The Zen Room

We've been living in this apartment since June 2016, and though we've had it decorated and looking decent for the majority of that time, only one of the rooms actually feels finished... or at least close enough. The living room is next in line, once I get off my ass and sew some cushion covers for the couch... but I digress. Let me finally give you a quick photo tour of the Zen Room!

We live in a rowhome - one long rectangle with a hallway that connects all the rooms and runs adjacent to another apartment which is laid out in the exact same way. Thankfully, we rarely hear our next door neighbors, and the darkly lit window-less woes of a city rowhouse are not upon us - we actually have an end unit on the corner of a semi-busy street and the sunlight is amazing. It's actually part of the reason we chose this unit! *

This is the first room you walk into; aka the front room, but we like to call it the zen room because that's our intention for the space. When we moved, I was at the beginning of my yoga teacher training and looking forward to finally having a space to practice at home. So we decided this would be the yoga/relaxation/plant space. When I want to practice, I just move the rugs out of the way. (I actually recently had three friends over for an hour-long yoga session - it was awesome!) We had our record player in here for months, but recently moved it to the living room because this room stays really cold and we weren't using it. Most of our plants are in here as well, but we may move them because the cold hasn't been good for them either. That sunlight totally makes it worth being cold though! And behind those curtains is the door to our balcony, another fun feature of this place.

One of the things I also really like about this room is that most of the things in here were found on my travels, or were gifts from family and friends. I think it just adds to the positive energy of the space. I also love the rugs! This is our first apartment with hardwood floors, and we were ecstatic to be able to get some rugs! If you'd like to know where anything specific is from, ask away! I'll try to remember, or help you find something similar.

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* A quick little background about this apartment building - when Shawn and I first moved to the area 4.5 years ago, every time we would walk past this building we would say, "One day, we're going to live in there!", but we always thought it was way beyond our financial means. Then, about two years ago, I became friends with someone who actually lived in the building. I got to see the inside of her unit and fell even more in love with the place. Lucky for us, when we were looking for a new place to move into, she reached out to her landlords and found out that there were two available units - and they were in our price range! (Actually, they were way less expensive to rent than we expected! Which makes us sad because we could have totally moved in here 4.5 years ago...) Annnnd now we live in our dream apartment! It's an old building and could definitely use a little revamping in parts, but the energy here is great and it fits all of our needs. The cats love it too because it's SO much more space than our last place. Oh, and we didn't paint anything. The last tenants had some great colors already so we told the landlord not to bother repainting. It's so nice being in an apartment that isn't all white!

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Apartment Tour

Finally! Some photos of our apartment. I took these on a way sunnier day than I should have, especially considering one of our blinds in the living room fell down a few weeks ago and we haven't replaced it, so it's extra sunny around here. I know some of you have been curious about how we hang our tapestries and the general decor of our space though, so I took some photos despite the over-exposure. (Both literally and figuratively...) I hope you enjoy this little peek into our world. I love seeing photos of where people live - it helps give a bigger picture of what that person is like. Most of our furniture is from IKEA, and the decorations come from all over, but if you're curious about anything specific, ask in the comments!

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Phantom Kiss

Fair warning- you're about to enter 'spooky' territory. Now, while Shawn is a big believer in the supernatural (I think he has watched The X-Files too many times...), it's fair to say that while I'm certainly not a non-believer, I'm not as in tune with supernatural occurrences as he seems to me. Though, ghosts and aliens aside, I definitely believe that strange and unexplainable things do sometimes occur. In fact, we recently had proof of this.

On Thursday I came home from work and Shawn asked me if I had hidden any Hershey's Kisses around the apartment. As you can imagine, this was quite a baffling question as it seemed to have come out of thin air. Of course I hadn't hidden any Kisses anywhere... I couldn't even remember the last time I bought Hershey's Kisses! They are just not my chocolate of choice. Why would he ask me such a preposterous question?!

Well, apparently when he opened up one of our kitchen cabinets that morning he found this:

Why yes, that is indeed a Hershey's Kiss slyly hiding behind the center bracket of the cabinet... but, how exactly did it get there? That is the part we can't even come close to explaining. I had cleaned the interiors of all of the cabinets when we first moved in, so it's not from the previous renters. We asked all of our recent visitors if they were playing a weird prank on us, but no one owned up to it. And as far as we know (and hope) no one else has been inside the apartment recently... it's as though the Kiss appeared out of thin air! The only other explanation would be that Lloyd put it there, but that sounds even more ridiculous.

And thus, we now have a Phantom Kiss in our kitchen cabinet. We don't want to move it, and we certainly don't want to eat it, so for now it's staying right where it is. I wonder if it will disappear one of these days...

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Snow Day

This is what I woke up to earlier today... lots and lots of snow!

I have the day off since the bakery is closed today. Which is a good thing because there was no way my car could leave the garage this morning. (We spent two hours shoveling! After that, we're pretty much convinced we'd rather have a condo than a house one day... or at least a driveway that's much shorter than this one!) I'm looking forward to an afternoon of reading, snacking, and seeing an old friend from high school.

