20 things about the husband and me

So. I LOVE lists. I also love over sharing. ;)

So listing random, quirky facts about my hubs and me is basically my idea of a good time.


1. We met in high school, but we are NOT high school sweethearts.
         ---Really. This is always super fun to explain at parties. Don't worry, I'll do a post about this soon. ;)
2. Large families freak me out.
   --- This wouldn't be an issue, except for the fact that my husband has a large extended family. Most of whom I'm meeting for the first time in oh...18 days. Yeah. Super fun. And when I say freak out, I mean my panic attacks trigger and you're liable to find me with my head between my knees taking deep breaths.*
3. I suffer from panic attacks. I'm also prone to depressive episodes.
  ---Let's just say it's a good thing I've got a realtionship with Jesus, or my coping mechanisms would be a whole lot unhealthier.
4. My husband and are the goofiest people you will ever meet.
---But you'd never know this unless we are best friends or you're a fly on the wall of our tiny studio. We play adult real well.  :)
5. The hubs is about a 100 times neater then I am.
---That sound you hear is every friend I've ever had laughing/nodding their head.
6.  Without coffee I am not a human.
--I'm not exegerating. It's a fact.  Early on in our realtionship, I had to establish the ground rule that he couldn't talk to me unless I had a shower or a cup of coffee. Otherwise, I am not responsible for my actions.
7. If I could inject coffee into my veins, or snort it without killing myself, I probably would.
8. My husband is a crazy good gift giver.
--For Valentine's Day one year he gave me something practical, useful, and pretty. He basically knows how to make a woman swoon. (Or at least this woman)
9. I once told him that I was perfectly happy to elope** but I wanted a damn good proposal story. And oh buddy did he come through. His proposal was epic and amazing and to this day makes me giddy.
10. Playing off 9...I wanted to elope to Florence. We would fly there, I'd buy a pretty dress and we'd say vows in a language we didn't understand then start the honeymoon. He vetoed that idea. Said something about how I'd be disapointed if I didn't have everyone at our wedding....ok he was right. But still. My plan would have been a whole hell of a lot less stressful. Plus. You can't beat Florence.
11. While parts of having a husband in grad school might suck (read: Often not home until 1 a.m., not a ton of money)  I try to appreciate the nice things. Like, yesterday I was off of work and we both slept in and had a relaxing morning together. We couldn't do that if we both had real jobs.
12. I am in full on mid to late twenties crisis mode of figuring out what you want out of life. It's not real fun all the time, but it's good for me. (Can you tell I repeat that to myself a lot? )
13. I really appreciate a well decorated space, but my apartment is more likely to be cluttered then cute. I think it's because I really believe that a space should look like people live there. I.e. there should be dishes drying, or shoes tossed in a corner, or books in a stack by the bed. For me, if those little things aren't there the space--while beautiful--doesn't feel authentic.
14. I'm trying to figure out what my life as a wife looks like.
--This is probably a post in and of itself, but for a girl who never ever thought she'd get married, being married is strange. (And wonderful, don't get me wrong). But when you've spent your entire life planning a life where you weren't a wife, becoming one throws you for a wicked loop.
15. He almost always does the dishes.
--This varies based on how much work he has, but for the most part it's true. Partly because I usually cook, partly because I HATE doing the dishes, and partly because about 60% of the time the dishes I do aren't clean enough for him. (Dude, if there's a spot of dirt on the decorative edge or the back of my plate, I'm not going to worry about it.)
16. We try to divvy up chores based on whose better at/likes them more.
--Except for rare fits of organizing, I am TERRIBLE at it. So he organizes the apartment and tells me where everything is. I love to vacuum and iron so I do those. He sweeps because I have an odd passion about hating it.
You get the point. Frankly, I think it's genius because things (mostly) get done and no one resents anyone because they're doing chore they like!
17. I swear our cat is training us for children.
--She wakes us up multiple times a night. She won't let me use the rest room in peace. She wines. We talk about the best way to discipline/train her. Seriously. It's an issue. But we love her.
18. I believe that there is no such thing as too many books. My husband belives that if you haven't read it in a year and don't have an emotional attachment to it, you should give it away. I'm still trying to make him understand that I have an emotional attachment to all books.
19. I'm really proud of the way we fight. It doesn't happen often, but when it does we work hard to fight cleanly, without name calling and such, and lovingly. I never want the hubs to think that I don't love him...even when he's annoying the heck out of me. And we always ask (and grant) forgiveness quickly and freely.
20. We sit in the baby section at church so we (ok mostly me) can make faces at the cuties. It's super fun, and I highly recommend it.

There you go! 20 random things about the hubs and me. Doesn't everyone feel closer now? :)

*Ok, the head between the knees bit is an exaggeration, but the deep breaths is not. Panic attacks suck man.
**I'm an event/wedding planner...weddings are STRESSFUL dude.

decorative garland

Got crafty over my Thanksgiving holiday break and made a little garland/lights that should work for the entire holiday season.  Christmas is coming!

xoxo Susannah

Happy Thanksgiving!

Scenes from a marriage:

Husband: You should wear the fuzzy pants today
Me: *Blank Stare* (This is pre-coffee)
Husband: If you're going to stuff yourself, you should be comfortable!
Me: Awwww.

Happy Thanksgiving from us! We are holed up in our tiny studio cooking too much food for two people, with a cat who thinks we are terribly cruel for not feeding her every hour.


*Please note: The "fuzzy pants" are my husband's flannel pajama pants and they are insanely comfortable.

date!

Two weeks ago, hubby and I went on a new adventure date.  Do any of you other newlyweds try and find creative date ideas?  Well, I do.  I enjoy going on new adventures, and so does the mister.  It only makes sense to go on adventures together.

The most recent adventure was to a colonial farm! 

I wrote a little more about it here.

Have any other creative adventure date idea?

xoxo Susannah

using buttermilk

Remember that time I tried making butter?

Yes, well, I made some more, then decided how I was going to use the runoff milk.  Buttermilk pancakes!

mmmm... 

They were so delicious!

Especially with some of my accidental blackberry syrup on top!

she's famous!

