moving day.

goodbye pretty castle house.
hello basement apartment.

goodbye young republican party girls.
hello old retired couple.

goodbye hardwood floors.
hello carpet.

goodbye small kitchen.
hello dishwasher.

goodbye beautiful first apartment. so much happiness and laughter and mistakes and forgiveness and lovely memories of our first year of marriage.
hello year 2. we can't wait to see what you have in store for us.

lizzie turns 4.

if you have never been to a 4 year old girls birthday party, i suggest you get on that. last sunday we had a party for lizzie and she was spoiled rotten, receiving gifts such as 3 pairs of shoes and pretty, pretty princess.

jenny wrote on her blog a little excerpt of what happened when lizzie woke up on her birthday:

She woke up this morning and looked in the mirror. "I'm four! Am I really four?! Am I bigger? When I was three I couldn't see in the mirror but now I can!"

i can't believe the little miss is getting so big. she is so delightfully funny and sweet, it's no wonder we are related. ahem.

plus look at those cheeks. hello! of course we are related!

2nd obvious reason we are related: we both rock the dress-up clothes look.

my sister is lucky enough to get to hang out with lizzie every day. she writes so many funny stories on her blog about lizzie, like this zinger:

Lizzie: Cinderella is the most prettiest in the whole world!
Me: Lizzie...What is the most important thing to you?
Lizzie: Heavenly Father....(Hallelujah, her mind is not totally obsessed with vanity)....told me that it's dressing up. (BLAST)

rainbow watch.

i've been wearing TH's romanian wind-up watch for a few days now. i haven't worn a watch for so long, but i really love it.
i'm considering getting my own so i don't live in fear of breaking his lovely antique timepiece, so i've been digging around online.

how about some handcrafted watches? this etsy shop makes their own watches/bands and they have some really pretty ones (hint, hint TH)

hand painted enamel rainbow watch

hello, embroidered watch. let me introduce you to my wrist.

one word:

thundersnow.

discuss.

i cannot wait.

a few things i'm excited about:

1. moving...t-minus 6 days!
2. new boots (TH finally acquiesced thanks to Josh and Robbie's advice. haha)
3. a new business venture -- more news on this next week. i am so excited to share the news with you guys!
4. this stupid meeting being over on friday.

did i tell you i have a big meeting tomorrow, thursday and friday? well, i do. i am just so not excited about work lately. it's depressing. TH and i ran through some ideas last night of things i can do to get through the doldrums of current job, as well as ideas for new jobs.
i have to say, i'm not excited about either option currently.

do any of you have your perfect job? how'd you get it? or what are you doing to work on getting it? xoxo

getting ready for alone time.

TH is heading out of town tomorrow for the week.
And due to a switch in moving date (we were originally going to move today, but postponed till next week), we no longer have TV or internet. Ahhh!!! My worst nightmare! (TV I can do without, but no internet is death sentence for this girl)

So for the rest of the week, it's just going to be little old me to fend against myself at home. Here are some things I've lined up:

1. Finish Christmas stockings (i know, i know)
2. Watch Netflix movies
side question - which 2 movies would you pick:
the girl on the bridge
vicky cristina barcelona
days of heaven
city island
mr. smith goes to washington
3. work out a lot
4. read a book
5. go to tryst and get on my laptop (my favorite thing to do. i will of course order the washington carver.)

Oh yeah, and pack the house. boring - of course that falls last on my list.

craigslist is a joke.

so i really really would like to get a couch from craigslist. since i messed up so bad with the last couch purchase, i'm pretty sure TH would flip out if i suggested buying another new couch. i am so indecisive when it comes to things to sit on.

anyway, this is my take on what's available in DC craigslist sofaworld.

1. Gold Velvet Couch $300
2. Blue Leather Chesterfield Couch $100

3. Antique Forest Green Sofa $150

4. Pottery Barn Greenwich Sofa $450

5. Pottery Barn Blue Greenwich Sofa $850

Even after I've posted all of these, they all look ugly to me. I am cursed with couch hatred. It is truly awful.
ok, give me your opinions, people.

music.

the arcade fire always injects me with the shot of energy i need to get through the rest of the day.
i didn't love their new album, the suburbs, on first listen, but some of the songs are growing on me. like this one. feel the kick at 1:45. love.

making a house a home.

we are moving in a couple of weeks, and bad news: i totally forget what our new apartment looks like. haha. we liked it so much, i didn't even bother to take any pictures to analyze later, whether i really liked it or not. also, i feel incredibly lucky that it became available when it did, because i've been looking at what's available lately (you know, just to make sure we got a good deal), and nothing is coming up! we probably would have left capitol hill for another neighborhood with available apartments - pickins are pretty slim right now.

