mooore adventuring

I'm trying to think about how to tell you what I'm about to tell you in a clever way. And the amount of times that I have shared this news is making me dig deep into the realms of my brain to get creative.

So here we go.

In high school, I went through this phase where I thought it was really funny to tell cow jokes. I don't know why I thought it was funny. But I swear I snagged my high school boyfriend with them. He took me to the moo-vies, even.

(Yes. They were that bad. Like Colonel Moo-stard and moo-chas gracias caliber. All the time.)

So today, brought to you by Whitney Circa 2004, I ask you what a cow says when he finds out his house sold?

That's right. We're moo-ving.

Moving! 

Which means, yes, so far in 2013, we have a post about moving as a quarterly feature. January and April. But this is it. For real, for real, for real.  This is the last time we're moving for a long time.

When we moved in to our current place, we knew it was a possibility that the house might sell, but the market wasn't that good and the rent was low and the location was amazing and our luck certainly had to be up after living with rats. 

Right?

But, alas, someone has decided they want our abode as their abode and they don't want to rent it anymore. I thought about lobbying for these newlyweds to let Mel and me continue to live in two of the four bedrooms this house offers, but it didn't exactly scream logical.

So, in just three weeks time, we'll be on the move again. You might think I'd be worried that I have absolutely no idea where I'm going. But I'm oddly relaxed...

In the meantime, I've made a real short Greenwood Ave. bucket list, which includes: dinner at Panita Thai and to score an invitation to a porch party at our neighbors' house. They live on the corner of Highland and Greenwood in this hugely huge house with two wraparound porches and they're always having so much fun out there. 

Cross your fingers for good weather this weekend so I can deliver them some baked goods with a cow joke and a smile and really set the mooood right.

{I won't do that. Cookies. No cows. Promise}

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moving weekend take 57

Atlanta is a foodie town and whenever I try a good, new restaurant, I’m almost guaranteed to say, “my dad would love this place.” The man will try any food once, and I can think of almost nothing he dislikes. The more obscure options they have, the more interested he is.  Which is why, this weekend when we were somehow able to squeeze in some really good meals in between loads of manual labor, I called it a great success.

We kick started the weekend at Murphy’s Friday night. After driving all day, Muff&Dave definitely deserved good food and wine. It was so much fun being able to show them a new place right by my house – I kept telling them they should just retire in Atlanta. Who needs the beach when you have Peachtree? 

Saturday we got up bright and early to start moving day. We moved all.day.long, from before 8 a.m. to after 9 p.m. – but it was so worth it. My parents were, as usual, total workhorses and I could not be more grateful for it. I think I’d be moving for three weekends in a row without them. Every time I turned around I felt like they’d done something else fast, furiously and perfectly.

The place was all set up by the time we stopped, and I’m so happy in it. I didn’t realize how much of a toll having rats was taking on me – I feel like a weight has been lifted.

Saturday night we crashed into our seats at Pozole for some good Mexican and margs.

Sunday, we woke up and had breakfast at West Egg before they hit the road. I basically begged them to (1) stay until Monday and (2) move here, but so far they’ve resisted. Maybe if I stopped putting them to work every time they came my arguments would work better?

Thank you, mom and dad, for moving me – yet again!!

It's Friday! And we're moving!

Yaay and a half! Just one more little night in our house to go!

My parents are en route to Atlanta to help, and, let me tell you, there are very few things that are a greater testament to how much they love me than the frequency with which they've helped me move. Three times in less than one year, to be exact. Not to mention twice in the two months preceeding our January 2012 move. If that's not love, I don't know what is.

Here's to hoping this one will stick, or else people might start wondering if we're in witness protection...

Happy long weekend, you guys! I hope it's great!

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weekend and a half and a halfway move

Do you ever have those weekends where you fall into bed Sunday night and feel like you can barely remember what you did Friday? Where it seems like forever ago and even though the weekends are never long enough, it felt like 37 combined?

This weekend was one of those. Mainly because we halfway moved out.

Some of our things went to storage, and some are going to the new place. Katie's super sweet parents came to help us with the first half. They got into town in the afternoon, so, to get a jumpstart on the task, we pulled everything we were moving out onto the lawn Saturday morning. We thought we were really funny and set it up outside like the inside.  Moving furniture already cracks me up for some reason - add that to our outdoor living room and I was doomed to lose it. 

It was also one of the easiest ways to move I've ever done (which is, let's be real, a subject I'm familiar with), because by the time the truck arrived, we had a full picture of everything we needed to load. Like a big puzzle! 

I also rented this beauty just to make sure we had enough room. Needless to say, it doesn't have the turn radius of my Jeep. It also beeps when you back up...

Surprisingly, we had no less than 11 people ask us if we were having a yard sale. At one point, we said no, but a girl still said: could I take a look and see if there is anything I want to buy?

I almost said yes, based on her persistence alone! I guess if you really want my table that badly...

Other weekend highlights include a late dinner at Taco Mac Saturday night, drinks on the patio at Noche Sunday afternoon, and dinner with Sally and her mama at Two Urban Licks Sunday. 