The other redhead (Sarah) of this red-haired duo recently had an article published in the Huffington Post!  How awesome is that?!

Take a look and let us know what you think.  I'm sure she would enjoy some feedback, and we always love to hear the thoughts of readers!

Find it here.



xoxo Susannah

On loving a mad scientist.

I married a mad scientist.

I mean, I knew this when we got married.

But certain nights it hits home more than others.

Father Octavian [about the Doctor]: Dr. Song, I've lost good clerics today. You trust this man?

River: I absolutely trust him.

Father Octavian: He's not some kind of madman, then?

River: [pause] I absolutely trust him.

Leonard Hofstadter: Penny, you don't want to get into it with Sheldon. The guy is one lab accident away from being a supervillain. 

I mean, in my husband's case, he's one lab accident/discovery away from being Iron Man not The Joker, but the point remains.

Oh my mad scientist. How I love you.

Lazy girl DIY

So remember the last post when I said I wasn't a DIYer? That not *strictly* speaking true.

I do like to make cute things and spruce up my apartment with little touches.

I just don't want to spend more than about an hour (30 minutes is ideal) doing it.

Basically, I have your classic case of lazy DIY. Where you want to make cute things, you just don't want to devote your life to it.

But I'm guessing there's more then one of you out there who is like that to, so I introduce to you: Lazy girl DIY! Where I will show you my quick, cute projects. All of which can be done with minimal skill and minimal time.

Lazy Girl DIY 1st Edition: Ugly wall-->Pretty Wall!

I love contact paper. A lot.
It's pretty, it's removable, it wipes up easily  And the new contact paper has really pretty and trendy designs. When we moved in, I bought a roll for the kitchen shelves, but I had a ton left over and wasn't sure what to do with it.  Enter: The brown wall of dooooooom.

When you live in a studio, you make "walls" out of some crazy things to separate the spaces. For my husband and I, we made a bedroom wall with a dresser, a bookshelf and a wardrobe. It borders the study/eating area of our apartment.

Exhbit A. Functional? Yes. Pretty? No.

So armed with a roll of contact paper I decided to cover the back of the dresser (the one in the middle). The wardrobe and the book shelf have porous backs so I decided to do a "spot" test (you can kind of see it in the photo) to see if the contact paper would stick or fall off.

I forgot to take photos during the process (lazy DIY remember) but essentially:

1. Measure Contact paper on dresser.
           I taped a section in the middle and then rolled it down and cut it off at the bottom. I then did the same thing for the left and right side.
2. Stick Contact paper on dresser.
          For this, I suggest help, but you could absolutely do it alone if you wanted to. Peel off the top bit of the contact paper and stick it to the top of the dresser. Press down to smooth and stick it to the dresser and keep peeling the backing off bit by bit until you reach the bottom. Repeat for the other two sides.

At this point my dresser looked like:

 Pretty good right? But I didn't like the top bits that were blank and there were some spots on the side where  the contact paper didn't quite meet up. Mainly because I can't cut in a straight line to save my life. So I decided to use some scrap contact paper cut into strips to cover up the blank spots. Like so:

Please notice all the care I took into cutting these strips. (You have to read that in a deadpan voice) After cover up all the blank spots, this is what I had:

 Yay for pretty dressers and non-ugly walls to look at! And because I believe in showing the goof ups of DIY, I present the below:

 Yeah. The edges of this dresser are porous and the contact paper doesn't stick terribly well to it. So I used tape to stick the loose edges to the side of the dresser. Will it win me any awards? Nope. But it's functional and I think you can hardly notice it. :)

Happy Sunday!

A home tour for all the messy people!

A thought about home tours.

I don't know about you, but I read *a lot* of blogs. And they all seem so shiny and happy and their houses are so clean. 

And while I have wanted to show off my cute little studio since we moved in, I was waiting.

"I don't want to do a tour until it looks pretty."

"I'll wait until everything is unpacked"

"Oh I'll wait until the desk gets here"

Well the desk is here* (accompanied by three more boxes of dear husband's stuff. Joy.) and I STILL don't want to do a tour.

Because here's the dirty little secret about this blog.

Looking for cute decorating ideas/housekeeping/diying?  I'm not the red head you want.

I am just not one of those cute diyers. My apartments look...messy most of the time.

And you know what? That's ok.

So for all of the messy people out there...this tour is for you!

*Actually it was here about three weeks ago. I've been a neglectful blogger guys sorry. 

Welcome to our lobby! To the left you can sort of see the built in bike racks, and that door in the left corner is our front door. 

Welcome to our messy studio!

This is our "pass through" kitchen (I think that's the fancy name for it) Please note our gas stove (We are THRILLED :) ) and in the corner you can just see our knife rack. Better picture here: http://www.thinkgeek.com/product/86dd/ .We call ours Fred :)

This is our lovely built in island with heater underneath. My computer live here much of the time because I like to watch tv while I cook/do the dishes. :)

This is our other island, next to the built in.
Please note the Tardis Cookie Jar. :)

Our Kitchen Guardian

Immediately after our kitchen you enter the living room! (With crazy tv system mounted to the wall)

                           

Our "Dinning Room" which is conveniently located about a foot away from....

The Study! Also, a little lesson in being a messy person. This desk is a sectary desk. When open, it adds more mess to the room. However....

Once shut you look a (teeny) bit cleaner! Yay!

This is the "nothing" corner (admit it, you have one too). The chair is where laundry gets thrown, or  one of us sits when we want to work alone. (The chair back faces the sofa table you can kind of see in the living room picture :) )

Our lovely bedroom. (Yes, we are fond of Ikea)

And one of my favorite features of the apartment, the built in shelves. These border the left wall of our bed and are GREAT for storage, as you can see

Ok  this is probably my most favorite part of the apartment. Our deck. It's lovely to be able to step outside and sit in the sun with a book, or have a glass of wine out there. We had dinner out there a few weeks ago, and it was amazing. :)

And now: Some Studio Vignettes/Tips

Short on bookshelves, but have lots of windows? Make one of them a bookshelf window. This one stores my library books.

