a nearly empty salsa jar and washed it out.  Necessity is truly the mother of invention.

I said I didn't want to do anything crazy, and J didn't think about making reservations early anyway, so on Friday afternoon he found a 5:30 reservation for a seafood restaurant.  lol.  It was fine with me, and they ended up having a special Valentine's menu, plus complimentary photo, and a rose.  We took the train and walked to the restaurant in the snow and it was quite romantic. 

 

We we got there the photographer came to the table just as we were unbundling and I joked about how I had hat head, to which she replied, "should I come back?" I laughed and told her it wasn't going to get any better and she could take the picture.  I was pleasantly surprised by the outcome though, there is only one weird hair bump on top of my head.

 

I think we were the only ones who noticed the typo in their template...this picture is now on our fridge and it makes me smile whenever I see it. 

 

Solo date

Earlier this month J was having a "guys night," and I was going to have a "girls night," but my plans fell through.  Ordinarily, I would shrug and put on the comfy couch clothes and watch a movie J wouldn't want to watch, but I decided to go out solo and had such a great time!

 

One of my favorite things about New York City is that when you look around, you never know what you'll see.  Maybe it's a street performer, street art, a restaurant you forgot about, or a frozen ball field. 

 

Here are some of my pics from my solo date:

 

 

In New York most of the schools have these outdoor "fields." All of the kids funnel out for recess and scream and shout and bounce off the chain-link fences, but because of all of the snow and ice I discovered this one was completely covered in ice.  The ball field is now an ice rink!

Street Art! Amor Fati roughly translates to love of fate.

 

 

I was a late arrival to the Breaking Bad party, but after finishing the series right after Christmas, I'm still obsessed.  A custom t-shirt shop in the village had this gem on display.

Is there anything better than Pho on a cold day? In Seattle Pho shops are everywhere you look.  Almost as pervasive as Starbucks (maybe a stretch, but there are a lot).  Here, there are only a few, and I think Saigon Shack in the village is probably the best of them.  Where else can you get a hearty meal in NYC for $8?

We desperately need everything for our apartment.  Seriously, everything.  Before I moved in J's brother lived with him, and the two of them didn't decorate anything.  I hit up Home Depot in Chelsea and saw this mirror on display (on the floor), and thought it was a funny way to display a mirror.  I was considering this as a front runner for our entry way, but J vetoed it on the grounds that it "looked like something you'd find in a west village bathroom."  I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing, but the search for the perfect entry way mirror continues.

And finally, I leave you with the "Beyond" from Bed Bath & Beyond...chipless cookies.  My dream. 

Snowy New Year

Somehow it's nearing the end of February, and I feel like it was just Christmas.  In fact, as I sit here typing this, I have Elf on in the background.  J is teaching tonight (a make-up class for all of these snow days he's had this semester), and something about freezing weather just makes me want to curl up on the couch and watch a Christmas movie!

 

Also, in defense of my Friday night laziness, I slipped and fell on some ice this morning, and throughout the day I've been discovering more and more aches and pains...it started with a skinned knee and hand, and a sore wrist.  The list of aches now includes, lower back, left ankle, mid-upper back, neck, and right shoulder.  I am such an old person. It was really inevitable, we've had so much snow and ice and I hadn't fallen once. 

 

I think this white manicure might be my favorite of the year! It's so crisp, and seasonally appropriate. Looking at this makes me want to go paint my nails again. I used Essie 'Blanc' which somehow is a bright white without looking like you painted your nails with white-out. I think it's meant for French manicures, but why not go all out?

Speaking of snow & ice, here's how my New Year has been going so far... 

January 18th - Ice Storm-y anniversary, January 24th - Snow, January 26th - Blizzard, January 30th - more snow, February 1st - Seahawks loss, February 2nd - Groundhog Day snow (again), Feb 14th - Valentine's Day snow, February 17th - Snow...You get the picture.  I'm pretty sure I missed some snow days, but those were the biggies.  

I have to admit, I'm not a complete snow Grinch yet.  Last year was worse I think, it's been colder this year, but I don't have to shovel a stoop this year, I think that makes a big difference.

It hasn't all been snow.  We've had some great date nights, I'm employed (though just with my old job who decided they couldn't let me go quite yet) and still interviewing like crazy, we got a new fish, and I've been desperately dreaming about decorating our blank slate of an apartment!

Ice storm Anniversary

Sunday was J and my official anniversary and I had big plans to make this big fancy dinner.  I planned the menu, placed a big grocery delivery from fresh direct...then the sky opened up and dropped frozen rain over our entire area and didn't stop.

It was impossible to walk anywhere, sidewalks, streets, trees, mailboxes all covered in a thick shiny layer of ice.  It was kind of pretty and if you were able to slide your way somewhere it was silent out and so peaceful.