Sunday night, I crashed into bed - happily exhausted. Now, just a few more nights until a rat-free home. Yaay! I hope your weekend was wonderful, too!

see you!

Y'all. (I know. I don't say y'all. But this is y'all worthy).

We're moving.

I know. I know! When I told you we were moving in August, I didn't expect to mutter those words again until at least next July.

I did NOT see this coming.

But we are. We really, really are.

I promise I am not some crazy person that is addicted to moving. Running? Maybe. FroYo? Most notably. But moving? Nah.

We wanted to stay in our house. We wanted it to be golden and not gilded. We wanted it to be cute and happy and ours.

But, as it turns out, the rats own our house and they're not going anywhere fast. They came back with a vengeance and ate right through my Pottery Barn chair. And that was pretty much the last straw for me. (Not to mention a lot of Mel's furniture. And then Katie went into the attic and found herself face to face with one).

So, our landlord is kindly voiding our lease and we're rolling off of Courtenay Drive. We gave it a good go, but we're not waiting around for these rats to get any bigger. It's the year of no waiting, after all.

I know it's definitely the right choice to move, but I'm having a hard time with the fact that Katie is not joining Melissa and me at our next place. We've grown so close in the last 13 months that we've lived together - I really can't imagine not waking up to her each day. 

Since she's getting married in June, she's going to live with her sister until then. I dream of living with my sisters, so I can't blame her for it, but I'm sad to see our time living together cut short. We thought we had until June to be roommates, and this January cut off date is feeling very abrupt. It's like we were on a seven day cruise and the captain just told us it's only a weekend cruise. Something must not be right, here...

We've both admitted it feels a lot like an unwanted break up - but we're not sure who the culprit is. (Fortunately we decided to share a storage unit, so at least we have that holding us together. It's like the pet you continue to share. Good little storage unit!)

And luckily, she will only be a bit down the road in Inman Park and she swears she won't forget about us VaHi girls.

Here's to our next adventure!

di di di!

We are moved in! And we are happy. And we are tired :) Photos and houseyhome love to come...

Until then, happy Monday!

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kappow! moving and cuppows...

Moving weekend is upon us! I hope that this is the last time I post about this topic for a looong time. I am so ready for my things to be neatly in their places: hangers hung, colors coded, drawers folded, socks matched...

It's going to be blissful.

My dad and mom arrive today to help, which equals a doubly special weekend.

If I didn't already have quite a bit to move, I think this would be the ideal time to invest in a Cuppow. My parents, who are the anti-clutter and anti-collections king and queen, love Ball jars - to the point that they've actually allowed themselves to cultivate quite the collection. Are they on display? Absolutely not. But they still love them in their hearts.

The coffee will surely be flowing this weekend, and I think a Cuppow would have been a great way to transport our coffee from Brookhaven to Midtown. Whappow! Next time, I guess. Which, I promise, won't be for a while...

Promise.

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here we go again!

The question at hand is: why did I buy multiple sheets of return address labels when I knew I was only staying at my current location temporarily?

Because of my admitted (more than once) addiction to snail mail? Maybe. Or because I had every intention of sending Christmas cards, and they’re still in a basket under my bed? That too. And also because I wanted my temporary abode to feel like home.

And it did.

But now, I’m on the move. My current roommate, Katie, and I are headed south – to Midtown, that is (Midtown is south, right?). I’ve got two groceryless weeks in my current place until I pack it up again and begin calling Piedmont Park, and Melissa and Sally, my neighbors. Oh, I’m so excited!

Di di di! See you at Park Tavern!

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And so begins the fridge challenge...

When my mom visited me in April, we were thrilled to discover  the new Publix Greenwise was opening in my apartment complex the same weekend. 

While we didn't technically plan the two to coincide, you may as well have thought we did based on our grand opening attendance. We ran around the store like kids on Christmas morning - checking the superb aisle organization, oohing and aahing at the product selection and interviewing the employees: "are you excited?" "do you think the people at Kroger are sad?" "what's your favorite sample?"

We love a good grocery store.

However, combine that with my love of fresh produce, and you've got an astronomical grocery bill.

Inspired by Shape's One Month No Grocery Challenge and the fact that I'm moving at the end of the month (more on that later), I'm abstaining from going to the grocery store for the rest of the month.

It's going to be a serious (majorly serious) challenge, seeing as I'm currently chickenless in this house. However, I'm relatively stocked up on vegetables - both frozen and fresh. It will just force me to eat more strategically and be less flippant about expiring spinach. No doubt I'll be nomming on soup by Jan. 31, but I'm hoping I'll actually clean out the cabinets, save money and avoid lugging cans of beans to my new place.

Wish me luck!

PS I only wish I had so many peppers as there are in that stocked fridge above! Yummers!

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Goodbye Goodwynn! Moving day...

My mom has this theory when it's lightly raining that if she doesn't turn on her windshield wipers, she might be able to will the rain away. If she doesn't admit it's not raining, maybe it won't be.

If you know my mom, this mind over matter mentality isn't shocking. Known as glass half completely full type of girl, she firmly believes that anything is possible with the right attitude.

This weekend, she proved that her theory is, in fact, true.