WIndow sills are also great for storing knick knacks If you're like me and want to be able to open the window though, make sure you only store things you don't mind getting a little damp if it starts to rain.

Cats always warm up an apartment. :)

And our time's up folks! Thanks for stopping by!

fall decorating: one at a time

I love fall. No, seriously. Best season ever.

But how in the world does a crafty girl decorate a studio apartment for fall without buying any more stuff or overwhelming her husband (and herself) with so many things just "sitting around not picked up"?

By gathering ideas and working one step at a time.

Last week, I decided I simply must have some fall decor in my teensy apartment.  I don't care if it means I have to rotate my knicknacks or dust more frequently.

So, after checking out some adorable and easy ideas in BHG, I knew the perfect place to start.

Like every girl obsessed with mason jars, I've made my own beeswax candles in mason jars.  (We'll save the details on creating these candles for another post.)  I took leftover orange scrapbook/craft paper, cut it in half, cut out pumpkin faces, and taped it into a cylinder just large enough to fit around the candle with a little breathing room.

Easy peasy.  And it's one tiny bit of halloween decoration.  Since we have such a small apartment, there's no way we could do real pumpkins this year. But these cute little candles are enough for me for this year!

disaster!

So... I realized today that I hadn't given you all a proper post in a while.  Last night, I thought I would make a delightful snack, take pictures, and tell you how to make it. 

Unfortunately, I failed. Miserably.

See?

Fail.

It was such an epic fail that I set off the smoke alarm at 10:15 at night and almost forced the entire apartment building to evacuate. It was...exciting.  Quite an adrenaline rush, I must say. For about 45 seconds, I ran around opening the windows and turning up fans and opening doors while envisioning hundreds of people standing outside our apartment building blaming me for setting off the smoke alarm.

I shall attempt said lovely snack again soon. I've made it before, so I don't know why it was difficult this time.

C'est la vie, I suppose.

Wait you're moving into a studio?!

This was the reaction of pretty much everyone we knew after we told them our moving plans. Even after we explained all the perks of the apartment: spacious, lovely deck, good location; they would still almost universally shake their heads, and say "I could never live in a studio with my significant other"
Which is fair. I can't really live with anybody other than Anthony,  no matter how big the apartment. (I am a TERRIBLE roomate) But we did have some pretty good reasons about why we moved, and why we're excited about our new cute studio that we thought we'd share.

Sarah's list of reasons why I'm glad we're out of our old apartment:

1. There were mice. A lot of them. We estimate that we killed at least 20 in the year we lived there.
2. Our old apartment was wicked expensive. Between the utilities and the rent, it was eating up a ton of money. Our new apartment? So affordable I almost feel bad telling other people what the rent is. And it's cute!
3. Our neighbors were...colorful.
4. We couldn't walk anywhere, except to the metro stop.
4a. The area was kind of gritty. Used car lots, loud music on the street, no trees, broken glass on the sidewalk.
5. It never really felt like our "home". While I didn't realize this until we moved into our new place, our apartment just never really felt like us.
6. Our dryer NEVER dried clothes the first time around. This might sound minor, but it jacked up our electric bills like no one's business.
7. Iron spiral staircases look super cool, but when you're half awake in the morning, walking down them is not so fun. Also, I found excuses to not go up or downstairs. I.e. I'd be upstairs, need something downstairs and ask Anthony to get it for me.
8.Our walls were paper thin. I got way more intimately acquainted with our neighbors personal life then I was comfortable with.
9. Our landlord was not responsive at all. We were once locked out of our apartment for almost 3 hours, because the service people had locked a lock we didn't have a working key to. (Oh yeah, we didn't have a working key to our deadbolt for the first 6 months we lived there.) We finally called--and paid for--a locksmith ourselves.
10. Mice. Everywhere. I realize I've said this once but it bears repeating. The mice figured out how to climb things so in addition to there being mice everywhere; there were mice droppings everywhere. Gross.

Sarah: Why I'm glad we moved to our new place:

1. Our deck is fabulous.
2. I feel so much more at home here. I call this the "Hippy, crunchy, mom's with strollers" part of the city. If you know where I went to college you know why this makes me happy. :)
3. Our apartment, while tiny, feels like us. It feels like a home. Which I didn't even realize I was missing until we moved.

Anthony's Top 6 Reasons Our Last Place Sucked
6. The neighborhood was on the edge of a very seedy part of the city.
5. Living near a metro stop, and only a metro stop, does not solve your city transportation issues.
4. Our building neighbors matched our 'hood (the very edge of seedy).
3. We had our property stolen from a "locked" garage.
2. Building management were easy to reach, but often slow to address our requests.
1. The literal mice infestation. And the worst part was I was sure they were nesting in the adjacent apartment.

Anthony's Top 6 Reasons Our New Place Rocks
6. We live in a lively, walkable part of the city.
5. I can now ride my bike to work.
4. We have a deck... Labor Day BBQ anyone?
3. Our landlord is an awesomely chill guy (e.g. he stopped by on a Saturday to replace some lightbulbs)
2. We have built in wall bike racks in building entryway.
1. We can live really comfortably without AC thanks to our wall-to-wall windows and two amazing ceiling fans. edit: He's not joking. There's maybe been 2 days since we moved that I've escaped to the library for air conditioning. 

On Name Changing.

No two ways about it.
This is a toughie.

I always thought I would change my name when I got married. Never even crossed my mind to consider othewise. When I would mention how difficult it was going to be to decide which names to keep (I have two middle names) when I changed my name, people would always say "Well, you can just keep your name" and I would say "No, I want to change it."

And I do. I can not stress that point enough. I love my husband, and I want to be Mrs. Hislastname.

And yet.

I haven't done it.

Legally changed my name I mean.

I didn't realize how attached I was to being Sarah French until I was about to give it up.

I mean, for one thing roughly half of the people I met during college still call me "Sarah French". I have never been Sarah, always Sarah French. I'm not even entirely sure how it came about, but it did stick. And while I realize changing my name isn't likely to change what they call me, it still resonated with me.