All of this peace and quiet could also be attributed to the fresh direct truck's noisy absence.  We had almost no groceries, so our fancy dinner became thawed meat sauce that I made  too much of a couple months ago, some penne from the cupboard, and a salad made from questionably old spring mix. 

It was a far cry from delicious but it was kind of a nice way to mark a year.  It was a night that was a quiet reminder of  the day to day greatness that we enjoy even when we're not having a lavish dinner or trip to the opera.

Date night - A year later

First of all, I would like to say, New York City doesn't disappoint.  There is always something novel to see...in this case, "Clean Underwear on Demand." 

You know who else doesn't disappoint? J! He was so sweet and planned an evening to celebrate our 1-year-anniversary. I'm always half teasing that we should go ice-skating so he decided it would be  a good night to give in and take me ice skating.  The only problem was that it was 20 degrees out.  

Once we got to the city we scrapped the ice skating (for now), and went to dinner first.  He had planned a dinner at Malatesta Tratorria in the West Village...the scene of our first date.  So we had dinner (I'm sorry for forgetting to take pics of the delicious food), and then dessert and coffee....mmm

After dinner we headed to Smalls (also in the West Village) for some live jazz.  It's one of our favorite date night spots.  The bands are always great, it's a tiny, dark, packed basement vibe and it's just so chill.


We had the best time.  It's so crazy to think about how much life has changed over the past year, there was a couple at the restaurant obviously on an early awkward date, and it was so funny to think that was us last year.

Pancake Friday

After feeling like a total Debbie Downer yesterday, I decided to celebrate one of the perks of being jobless...time to make pancakes on a weekday!

I still had a bunch of blueberries left, so I tossed them in my go-to pancake batter and made one enormous pancake just for myself (and 2 for the refrigerator, lol).  It was seriously the perfect pancake, but maybe it just felt extra perfect because it was such an indulgence to make pancakes all for myself and on a weekday morning! 

Never enough time

What a whirlwind...can you count 20 days a a whirlwind?  Somehow it felt like it was.  I've just returned from visiting family in Washington for the holidays and I have the post-holiday blues.  It's a very strange thing to have the important people in your life split on separate coasts of the country.  Every time I go back to Washington, I spend the first week missing New York, then the second week soaking up my friends and family (namely my mom's babysitting), then the third week, I'm ready to go back to New York but simultaneously miss my family and friends already.  It may be some form of mental illness.  lol.  

I think this time was particularly hard because of the job situation.  Being in between jobs meant that I had plenty of downtime to see everyone, but the uncertainty also means I don't have a planned return trip, and this will probably have been my last 20 day trip. While my last job wasn't ideal, it meant that I was able to work remotely, so I could take these long trips without having to take vacation time, but it seems unlikely this will be the case in the future. 

Enough of the sap, I had an amazing time!  Here's a quick recap of what I've been up to the past month or so: 

As soon as I got back to Washington, my mom and I went into full Christmas mode!  She had already decorated just enough so it felt like Christmas when I got there, but we usually do most of it together so she saved a bunch...

Of course we had to have Christmas (or music) movies on while decorating...this year she graduated us all to small stockings, and J got his own, too! I guess I have to keep him around.

My brother was in desperate need for an Ugly Christmas Sweater, so I whipped this puppy up for him.  It was pretty amazing, all of that garland made it weigh a million pounds, and I sewed bells in it so when he shimmied it jingled.  haha...does anyone have any ideas how to make homemade ugly Christmas sweaters my livelihood?

I squeezed in as much Goodall time as possible.  First Kaitlin and I had a wild night on the town, which in our world means a dinner out at a wine bar, and a tasting flight of "bubbles." It was so good to reconnect and gossip like we don't live 3,000 miles apart.  I got my usual favorite, flat bread with roasted figs, goat cheese, honey, and pistachio.  It's the perfect balance of sweet and savory.

A couple of nights later I headed back over to the Goodalls for our annual gingerbread house building. Sweet little Lila got in on the action this year, and probably ate just as much candy as she put on her house, but she was so proud of herself and for the record, some of the candy did make it on her house.

My mom and I did our normal holiday bake-a-thon but she had to work throughout the holidays so we had to seriously scale back the variety of cookies.  We still made chocolate crinkles, sugar cookies, snickerdoodles, peanut butter, chocolate chip, oatmeal raisin, fudge, and rice krispie treats, so I don't think any of our recipients really noticed. 

If you look closely you'll see Humphrey hoping my dad will share some of his sugar cookie with him...poor neglected Humphrey.

The Monday after Christmas both of my parents had the day off from work so we all went to this little Bavarian village on the side of the mountain, Leavenworth.  We indulged in bratwurst for lunch, spiced German wine, beer, and wandered through some of the cute little shops.  Living so close to it, I never thought about the history, but J was asking how it came to be...upon googling it was literally developed to be a tourist trap.  In the 60s the town wasn't doing well economically, so they decided to create a faux Bavarian village, and voila! Success!

