Goodbye and Good Riddance.

Dave and I were working on this list yesterday. We would like to say goodbye to the following:

- Crying baby across the hall

- Bad cooking smells

- Fire alarms (at least one a week)

- Groove on Grove

- The moldy smell that came out of the HVAC unit

- The drain that was always clogged

- People who think it is a good idea to cook popcorn in tupperware in their stove (see the note about fire alarms)

- The constantly broken elevators

- Black dust

- The friday night DJ at the market outside of our apartment building

- Car alarms (all night long)

- $200/month parking garage

- Holland Tunnel

- Non-refundable deposits

- People that don't know how to sort their recycling

I'm sure there are more, but this seems to about sum it up.

We drove to Jersey City early yesterday morning to finish cleaning our old apartment. We were there a total of 3 hours, scrubbed everything up and down, and closed the door forever. It felt so good to hand those keys over the doorman. We also moved everything out our storage space, and hopefully closed out that account.

We will officially never have to make that drive again. Horrah!

It's so nice to feel like that part of our lives is over and done with. We can completely move on, and we have nothing hanging over our heads.

Also, I can't wait to get that security deposit check in the mail!

Band of Horses | Part One

This is where the name of this blog comes from . . . it's a pretty song.

GP Kind of Day

EXHAUSTION

I am, to say the least, exhausted. I have been going into work early for the last few days. My normal schedule should be 7:00 - 4:00, but lately it is more like 6:00 - 3:00, or even worse 5:30 (AM!). In order to get to work at 5:30 in the morning I need to leave the house before 5:00. This means I have to wake up around 4:15, and I don't like this one bit.

It takes every ounce of effort I have in my tired, little body not to fall asleep immediately upon returning home. I hit the sofa and I'm gone. I feel like all I do is work and sleep, and that's a bad habit to get into. I need to find ways of motivating myself post-work without assistance from caffeine.

Today I managed to actually be a little productive - I hung some things around the apartment, sifted through the few remaining boxes that are still taped up, and assessed the dinner situation. The situation being that I don't feel much like cooking.

I am hoping I can at least stay awake until Dave gets home . . .

I Die

I was starting to feel like Alexander Wang was a bit of a one trick pony, but this S/S10 collection is so good! I want it all. The football inspired clothing and the patchwork leopard wedges are killing me.

I will gladly accept donations from this collection.

Half Way There

Well, we are almost completely done unpacking.

Now we are just trying to figure out where to put everything. There are piles of paintings, photographs, and tchotchkes everywhere, and I'm still not sure that the furniture is all in the right place. Due to my indecision there has been a lot of decorating, undecorating, and then redecorating happening.

Here are the rooms that are the furthest along:

Dining Room:

Foyer:
Living Room:
Living Room, again:

Today I slammed my head on the edge of the door for the built in china cabinet. I have a big bump, and now Dave won't let me lay down.

Oh, the trials and tribulations of moving . . .

Sad, but true.

Christmas Wish List

In case you were wondering what I wanted for Christmas, you can start with this:

This is a poster made by Richard Perez of Skinny Ships. It is literally everything that I like.

Also on my wish list: some thigh high boots from Chloe (a steal at $1200), a leopard print Marc by Marc trench, a clear acrylic console table from CB2, and some CDs. I aim really high with these gifts.

You better get started now, folks.

Oh, Also . . .

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MOM!

6 am Tree Trimming

Well, I woke up at 4:45 this morning so that I could get to work by 6:00am for tree trimming. I wish I had actually done tree trimming, but it was more like unpacking boxes and boxes of glittery ornaments all morning. I didn't mind doing this, but it makes it awfully difficult to want to come home and unpack boxes and clean when that is what I have been doing all day.

On a side note: Starbucks needs to open earlier. 6:00am does not cut it.

These little guys are my personal favorites for this holiday season:

This Is What I Do:

So I realize when people ask me what I do, and I tell them that I am a Visual Merchandiser for a website, they have absolutely no idea what that means. Basically this means that I am a stylist for a website (which should probably remain nameless).

Here are a few examples of what I have done. Keep in mind that this isn't really necessarily the way I dress, nor the way I would personally style something. It's more like this is my take on my company's styling aesthetic.

I only have 2 days left at this job before the big move. Each time I get off the train in Long Island City and walk to work I think, "Okay, I am only going to do this 2 more times in my whole life." That's a really exciting feeling.

I will definitely miss my job, but I will most definitely not miss my commute. Nor will I miss Queens and all of the concrete I am surrounded by on a daily basis.

Goodbye asphalt and concrete, hello trees and grass.

Books of the Year

The one thing that I think I will really miss about living in Jersey City is my long commutes that allow me to read. I currently commute about an hour to Long Island City for work everyday, and then an hour back home again. My new job (post-move) will be at an Anthropologie store in Natick, and I will have to drive every day. So, there goes my reading time.

My mom and I have a book club, and the most recent member to join is my sister-in-law, Jamie Lyn. My mom and I started the club about 2 years ago, and I am guessing that we have read anywhere from 25-35 books together. Jamie Lyn joined only 2 books ago, and we are currently reading her first pick, "The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle" by Haruki Murakami.