Also, (and I'm playing couch pyschologist now aren't you pschyed?!) it took me a really really long time to be happy with who I was. It took me a long time to like myself. And my name was part of that, and is still a part of me. Perhaps on some level, it feels like regression. Like taking my husband's last name (which is unquestionably prettier and more exotic then mine) is saying that I didn't like who I was, and was waiting for him to change me into someone I do like.

This is coming out badly, excuse me.

I guess it boils down to identity. And what I didn't realize was how much I idenitfy who I am with "Sarah French". I've been Sarah French for 26 years. That name has taken me to foreign countries, survived heartache I thought I would never recover from, saw both my parents go through major life threatening illness, and been shouted by friends (in both joy and not joy) more times then I can count.

And while I know intellectually that just because my name is changing it isn't changing who I am (let's get real, it's just a name, and if you met me during college, chances are good you're going to be calling me "SarahFrench" for the rest of our lives) it feels...big. Like it does mean I'm becoming someone brand new. Which is kind of fun, and kind of scary. Like I said, it took me a long long time to like who I am.

But after this weekend, I just feel a kind of peace about it. It's time. I'm ready.

And I finally came up with a solution about my myriad of name that makes me happy. Which is probably a large part of it too.

But if you ever address mail to me "Mrs. Anthony Hislastname" I might send it back to you.

Cause dude. I am "Sarah French Hislastname". Not an appendage.

Edit: I'm still working on the paperwork. But hey. At least I'm working on it?

a thought.

"I love being married. It's so great to find that one special person you want to annoy for the rest of your life."

-- Rita Rudner

Taking a moment to appreciate my hubby today.

He's a keeper.

Anyone have some inexpensive, creative date night ideas to share?

We've done a picnic in the park (with a little soccer or frisbee tossing, of course) and a few other inexpensive dates like netflix movie with wine, etc.  

xoxo Susannah

found: blog post

Find of the day: another blog by an adorable newlywed couple.  They've been blogging for about a year, and I came across their blog through Pinterest, of all places.

Anyway, check out this post:

 It's a whole post on advice for newlyweds, from newlyweds.  They have some lovely things to say, and I love the suggestions.

See for yourself!

xoxo Susannah

birthday fun

via

For my birthday last week, we spent the whole weekend doing fun things. Friday night was dinner in with the husband and my birthday presents from him.  Saturday was a day in town visiting the big flea market.  Saturday evening, we went bowling with a few friends, and Sunday afternoon was a baseball game!  It was a lovely weekend, and one of the only times the hubby has had a three day weekend, which made it even better.

So, I was thinking.

How, exactly, are we (those of us watching our budgets) supposed to celebrate birthdays in a fun way that doesn't stress the wallet?  A few ideas for your consideration!

1.  Do those things you always say you're going to do but never have time for. 

2. Stay in town instead of taking a trip, but act like a tourist.

3. Do an activity like bowling or game night with friends.

4. Check out deals on Groupon, LivingSocial, or TravelZoo.

Have any other ideas to share?  This was only our first birthday as a married couple and we have lots to learn, but these are our preliminary ideas for this go around.

xoxo Susannah

birthday!

I have learned that only two things are necessary to keep one's wife happy.  First, let her think she's having her own way.  And second, let her have it.  

--Lyndon B. Johnson

Hah! Hilarious, no?  Is it true?  (Maybe you shouldn't answer that...)

This week is my birthday!  Hubby is planning most of the birthday things, so I have no idea what's on the menu, but I do always love celebrating birthdays.  And not just my own birthday, if that's what you're thinking.  :)

Birthdays are a chance to celebrate, to spend time with people you enjoy, and to eat inappropriate amounts of dessert.

So, for this week, I do believe I'm allowed to have my own, if only in the dessert department.

Apologies on the short post this week.  This is a week of big life changes for me, and not just because of the birthday. Updates soon!

xoxo Susannah

The Moving Saga Part 2

So yesterday you heard the story of how the studio came to be.
Today I shall share with you the lengths the husband and I will go to for a good apartment (More then most if my friends' reactions are any indication)
Also I promise no more grand language.

So.

The lease on our old place was going to end 10 days before we could get into our new studio.* As fate would have it, we were scheduled to be out of town anyway over the weekend because I was running a wedding, and my husband was assisting me.
So that left us with about 7 days where we needed to sleep somewhere, and store our stuff.

First up: The stuff

While we explored the idea of a POD (basically a portable storage unit that you park on the street), it proved wicked expensive. So we thought about renting a UHAUL for the 10 days and parking it in front of our new apartment. Also wicked expensive.
This is where my lovely husband stepped in (possibly to keep me from tearing my hair out). A storage unit was found with a great deal and good review.
So it was decided. We would pack up our apartment, load it onto a UHAUL, unpack it at a storage unit and  re-load it onto a UHAUL in 10 days.

Stuff done.

Next up: Where to sleep
So. We are nowhere close to being the Rockefellers. So while this might be easy enough for some people "Just rent a hotel room for 10 days!" Yeah. Not happening. We are newlyweds and money is tight**
A plan was created.
A friend generously offered to let us stay on her living room floor for the first few nights of our odyssey.
Tip: A twin air mattress is only meant to support the weight of one person, not two.
Then we trecked out to the wedding site for a Sarah French Events wedding( :D)
Which left us with a five day, four night period of where to sleep.
Which is where the lovely site www.airbnb.com comes in.*** If you've never been to that site, airbnb is a website that allows homeowners and renters with extra bedrooms (or, apartments that they're never in) to list their rooms. You can stay there for a day or multiple weeks. It's a super great site for when you're moving to a new area, have a lease overlap, or are budget traveling. They also have reviews about the owners/rooms so you have a better idea of who you're sharing a house with.
 We found a room to rent that was in the same neighborhood as our new place. It was pretty, affordable, and conveniently located.
Done.

*Whew*

And now, it's D-Day. And it's raining. Lord be with us.

See you on the other side!

UPDATE: All of our stuff and us are in the studio. I can't find the hardware for the bedframe, and we are exhausted. So essentially, all is right with the world. :)

* Originally, it was going to be 15 days, so this was actually good news.
**Those two things don't have to go together, but they often do.
***This is not a paid advertisement, airbnb doesn't know me from Anne of Green Gables. They're just awesome.