anyway, i'm pretty excited to move and tackle the home design project again. even though the dimensions and colors of the house have completely escaped my mind, i do remember the snooze details: off-white walls, beige carpet, and an ugly chandelier in the dining area. some real renter humdingers. i've been saving some pictures in my home inspiration folder, so i can have some sort of idea what to do when we move into the beige palace. my big ideas focus around one thing: COLOR.

do you know of some good sources for home design inspiration? these are from all over the place, but mostly from lonny, domino, and living etc.

how do you stay in shape?

here are my tricks to staying in shape (yes, circle counts as a shape), from most logical to least.

my tricks at the gym:
1. elliptical (my knee doesn't like me to run)
2. deep lunges with weights
3. stairclimber
4. 300 crunches

my tricks outside the gym:
1. walk to work and home from work (2 mile one-way)
2. stand on tip-toes while waiting for the light to change (go calves!)
3. yoga on netflix in my living room
4. fake ballet for TH in the living room (he loves this)
5. live in an upstairs apartment

i have to say i've gained a few pounds since we got married. sad sad sad face. it kind of coincided with graduating from columbia and moving away from NYC, where i walked up a 5 story walk up every day and walked 12 blocks to and from school every day. i still miss that. i stayed so skinny, no matter how much bagels or pizza i ate (i ate a LOT).

but i have a new years goal of losing 10 pounds by our anniversary, march 6. if i achieve my goal, i get to buy a kate spade purse. so naturally, i'm pretty motivated by this. i have 7 weeks to make it! easy, right?

do you have tips to help a girl out?

smoothies.

hello winter friends.

it's so cold outside, right? and icy! argh, don't you wish it were warmer? oh you do? because i most certainly do not. i love cold weather, and i love to hear the sound of sleet on our windows. i love to bundle up in all the clothes i own and complain about how all my coats are ugly. i like to wear my poofy white hat. i love to hold TH's hand with my mittens (oh, there is nothing better than holding mitten hands!!) most of all, i love to drink cold, cold smoothies when it's 30 and below outside.

ok, that last part is not so much true as it is coincidental. for some reason, since christmas, all i want to do is drink smoothies. we got a huge huge bag of frozen strawberries from costco, a couple cans of pineapples, and try to have bananas laying around. and that's all it takes, friends. we love our blender. last night, we were drinking our smoothies and watching friday night lights on my computer and TH was like, "i'm kind of cold". then we looked at our smoothies and just started laughing. grab a sweatshirt, and problem solved!

guess what else? i like to drink tea in the summertime. i don't think my internal temperature ever got the memo...

do you like soul?

cristy and annie invited us to the rock and roll hotel on saturday night to see

eli "paperboy" reed.

we hadn't heard of him, but after about 15 seconds of listening to his sound, we were sold. he's like sam cooke, james brown, and otis redding all wrapped into one man. one 26 year old white man, but whatever. he's incredible. unfortunately his recordings only have half the soul of his live shows. WOW. the whole room was bouncing up and down, dancing with each other.


listen here for a live concert from NPR.

perfect day/night.

sleep till noon.

long walk around the neighborhood.

puppies in the park.

fries and milkshakes at teds.

play music (me: piano. TH: guitar).

eat dinner together.

watch the bachelor, listening to TH commentary is so entertaining.

TH learns to strum on guitar via youtube.

bake.

bed.

what do you do on the coldest night of january?

you go eat pupusa's and other such foods, of course. we went to el riconcito in columbia heights last night, to begin our search for the best pupusa in dc. pupusas are stuffed with all sorts of goodness - my favorite is cheese and loroco (loroco is a type of flower, i think).

i will keep looking - i have a feeling el riconcito is not the best DC has to offer. and by the way, good conversation with friends in a warm restaurant, eating spicy foods is the BEST way to spend a cold night in january!

this time last year...

...we had our extremely talented friend, joshua brown, come to DC to snap some photos of me and TH for our upcoming march wedding. it was the COLDEST weekend i can remember that year and we were outside for about 3 hours that day. but now, i have a few spots in DC that when i walk by, i just swoon.
this is my favorite - on the pond in front of the capitol building. it was totally frozen over that day and we had to evade the cops to get this picture. worth it.

i'm having a really hard time thinking that it has been almost a YEAR since we got married.

snowy dc.

not much snow - maybe 2" on the ground this morning. but it was so pretty last night. and it made my walk to work this morning seem so magical. i like to walk along the mall, between the museums. there isn't much traffic there, the buildings are beautiful, and it gives me time to reflect and think about life. until i turn on 12th street and the city is bustling, that is.

i like having my own private world in the middle of a busy city. i like dc.

now, do your very best snow dance everyone.

i'm going to a movie, and when i walk out i hope it looks like this. and when i wake up in the morning i hope it's up to my knees!

gnomie cooks!

I'm doing my best to keep up with the things I cook at my new blog, Gnomie Cooks. It's still a work in progress, but I just posted a recipe for my favorite thing, the Marv N Joe (cheesy bread and tomato yum!).