Like a machine, she helped me move from my apartment to my new home and although I never doubted that it could be done, she somehow still amazed me. Powered almost entirely by Caramel Macchiattos, we pushed through 48 hours of nonstop moving bliss (really. we had so much fun.) and Saturday night, when I was thinking bed was sounding just perfect, she looked at me and said, "You won't mind if I just clean a little, will you?" Baseboards, floors, bathroom and kitchen later, you would have thought she was getting my apartment ready for a showing. If it wasn't sparkling when I moved in, it certainly was when I moved out.

And as I kissed the place goodbye Sunday morning, I was especially happy to have her with me. Although when it comes to being sentimental I'm not always the first to jump on board, I felt surprisingly sad as I left. I've been through a lot in this happy little place, from my first Christmas tree to countless recipe experimentations - and many things in between - I'll never forget my first. I may or may not said I love you as I left...

I think that's enough true confession time for one day. Back to regularly scheduled programming tomorrow. But as a parting gift: adios 409! It's been real...

...Yes, I left my birthday sign up from September until December.

And because we couldn't give up our last night in the apartment, we slept on the flizoor. 

My bags are packed and I'm ready to go...

When it comes to packing, I tend to be pretty prepared (read: psychotic). I get panicked if I don't have a handle on things days in advance. For example, my freshman year of college, I moved into the dorms Sept. 25, yet packed at the end of July. It led to two full months of me digging through boxes. But man! I would have been ready to go at any minute.

I shouldn't have been shocked when I woke up Tuesday morning and realized I'd already packed (and loaded into the Jeep) all of my tights. Along with my TV remotes (no Today show!?). You see, I am moving this weekend. And therefore, I felt the need to pack the majority of my apartment Monday night. Why I feel more comfortable living among a jungle of boxes than I do packing Thursday and Friday night, like a normal person, is beyond me.

Last night, Savannah came over with sushi and dedication, as she helped me wrap things up by packing every square inch of my kitchen, food included. That pantry has never looked so empty! Moments after she left I got a serious craving for red hots and had to do a little digging to satisfy it. Nothing like working for my meal, eh?

Mid-process, we decided it was time to drink sparkling peach juice, which I've had since a wedding in May. With the bottle openers and knives packed, Savannah was sure she could open it with the edge of a metal spoon. A lot of work it may have been for five month old nonalcoholic champagne, but the beauty was in the process...

And just when she was about to give up...

Just a few more nights in this happy little apartment! Eek!

Oh big PS: Happy Month of Christmas! Whoahwhoahwhoah!

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Bring your cheer!

I was going to blog tonight but accidentally turned on the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show and got distracted. Whoopsies.

So instead I'll just say that I'm rillly excited because, as you can see from yesterday's post, my family bought our tree this weekend. And in approximately six tiny days I get to put up another one in my brand new home! Although I'm a teensy sad to leave my happy apartment, I am so excited about my new roommate and the sparkly town lights we will have on our tree.

See you on the twinkly side!

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one

In one year you can fly around the world 13 times. You can form 17 new habits. You could walk (and boat) from Atlanta to Sydney, and still have 156 days left to vacation (according to Google maps). Or, you could be me, and be completely shocked that you’d already spent a year in Atlanta.

Where did it go? In some ways it feels like I just packed up my car, and in others, it feels like it has been so long. So many things in my life have changed – I have new friends, and yet somehow feel closer than ever to my oldie goldies, I said goodbye to my first job and started a new one, I decorated my first apartment and am getting ready to pack up and move to my second. I had my first Christmas tree, found my own dry cleaners, got lost about 1,000 times…

Ah! It’s crazy. And although I would certainly never ever give up the last year, because I’ve learned so much, grown a lot, cried a little, laughed a ton, I’m excited for the second one to begin. I feel much more grounded in my life here. I’m less reliant on others and am so excited to see what this city has to offer, now that I’m not longer a total newbie.

Thank you to everyone who has made my first year in Atlanta wonderful. I never would have understood all the hundreds of Peachtrees without you guys.


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bye bye house, hello apartment

I thought I might feel like a grown up when I graduated college.  Or when I started my first job. Or started paying bills.  It never happened.

And now that I have my own apartment with [real] real bills, I still don't feel like one.

So now I'm thinking it might happen when I get married. Or have a baby.  Or when my baby has a baby? Or maybe I'll never really believe I'm a grown up.

While I do not exactly feel more mature, it does feel very different walking into my own apartment, as opposed to my parents house.

And, while I absolutely love the feeling, I also must say that for the last year I had the best roommates I could have asked for.  I had so much fun living with my parents and walked away feeling closer to them than ever before (I also walked away more interested in Dancing With the Stars and The Biggest Loser than I care to admit).  This time around, they really were more like my friends, and I am so grateful for our time together.

Now I just can't wait for them to visit, so I can show them to same hospitality they showed me.  Maybe THEN I'll feel like a grown up.

No whims this Wednesday...

...Because I am completely and entirely consumed with moving to Atlanta tomorrow!

I'm so excited and have been running around like a mad woman preparing for the move.  I'll be back next week, blogging in full force from my brand new apartment!

Until then, happy weekend! See you in Atlanta!