The Moving Saga part 1

That sounds like the beginning of some epic adventure story right?

Well...the husband and I have had a pretty epic move this time.

Let me begin.

It all starts back in June/July when your lovely red-headed heroine was desperately searching for a new apartment.* The need was great, the specifications were bountiful.

Time wore on and our red-head and her partner in crime saw more apartments then they could count. And like the princess and the pea, all were rejected. "The carpet is ugly" "It's too small"** "Too expensive".

And then...our heroine and her partner found the perfect place. Good price, lovely hardwood floors, a gas stove.

Half a day later, an e-mail was sent.

Someone had taken the apartment on the spot a few hours prior.

Much teeth gnashing and a few tears.

And then...the grand and glorious studio.

It was perfect! Hardwood floors, amazing rent, and oh a deck!

"We must have it!" cried our heroine. Her partner agreed.

Then the But....

They could not move in until 10 days after their current lease ended.

"We'll find a solution! I can't look at apartments for one more second!"

And now....you're pretty much caught up to speed.

Tune in tomorrow when part 2 of our saga is posted!

*The husband was helping, but as the half with more pecularities about where I live and more time, I spearheaded the search.
**Seriously, some of these "one bedrooms" were probably half the size of the new studio we are moving into. I could barely open some of the doors.

when you don't have time

As some of you may know, the hubby and I don't get as much time together as most newlyweds. He works mostly evenings, and I work "typical" office hours during the day. I'm up early, he's home late. He used to be guaranteed Sundays off, but these days it seems like he never gets them, so there are no days in the week that we both have off at the same time.

However, I'm not throwing a pityparty.  This is what we have now and we're making it work.

In light of that, a few suggestions on spending time together when you don't have time, and making the most of what you have:

1.  Be awake. When the mister gets home after midnight, I do my best most nights to stay awake and wait up.  "That's crazy!" you say.  Well, yes. I'm up early for my own job, so why would I stay up until 1am?  The answer: because if I don't, we won't see each other. Hubby does the same; he wakes up for 10-15 minutes with me in the mornings before I head off to work, then falls promptly back to sleep.  If we weren't awake, we wouldn't get any time together. It'll make you tired, but for us, it's worth it.  And you know what? That's why God invented coffee. And weekends. And naps.

2.  Be present.  If you're only getting limited time together, you should be fully invested when you do get time.  Sitting and watching a movie is fantastic, but if you completely ignore each other all evening just to relax, you've let hours slip by that you can't get back. If you both happen to be home and need some time together, maybe the dishes or cleaning the bathroom or doing the laundry can wait.

3.  Make time. Can't say this enough.  If you want to see someone, make the time. Write it down, send text messages, create a schedule, brainstorm date night ideas, whatever it takes.

4.  Communicate.  Seems silly, right? Of course you're going to communicate. Well, when you don't see someone, communication becomes more...screen-based: texts, gchat, email, phone, etc. It's not very fun (compared to face-to-face), but it's important.  Not speaking to your spouse all day, every day, isn't going to work out well.  Gentlemen, she won't like it and I doubt you will, either. And, no, seeing someone for 20 minutes a day is not enough communication.  Found this out really quickly.  For us, the 10 minutes in the morning that he can be awake and the 20 minutes in the evening before I doze off are not enough. Thus the importance of...

5. Date nights! Or date days. Or lunch dates. Or whatever works. Just do it. It's worth it.

I know not all of you have the same dilemmas we face.  Many married couples see each other every night and all weekend and are in the opposite boat of trying to make time for friends.  But for those of us who face opposite work schedules, I hope our ideas help! We're still learning, so if you have any ideas, I'd love to hear them!

xoxo Susannah

Confessions of the husband kind

We're big fans of marriage around this blog. We think it's pretty fun. It can also be pretty mysterious until you're in it and you're thinking to yourself "Why did no one TELL me that husbands are just as moody as my girl friends are?" (Fact.) Well, here at Newlywed Studio Living...we want to take the mystery out of marriage  (for the singles) and have a discussion about the crazy stuff our spouses do (for the marrieds)

Confessions of the husband kind:

1. My husband is neat. I am not. 

     Look. I understand I'm messy. I like to think it's because my mind is preoccupied with other things, but frequently it's that I just doesn't occur to me to wash the dishes until I need a dish. This is not the way my husband thinks. If this sink is full, it needs to be emptied. (I mean, he's not ocd about it, but when he can no longer use the faucet, it starts to bug him). Point is: Your husband has quirks just like you do. They might (read: will) drive you crazy, but you've got to learn how to deal with them.

2. The laundry.
Has anyone else noticed that the ammount of laundry you're doing has somehow tripled despite the fact that there is only one more additional person in the house? Maybe it's just me and my husband, but my lands, the laundry!

3. Exsperation, thy name is newlywed.
There is something about living with your significat other that is equal parts Disney wonderful and "My lands, who ARE you?"
It is wonderful when my husband and I cuddle on the couch and he strokes my hair to calm me down. (Yes, I am essentially a cat)
It is exasperating as heck when I explain to him that no, checking 6 books out from the library is not in fact a lot.
It is wonderful that he lifts heavy objects when we move. (I mean, I probably could...but it would be more difficult)
It is exasperating when we are moving/packing and I literally don't know what's going on (because he has a plan) and stand in a room saying "Tell me what you want me to do" (No joke, this happened at least a dozen times while we were recently moving)

Point is: Living with your love is AWESOME. Except there's this weird relationship where because you love them so much, they have the ability to annoy the hell out of you like no one else.
I think it has something to do with the sex......

4. Sex
This is not graphic. No dirty secrets shall be spilled here. (You have to get at LEAST two martinis in me before that happens ;) ) I will simply say this:
I am discovering that sex is important. It's important to have a lot of it. (I'm talking (ideally) at least every 48 hours here)
There's something about it that brings you closer* and makes you both happy** and your marriage...better.
It's kind of hard to explain. Just do it. Pun fully intended.

*Duh, right?
**Again, duh.

crockpot beer chicken

Okay.  Bear with me on this one.  Sounds weird, right?  Beer with chicken?  And in the crockpot?