So check it out. If you are interested in foods that are primarily vegetarian, but usually pretty generous with cheese and eggs, you might like a few of my recipes. I swear I don't just eat eggs and cheese, but maybe I do more than I thought?

baby it's cold outside.

since the new year, i've been walking to work in the mornings. it's about a 2 mile walk, and i absolutely love the view and the vigorous start to my mornings. i walk 2 blocks, pass the capitol building, walk down the Hill past the newseum, where they have on display the front page of each State's newspaper. I love seeing the headlines every day: "Grizzly Bear Causing Nuisance at Local YMCA", "Residents Must Collect Petition Signatures on Nude Dancing". Then I walk past restaurants, selecting the ones I still need to try (Cowgirl Creamery for lunch!), and the not-too-tall buildings of DC.

Next thing I know, I'm at work having listened to some great wake-up music or a podcast. And I feel great.

And I'm pretty sure my pants are fitting a bit looser. And I avoid things like this morning's bomb scare. Good news all around.

turns out i can fit around 20 people in our living room.

well, we did it, a baby shower. and nobody even went into labor! yay naomi! (though i have a sneaky suspicion she would not have minded too much.)

i really didn't think that was possible to fit 20, let alone 10 people in our little apartment. but look! we did! and the mother-to-be, miss naomi. if i could look this good pregnant, i'd have tons of babies by now.

food. i love an excuse to eat breakfast food.

this is christina and hannah. they were miracle people and made the whole shower seem effortless. muchas gracias!

(that is josh. he came later.)

the matriarchs, wise with babies.

it was a really fun day. i've never been to a baby shower where the mom-to-be was so close to the due date, and the anticipation of knowing baby davis is so close to joining the world was so special and exciting! we are so excited to meet little baby, and can't wait to see naomi and josh be new parents. it's so cool to see your friends turn into parents. i just love it.

i was prepared + good news!

i really liked black swan. i think because i was so prepared to be terrified, it was not so bad. when annie and i were walking into the movie, we passed a black swan poster advertising it as a "psycho sexual thriller" and we were like - what are we DOING here?!

my black swan review, as it happened:
oh my goodness, did she really just...? is that really happening, or it her psychosis again? shaky camera is making me seasick. i think i should close my eyes for this. i think i should close my ears for this. beautiful dancing. the sound of bones cracking sickens me. this girl is seriously losing it. perfect ending.

when i got home, TH was ready to console me, but i was surprisingly calm. bring on the horror sexual pyscho movies! haha.

so. some good news.
we signed a new lease this morning! and guess what, i think it's pretty perfect. just a few blocks from our current apartment, a little further into Capitol Hill. an english basement with lots of kitchen space, a dishwasher (yay!), big laundry room, living room fireplace, and built in bookshelves. oh yeah, and space for our bikes in the backyard! we move in just a couple of weeks, and are really looking forward to another fresh start. i kind of like moving in the new year. it's a chance to purge all the lame furniture you previously bought and currently hate. so that's nice. here's hoping we don't make the same mistakes again on our 2nd apartment.

to spend 108 minutes trying to keep my eyes open.

seeing black swan tonight. i have heard such wonderful and awful things about it. so, naturally i have to find out for myself. i'm excited to see what all the hub bub is about.

never let me go.

if not for friends, i would be lost.
(via ffffound)

i am resolute: cooking

last night i made migas. que rico! TH and i were both over the moon in love with this dinner. hooray!
one of my new years resolutions is to stop being so scared to cook, especially being ok with improvising on recipes (i'm one of those people that feel like they have to measure every single thing. how boring, no?).

So I have lots of ideas up my sleeve, and i'm excited to share them at my semi-new cooking blog, Gnomie Cooks. the blog is really just a way for me to track what i'm eating and save recipes. i always seem to misplace the good ones.

bon annee!

we spent new years eve keeping very busy. you see, we recently decided that we should buy a new car. why? i have no idea. something about lowering monthly payments. which turned into buying a new fancy hatchback car. so we've spent nearly our entire christmas vacation researching and test driving cars. we woke up on new years eve, drove uptown to a VW dealership and made a decision: we do not need a car. so, we will be doing a few small repairs on the mini, then will sell it. hopefully soon. i remember the thrill of not having a car - i didn't have one for about 3 years, and i made it work. we'll make it work, too.

after we made the decision, the rest of our day was so enjoyable and relaxing. we ate falafal at amsterdam in adams morgan. checked out the new exhibit at the hirschhorn, colorforms. kind of cool, but i fell asleep during a little movie. oops. home to take a nap, regroup, then headed out to old town alexandria to celebrate the new year!

dinner at red rocks. a table next to the window, quite perfect. so fun to see everyone walk by in their festive hats, dresses, and coats. and TH had the most perfect little paperwhite on his lapel. i loved it.

we are excited for 2011 - our first whole year of being married. we are becoming quite the experts (hahaha). happy new year!