So far this year I have read 21 books:

1. Giants: The Parallel Lives of Frederick Douglas and Abraham Lincoln - John Stauffer (I am an Abraham Lincoln enthusiast, so I found this pretty interesting. There may have been some reaches here and there to make the parallels come together, but overall it was good. Books like this can read like stereo instructions sometimes, but this one definitely did not.)
2. Let the Right One In - John Ajvide Lindqvist and Ebba Segerberg (The writing is fantastic, and the story is wonderfully developed. That being said, I had a really hard time with this book. There are some parts I found so deeply disturbing that I actually had to put the book down for while. My mom and I read this before we knew a movie was being made of it, but when the movie came out I had a hard time watching it because they changed the plot so much from the book. Also because it reminded me of all the really horrible things in the book.)
3. The Road - Cormac McCarthy (I know people love Cormac McCarthy, and I think he has an interesting writing style, I'm just not so sure I'm buying it. I have a sneaky suspicion that the movie of this book is going to butcher the ambiguity of the story.)
4. Ishmael - Daniel Quinn (Meh. I started reading this on a plane when I was probably 18 and I forgot it in the seat back in front of me. I found this book absolutely dragged at some points, and I struggled to get through it. That being said, some interesting points were raised - granted, things I have never even considered.)
5. Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close - Jonathan Safran Foer (I loved this book, and I have vowed to read it once a year. So beautiful. I highly recommend it. Reading the back of this book really made me not want to read it because it seemed like such a downer - it's about a small boy whose father was killed in 9-11. The development of the story and the characters is really nothing short of stunning.)
6. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly - Jean-Dominique Bauby (Terrifying and fascinating. This is written by the former editor-in-chief of French Elle magazine after he suffered a massive stroke that left him unable to move or speak. The book was actually written by him dictating letters by blinking his left eye. Pretty unbelievable.)
7. The Book Thief - Markus Zusak (This was my other favorite book of the year. It is categorized as a young adult novel, but I can't really figure out why. It is certainly a book that anyone at any age could read.)
8. A Reliable Wife - Robert Goolrick (Amateur-ish writing, but a good little plot twist in the middle.)
9. A Girl Named Zippy - Haven Kimmel (This book, which is actually a collection of short stories, was given to me by my mother-in-law, Nancy. It's about a little girl growing up in a really small town in Indiana, so naturally it was a good fit. I could see the writing style being compared to David Sedaris - some parts were so funny I was stifling my giggles on the train. That always makes me feel like a crazy person.)
10. The Help - Kathryn Stockett (This book is about white southern women in the 60's and their black maids. I kept reading it thinking that it was written from a totally different time period because of how antiquated it seemed. There is also a mention of Emilio Pucci that I sort of died for.)
11. Losing Mum and Pup - Christopher Buckley (I read about this in the NY Times and thought it sounded pretty interesting. And it was.)
12. Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist - Rachel Cohn and David Levithan (I love, love this movie. I was really surprised by how graphic parts of this book were for a young adult novel. I think the movie took a lot of liberties with the book, and thank god for that. The book seemed childish.)
13. She Got Up Off the Couch - Haven Kimmel (I can't get enough of some short stories about Indiana.)
14. The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane - Katherine Howe (Some more amateur-ish writing. Very "enter adjective here." I did think the history in the book was interesting, and it makes me really want to go to Salem and Marblehead.)
15. 9 Stories - J.D. Salinger (I have been trying to read this off and on for years. Some stories I loved, others I didn't. There is always this weird underlying melancholy in everything that Salinger writes that I love. It's something to do with the dissolution of the American dream . . . at least that's what I think.)
16. Mrs. Lincoln - Catherine Clinton (Read like stereo instructions. I struggled with this a lot.)
17. City of Thieves - David Benioff (Fantastic.)
18. I'm Down - Mishna Wolff (This book cracked me up, and made me cry. Some parts, or maybe some of the author's perspectives, really frustrated me.)
19. Zeitoun - Dave Eggers (While I found the writing a little choppy, the story was amazing. It really got me pissed off about Hurricane Katrina, and shed a lot of light on things that I had no idea were happening. I would recommend that everyone read this.)
20. Young Hearts Crying - Richard Yates (Pretty typical story line for Richard Yates, but the writing is so great. Back to that whole American dream thing . . .)
21. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle - Haruki Murakami (I'm still not really sure what this book is about.)

So there you have it. I am hoping to squeeze another book or two into the year, but I still have 200 pages left in The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle.

Now accepting recommendations.

On To The Next One.

Well, it's official.

We're moving again.

As cliche as it is to say I think Dave and I feel like we are officially starting a new chapter in our lives. We have lived all over the United States (Indianapolis, Attleboro, Providence, San Francisco, Boston, Portland, and Jersey City), and we are ready to settle down.

So with new beginnings comes a new blog. I have actually never had one before so I suppose we will see how it goes.

I am notoriously horrible at keeping in touch with people, so maybe this will be a good way for me to communicate with the rest of the world. Chances are I will probably just write about clothes and fashion . . .

Stay tuned.