The answer is yes. Yes yes yes.

When we got married, my beautiful and wonderful mother gave us a fantastic crockpot that I have been dying to use.  I've had a miniature crockpot (1.5 quarts) for a while, but it was always hard to find or adapt recipes.  Everything I made in it was fairly simple.  Now, I don't have that problem.  I have 6 whole quarts to work with!

So I made a plan.  It involved chicken and chicken stock and -- yes -- beer.

The rest of the plan will show up in posts, I'm sure.  But, basically, the idea was to make the crockpot beer chicken one day, make chicken stock (for the first time!) in the crockpot the next day, and use the leftover chicken in enchiladas the next day!  And the stock could be used for all sorts of soups and meals.  Most of it will be frozen first, then used more creatively later.

First!  The crockpot beer chicken!

Ingredients:

Chicken.  Whatever kind you like: a whole chicken, a cut up chicken, chicken breast, I've even seen other types of meat like pork.  Since I am planning to use the bones and bits for stock, I bought a cut up chicken that came in a pack thing.  The other option I would have gone with was split chicken breast with the bone in.

Beer.  Again, choose your poison.  I went oatmeal stock because it just seemed tasty.  It was also raining when I cooked the chicken, so the full flavor was pretty tasty and appropriate.

Spices.  Whatever kind you like that you think goes with your flavor.  I went with things like garlic, basil, a touch of oregano, cumin for spice, and salt and pepper.

Directions:
Load the chicken into the crockpot.  I rinsed mine first because it was organic chicken and I like to rinse things quickly most of the time. Just a quick pass under water for me.

After the chicken is in, pour in the beer then add your spices.

Cook on low for 8-10 hours or until done.  This is one of those great recipes to leave while you're at work and come home to the hard part of dinner already complete.

Easy enough, right? Right.

In case you were wondering, the alcohol cooks out, so it's safe for everyone.  If you don't like the smell of yeast or beer, this is probably not the recipe for you.  Crockpot cooking always means aromas in the house, which I think is half the fun of cooking in a crockpot.  The other half is split between having dinner already made after work and not having to have a hot oven on for a long time.

If you try it, let me know how it works out!

I saved the chicken bones and bits for making stock the next day (post coming soon!) and the chicken we didn't eat that day I shredded to use in chicken enchiladas.  So much potential use for a whole bunch of cooked chicken.

xoxo Susannah

Chchchanges

You might have noticed that Susannah's been posting a lot, and I have been a little absent. That's because my living room currently looks like this:

Yup. We're in the midst of our great moving adventure (more on that later). Which means when I'm not sending e-mails or working, I'm packing and trying to pare down our belongings.
So I'll be a wee bit absent from the blog for a bit.
Don't worry. The other red head will take great care of you.  :)

butter butter everywhere!

I did it! I accomplished a brand new task in the kitchen that I've wanted to try for a while: I MADE BUTTER!

Yes, I realize that some people do this often. Usually, they live on farms or are part of a farm co-op where they get lots of beautiful cream every week.  Us city folk aren't usually too adept at making every single thing for ourselves.  I mean, I'm not.

Matthew and I have been working toward healthier lifestyles.  We can't live in the country (or even in a bigger apartment) just yet, so our lives are changing at a much slower pace.  Our little studio isn't set up like a big beautiful farm kitchen! Or even a medium sized regular kitchen.

This first step to changing the way we eat and live happened mostly by accident.  I picked up a bottle of juice/tea this week at CVS, thinking I was almost out of regular tea I had made and I wanted something besides water with dinner.  Innocent enough. Turns out, the drink was loooooaded with high fructose corn syrup.  It was the second ingredient listed after water.  Now, I won't waste your time here talking about the pros and cons of high fructose corn syrup.  All I'll say is that it's highly processed (something we're trying to stay away from) and it gave me a huge stomach ache.  I mean, I hurt pretty bad.

High fructose corn syrup is officially out of our apartment, never to come back again.

Second?  I started looking more closely at labels (what, exactly, is "natural flavorings?") and blogs and other musings that people had posted and noticing that others are striving toward a more healthy lifestyle with us.  And they have so many good ideas and fun things to try! Where does a girl start?!

With something simple, of course. Butter.  All you need is one ingredient: heavy cream.  And a blender. And some wooden spoons.  That's it.

I found an absolutely wonderful recipe here, complete with super helpful pictures. Who knew making your own butter is so easy?!  I certainly didn't.

it's a little blurry, but i think you can see: it's butter and buttermilk

Mine didn't turn out as pretty as hers, but I got another thing of cream to try out next time.  

one and a half mini jars of butter, and about a cup of buttermilk!

My buttermilk isn't as clear, and my butter isn't quite as solid.  No worries.  The buttermilk will make some buttermilk pancakes a little extra tasty, and the butter will probably disappear pretty quickly!

xoxo Susannah

storage space

As we've been adventuring through the process of moving in together and living together, we've noticed that storage space comes at a premium. (Obviously.)

A list of interesting places that could/do serve as storage space storage space for us:

under the couch
under the bed
shelves
cube baskets (you know the ones I mean)
top of the closet
bottom of the closet

This is just a preliminary list.  Are there any others you can think of?

close encounter of the husband kind

Ladies, I decided to make a list of things that may come up in the course of moving in together, and my own solutions.  I have encouraged Matthew to write his own list for the gentlemen and post it, but that's up to him.  Feel free to take it or leave it, but I thought they might prove helpful to some!

Turns out, he has just as many clothes as you do.
In our case, we have extremely  limited closet space.  As in, it barely fit my clothes, and now it has to fit aaallll our clothing. Plus some storage items.  Plus a vacuum cleaner.  Plus the suitcases and such.  Oy.  The solution? In the words of my grandfather, it's time to "reduce."  This was difficult for me.  I had to donate clothing.  Don't get me wrong, donating to the Salvation Army or another organization is fantastic.  I just wasn't quite prepared.  The consolation was we donated together.  He donated a few items, and I donated a few items.  I even gave up a couple of pairs of shoes. That's love.