Then came New Years...J and I couldn't decide what to do for New Years Eve.  As much as I love my family, we decided we should do something other than stay in with my parents so we went down to Portland for a couple of days.  We lucked out and found this really cool "speakeasy" style party, and spent the night dancing and drinking...So fun!

We had a few low key days with my family, and then headed to the airport early on the 6th.  I didn't cry but I did a little on the 4th.  To make coming back feel more monumental, there was a snowstorm in the morning that meant an extra 2 hours on the plane with Humphrey.

Welcome back to NY

 

When I was in Washington I was saying, I'm dreading to going back to wearing my long puffy jacket for the next few months when people mentioned winter.  Welp, we made it back just in time for a little snow storm (and an extra 2 hours crammed onto a plane), but look how pretty it is, and look how adorable Humphrey is eating the snow...I guess it's not so bad

The Most Perfect Day!

This weekend has been such a blur. I once again tried to cram way to much in but I wouldn't change anything. 

First, J and I went to see New York City Ballet's "The Nutcracker." It's funny because my experience or the Nutcracker was always Pacific Northwest Ballet's and I assumed it would almost all be the same but as it turns out, the NYCB choreography is much truer to the original choreography. The dancing was just on another level. Even J murmured "how is that possible" at one point during the sugar plum fairy's dance with her cavalier. 

The only draw back was all of the kid noise. Haha. It sounds like such a snobby thing, and I really love kids. Plus, I know when I have kids I'll bring thing to theater and ballet, but it's just a strange thing when you pay a lot for a ticket to go to the ballet and hear kids rustling candy wrappers the whole time. Actually my biggest problem wasn't the kids, it was the adults who somehow thought that since it was a kid friendly performance it meant they could behave as kids. The woman beside me literally stood for the beginning of the second act, and we had good seats. It's not that she couldn't see. (End rant. It was an amazing experience and I can't wait to bring my kids and be the mean mom that won't let them rustle candy wrappers). 

After the ballet we headed to Brooklyn to this neighborhood called Dyker Heights. It was featured on one of those, "Extreme Christmas Lights" specials, and for a good reason. More lights than you can imagine. J was such a good sport and I laughed good-naturedly about my pure joy and enthusiasm despite the freezing weather. 

(More lights below)

On the way home he surprised me by stopping at my favorite restaurant in my old neighborhood, Lot 2. He won serious points with that move and then was rewarded by them having his favorite cocktail featured as the drink of the night (Veiux Carre...recipe at very bottom. It's the perfect winter warm you up cocktail. It was a shame I don't live a few blocks away and we couldn't stumble home because we both would have gladly imbibed more.)

Then we were going to have "Christmas" because I'm heading to the west coast for Christmas with my fam tomorrow but we decided to watch an episode of Breaking Bad instead...priorities. Christmas tonight though!

A Christmas Story of Mistaken Dates

You know that scene in "A Christmas Story" when all of the kids are ogling Higgbee's corner window display? It was recreated last night as J and his friend passed this liquor store in the West Village. Stopped them in their tracks and I watched as they nearly smashed their noses to the window. 

We were on our way to see Jimmy Stewart in all his glory in "It's a Wonderful Life" at the IFC center...that was until we got to the theater and picked up our tickets and they were for Thursday the 18th. I even remember double checking dates when I bought them but apparently I was having a lapse in mental clarity then because they don't even start showing it until Friday. 

Thankfully we had also had an amazing Italian dinner with a friend (fresh pasta, bread, wine, dessert...so much gluten...so much goodness) so the evening wasn't a wash. We even had tiramisu! I wish I had pics for you, but we devoured it too quickly. 

So I tried to be a grown up about it and not cry in disappointment, and J and I went to one of our favorite book shops, bookbook before heading home. Tiramisu and books, not exactly the night I had planned but not too shabby when I think about it. 

Dreaming of a White Wednesday

Snowy day spent in Chelsea today. I half loved it and half hated it. Something about being out rushing about in that cold wet stuff wipes you out (and may or may not explain my extremely unhealthy dinner.

My poor suede booties took a swim in Saturday's torrential rain, and now are getting a good dose of snow, but I love them so much I can't help but wear them most days. 

I stopped in at Chelsea Market for a quick gift and can never help but stop and gawk at these lighted arches. They're seriously the stuff of my dreams. Lol 

I was also joined by what appeared to be a preschool caroling field trip. It was so cute they'd walk a few yards then burst into song again. Mostly their teacher (striped hat) would sing and they'd mumble along until they got to jingle bells which appeared to be their favorite. Ah, the city steals my heart again...

And then, on an unrelated note, as I was weaving my way underground at Time Square I saw this...it's not so much the woman holding the sign that caught my attention but the complete indifference of the other New Yorkers...it made me chuckle