Enjoy your Saturday, snow or not!

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Christmas Festivities

This year we didn't have to travel far for Christmas - we had it at the house and made everyone come to us! I wasn't on the computer at all yesterday, but I did think to snap a few photos throughout the day.
Here's a little Christmas recap:



It snowed on Christmas Eve! The snow didn't stick around for long but it was so nice to watch it fall; it certainly put us in a jolly mood. I also couldn't help but shoot a few photos of my new dress courtesy of my grandmother. I thought this photo showed off some our Christmas decorations and all the gifts piled under the tree splendidly. There's also a cat hiding in the corner there.



Shawn's mom brought over a pretty bouquet for the table. I love that there's a pinecone and twigs in there! And those messy looking cookies are my first attempt at rugelach. I used the recipe for chocolate raspberry rugelach in my new Smitten Kitchen cookbook. Shawn was ecstatic - he loves rugelach!



This year, we hosted Christmas dinner! Actually, in our case it was Christmas lunch. Shawn's mother, brother & fiance came over and everyone made a little something for nommin' and then we all exchanged gifts. This was the first year I didn't get to see my family for Christmas! :( My sister and her boyfriend came over later in the day to exchange gifts, but it's just not the same. We still had a great meal though, and it was the first time we felt as though we made Christmas 'our own'. Here's to the start of our own traditions and celebrations!



Speaking of traditions, it's not Christmas without a buche de noel and some champagne.
Shawn felt the need to photo-bomb all the pictures I tried to take of the buche. This year I wasn't ambitious enough to make it myself, so I got a small one from work. It's chocolate cake, filled with chocolate mousse, and topped with chocolate ganache and various sugar decorations. I think it looked so pretty!



This is the only picture I took of my gifts; these are all from Shawn. It really helps to make a wish list because you end up getting lots of things that you want! ;) My brother also got me the adorable succulent tea lights from my list, and my sister got me an awesome wooden-looking owl candle and a cookie cookbook. Shawn's mom got me a really pretty sweater and his brother got us some sweet popcorn snacks and a cactus. Actually, we got a lot of snacks from friends this year... I wonder what that says about us. We got so many thoughtful amazing gifts this year, I am so grateful! And I'm even happier about the fact that everyone else enjoyed the gifts that were given to them - I think I may like giving gifts even better than receiving them :)


Merry Christmas to all who celebrate - I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday!

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Decking the tree

It's starting to look a lot like Christmas around here!








We picked out a some ornaments at Michael's today - a few different colored globes and some birds - the tree doesn't look quite as barren anymore! Shawn also hung some lights up in the living room. And I filled an advent calendar with Hershey's chocolates and mini Reese's. It's also the perfect time of year for hot chocolate, which Shawn and I call 'our drink' because we first met over hot chocolate... but that's a story for another time. Enjoy the gratuitous cat photo!

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Happy December!

I can't believe it's December already! This year has really been progressing incredibly quickly... and the holidays always seem to speed up the process too. I've been so busy working overtime these last few weeks that I barely even got a glimpse of November. December is one of my favorite months though; I get so giddy about the holidays! I could do without the bombardment of Christmas music e.v.e.r.y.w.h.e.r.e, but I love the decorations and I really do believe most people are in better spirits this time of year too.

But back to November for just a moment. We celebrated Thanksgiving at Shawn's grandparents' house this year. Even though we've known each other for eight years and counting, it was my first time ever meeting any of his family, other than his mother and brother. Actually, he's never met any of my extended family either! (But I have an excuse... none of them live in this country.) Shawn's family was nice though, and his grandmother cooked up quite the feast. I went back for seconds of everything, but the stuffing was particularly delicious. And I must have impressed her too because apparently she's very picky when it comes to food, yet she had four (yes, FOUR!) pieces of the cornbread that I made for the occasion. Remind me to post the recipe for my amazing grandmother-approved cornbread one of these days!

I have no photos from Thanksgiving, but here's a taste of the last two weeks of November...

1. One of our staples: sausage, peppers, and onion.
2. I can't find Sour Punch Straws around here so my friend brought some back from Ohio for me.
3. Another staple: chicken, broccoli, and mashed potatoes.
4. Roasted zucchini, tomato, onion, and cheddar quiche!
5. Breakfast wraps... both of those were for me the monster in my belly.
6. Snow! Not our first one of the season, but snow nonetheless.



The most exciting thing to happen recently though is we got our very first Christmas tree!




Look at the size of that thing! I'm 5'6", if that gives you any perspective.





We don't have many ornaments though, so just some lights will have to do for now. My mother left some of her older ornaments behind, so we do have a few on there, but not nearly enough for the size of it. I guess we're going to have to buy some of our own this year!

I'm so excited for Christmas! I really love giving gifts. Even more than I like getting them :)



P.S. You can tell how excited I am because I use so! many! exclamation! points! in! this! post!

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