There would probably be more room for his stuff if I gave up some books.
Sorry.  Not going to happen.  Not in my case, anyway.  He didn't actually ask me to get rid of them...but I got fairly defensive even thinking about the possibility of losing my book friends. So, we bought more shelves.  Which, incidentally enough, also housed the movie collection he refused to give up (not that I asked him to, either.)  Stubborn all around, but we make it work.


He eats so much food! 
Use coupons when shopping to reduce cost a little.  (I suspect there will be a future post on this.)  And, when cooking, cook larger portions (generally cook for 3 or 4 people) and save them for leftovers.  I also try to keep milk and cereal on hand for "second dinner," when Matthew gets hungry at about 9:30pm.


Goodness, there's so much laundry.
Yes. No solution for this one.  Someone is just going to have to do it. One of you or both of you, whichever works.


He says the apartment is too girly.
Well, work that out between the two of you.  Matthew vetoed the flowered bed linens.  I vetoed the uber manly linens.  He buys me flowers to put in my pitchers, and in return I don't put anything sparkly on the walls. And I limit the number of throw pillows. You're welcome.



xoxo Susannah

Butterfinger Bars!

That is a totally misleading name for these, as they taste nothing like Butterfingers, but this is a Grandma recipe, and you don't mess with Grammie.*
Interesting side story*: All when I was growing up, I LOVED these things. And Grammie only made them at Christmas time. I'm not even sure I ever had the presence of mind to ask for them other times of the year, so strongly did I associate these with Christmas.
And then a few weeks ago, on a random July day, I made them.
And let me tell you. They taste just as good in July as they do in December. They also bring back lots of warm fuzzy memories, which really, all good food should right? Good. Recipe!

Ingredients:
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup butter or oleo(shortening)
4 cups quick oats
1 cup chocolate chips
3/4 cup peanut butter (creamy is best)

1. Pre-heat oven to 350.
2.Melt butter in microwave or on stove top
3. Pour oats and melted butter into 9x13 baking dish. Mix well until oats are coated with butter. Pat down.
4. Bake oats for 15-20 minutes(IMPORTANT: Do not over bake, as bars will crumble. I've found that 14-15 minutes at 350 works well. If worried, pull oats out early to test for firmness)
5. Let cool in pan to room temperature
6. Melt 1 cup chocolate chips over hot water(use a double broiler, or metal bowl over a small pot of boiling water)
7. Mix in peanut butter.
8. Spread over baked oat mixture
9. Place in fridge or freezer until chocolate is hard (I've found that if you're in a hurry, the freezer works best. My batch was solid in less then 30 mintues)


*This was confirmed last week when once by accident, and once on purpose I fudged the recipe.
The results were just awful.

baked split chicken breast

I recently discovered that split chicken breast goes on sale frequently at my grocery store.  (Yes, I know I"m probably the last person to figure this out.  Sorry, goodness.)  While we're living on one income, being more economical has become more than just a hobby and transformed into a new adventure.

Now, I don't have much experience cooking, so that's been an adventure, as well.  Turns out I'm a reasonable cook; I'm just lacking in experience.  Thankfully, the internet is positively rife with recipes and recipe ideas and tips and tricks. 

So! What to do with the split chicken breast awaiting my attention in the freezer? What a good opportunity to use one of my new baking dishes!

After an extensive amount of googling for temperatures and times and some basic ideas, I decided to have fun and make my own version. 

Recipe (sort of) for your perusal:

Preheat oven to 375 degrees farenheit.

Ingredients:
pack of split chicken breast
olive or canola oil (whichever you like better)
butter
spices you like with chicken (this time, I used basil, salt, garlic, cilantro, and just a touch of chili powder to keep things interesting)

1.  Spread a little butter or oil around the bottom of your baking pan (13x9 or whatever you need to fit the chicken) to prevent the chicken from sticking.

2.  Layout the chicken in the baking dish. Skin side up!

3.  In a small or medium bowl, combine enough olive or canola oil with melted butter to equal somewhere around a quarter cup (I think my mixture ended up being just over a quarter of a cup).  My own concoction was about half canola oil and half melted butter.  To this mixture, add whatever spices you want to try with your chicken.  Mix well with a spoon.

4.  Baste or spoon the mixture onto the top of your chicken.  Use it all!

5.  Put the chicken in the oven for 35-40 minutes or until the juices run clear when you poke the meaty part of the chicken with a fork.

How did yours turn out?  Mine was a hit with the hubby, and it makes great leftovers!

On marriage.

Marriage is hard.
I say this a lot.
And it's not because I don't love my husband. I love him to death. He makes me giddy, and happy and he makes me feel so so loved. I think he might be the most amazing man I've ever known.
And I say that marriage is hard a lot (especially to my single, longing to be married friends) because I feel like it's important to be honest about marriage. There's still a perception that getting married is a fairy tale. That once your married your life is fun and romantic and giggly and just fantastic.
And parts of it (most of it even!)are.
But parts of it are days where the love of my life annoys the hell out of me.

So we're learning.

We're learning to fight cleanly.
Sometimes that means biting my tongue and NOT saying the witty but incredibly mean remark that pops into my head.

We're learning to fight openly.
Sometimes that means venting my emotions at him. We both yelled the other day in the car. This is remarkable because we try very hard to never yell at each other, and are mostly successful. It's important to fight cleanly, yes. But sometimes you can't be calm and clear. Sometimes, you just have to let your frustration out.

We're learning that making each other laugh during fights is the best thing in the world.
Oftentimes when we're arguing one of us will do something ridiculous or just veer off into another topic entirely. I'm sure it wouldn't work for most couples. But for us? It helps.

We're learning to be in close proximity, and touching, during fights.
It is very very hard for me to be mad at my husband when I'm holding his hand or hugging him. It takes away the anger and just leaves the issue.

But mainly we're practicing forgiveness. We fight sure, but two to five minutes after the fight, my husband has cracked a joke or I've said something wildly inappropriate and we're back to being us. Which to me, is what it's all about.

You're going to fight. It's normal. You live with this person, you have sex with this person*, and you spend a crap ton of time together. You're a family. So they're going to irritate you. The thing to remember is that you love them...even when they're in the midst of annoying the hell out of you.**

*I mean, hopefully.
**This is obviously much easier said then done.

an afternoon in the sun

After being so active on our honeymoon, Matthew and I wanted to make sure we stayed more active this summer.  He works mostly evenings (the life of the hospitality industry employee...), so our relaxing-together time mostly happens during the day or on the two evenings a week he isn't working.

We end up being creative about our "date nights."  Since they occur during the day and money is a bit tight at the moment, our dates have become a little more creative.  We're working our way through a couple of tv shows, but that doesn't fall in the category of "active," unless you count pressing the remote as a form of exercise.

So, recently, we've taken to grabbing the frisbee or soccer ball and heading out to the park. Does anyone else do this?  We love it.  Matthew and I spend time at the park being active and getting in some exercise and sun, then head home to make lunch (or dinner) and shower before he has to go to work or before we settle in for a glass of wine and those tv shows we're working through.

Other cheap date ideas we've tried: picnics, wine and a movie in, local movie-in-the-park nights, local food festivals, book or cultural festivals, kayaking for an hour or two, baseball games (we bring our own sandwiches on weeks when the budget is tight), etc.

Got any other ideas to share?

xoxo Susannah

My fears about studio living

Don't get me wrong. I am JAZZED about moving into my little studio.
But I have some worries.
So I'm making a list. *

1. I am not a neat person. My husband is. This has already caused several sessions of energetic discussions in our marriage. In an apartment with no doors, I'm afraid my messiness will get out of control. The flip side is, this might cause me to be neater...

2. We currently have a dishwasher. We are moving to an apartment with no dishwasher. I'm the type of person who can (and has) leave dishes sitting in the sink for a week. I'm also not as through a dishwasher as my engineering husband.

3. Storage. I like stuff. I have a lot of tchotchkies and stuffed animals and photos. I want to make our apartment feel grown up and pretty and not like a college dorm. I'm just not sure how to achieve that.


Mainly, I'm worried about the neatness and the stuff. I mean, we are definitely getting  rid of a ton of furniture before we move, and I'm excited about using the porch as a second living area** but I'm worried about containing my "ness" without making it feel like I'm cleaning all the time.

Susannah do you have any older and wiser thoughts? :)

Susannah here! Since we both love lists, let me move through the thoughts numerically.  But I'm not any older or wiser!  Just been squished in a smaller space for a teensy bit longer.

1.  For the record, I have the same problem! My husband is kiiiiind of a neat freak.  And by kind of, I mean he can't sit down and relax until the apartment is reasonably picked up.  Which drives me crazy because then he can't relax with me on my time table.  In my mind, the cleaning could happen later. Or tomorrow. Or any other time than relaxing time.

(As a small side note, I have a few personal areas of neat-freak-ness.  I have to have a clean bathroom. Must have. It's weird, I know.)

The short (hah) version is the smaller apartment has helped me figure out the areas where I need personal work, areas I can happily take care of, and areas where it's just better if I don't do that.  I have learned -- it was hard at first -- that sometimes Matthew needs to pick up around the apartment for 10 minutes before sitting down for a movie or to hang out with me. edit: Anthony's the same way.  And he has learned that he's just always going to have to help me change the sheets because I hate doing it.  At the same time, he knows the bathroom will always be clean...buuuttt I won't guarantee those dishes won't sit there for a few days until I feel good and ready to wash them.  As for the rest of it...we're working on it. And it's a good learning experience for us. 


2.  If he cares so much about the dishes, why not trade something?  For example, what if you promise -- and you'll have to follow through -- to always clean out the drain or do the laundry or keep a room picked up if he'll almost always take care of the dishes?  If that's not a good way for you, then...maybe it's helpful to know that I find dishes much more enjoyable late at night.  I can think and listen to the tv in the background and it gives me something to do while Matthew works in the evenings. That was our first thought too...to have it be a trade. We fear we'll just end up resenting each other if one of us always does a certain chore. But hey! We're working on it too :)


3.  Shelves and walls!  Since studios are so tiny, your best unexplored storage space is on your walls!  We put in shelves above the couch.  I already had some next to the bed.  I use the space on top of my "kitchen" cabinets to store things like canned food and foil.  The space on top of my free-standing shelves is my "display space" for my "stuffs."  If that's not enough space for your things, then I'll let you in on a secret my mother once told me: if you rotate all the little things, they seem like new every time and you don't get tired of them.  You could store some of it, display some of it, and rotate some of the things in a few months or a year or so. 


You can do this!  Another cleaning tip I've heard that helps me sometimes: set a timer for 10 minutes and clean with the fury of one of those superwives that always seems to have a clean house, a well-fed husband, and loud-and-happy children.  Just 10 minutes. Then go relax.  Later in the evening, clean or pick up for 10 more minutes. Shorter increments make picking up easier to handle.  Or, if a Gilmore Girls marathon is on and you simply can't tear yourself away, clean during commercials! 


Hope my silly-person ideas are helpful!

*Since we're going to be spending a lot of time together you should know: I LOVE lists. And office supplies. They make me happy.
**Obviously, this will work best in the summer time, but I'm hopeful that I can find a fall/winter solution as well.

on flooring

In our tiny apartment, we knew we had at least one top priority that didn't involve the closet: the floors. The floor is mostly hardwood, for which I have a reusable fake-swiffer thing.  The reusable pad is awesome and I use it pretty often.

This meant that the only thing I couldn't clean easily was the large area rug and the smaller rug in the kitchen.  This may not sound like a big deal to you.  However, between those two rugs, that's over half of the apartment that I was cleaning with a lint roller and a sub-par handvac.  I'm not kidding.  A lint roller. On my hands and knees with a lint roller.

But this week was a momentous occasion!  We bought our first vacuum cleaner!

The rugs are happy. The husband is happy.  I'm ecstatic.

Dirty rugs are now a thing of the past!

I highly recommend investing in a vacuum cleaner.  Seriously.  It has already saved us two cleaning meltdown-arguments and we've had it for less than a week. 

xoxo Susannah