post-party relaxation

The housewarming party was a success! Everyone came, everyone ate, and everyone had a good time. I'm crazy sore from cleaning, cooking and mingling all day, but it's worth it. I have a ton of photos, and they'll all be here soon. For now...I need to clean up and start writing out my thank-you notes, and start planting my new flowers. And OH SHITE! I'm off tomorrow! This is amazing.

entertaining

We got a grill! Chris' mom generously offered to give us something for our open house this Saturday, and let Chris pick out a kickass grill. It's silver and pretty, and propane, so it's super fast and easy. This is great: something to knock off our list, that we don't have to worry about anymore. I love it! Chris said he's not too familiar with grilling, so we're going to grill every night to practice. I totally support this.

As for the rest of the "to-do before the party" list...it's coming along. Kind of. We bottled beer tonight, so I'm going to have to clean the kitchen again, but it's okay -- I'd planned on doing it one more time before Saturday anyway. I just need to get a new dress, get all the ingredients for the food I plan on cooking, and then...cook it. Man, for "fast" and "easy" appetizers, these seem like they're going to be a pain in the ass.

My flowers are looking a little haggard right now, unfortunately. I think I bought/planted them too soon, you know? Since the weather has been insanely hot right now, they seem to be getting sunburned. I don't really know what to do -- I've been putting them in the garage during the day so they don't dry (or fry) but then they don't get ANY sun, and they only get watered when I come home. Oh, well.

I also joined two Yahoo! groups, called Ferndale Freecycle and Metro Detroit Plant Exchange. Hopefully I can end up with some cool stuff from those. I'm a little intimidated by the knowledge those people already have, where I'm barely a beginner. But hopefully they'll be cool.

ouch.

Oh man...running a 5k after NOT running for three months, then garden shopping, mall shopping and weeding/planting makes for one sore lady. My chiropractor would be so pissed. At least I have this cozy, pretty house to relax in. :-)

planting

I'm a mommy! Look:

I don't remember what I planted, but it's growing. So exciting! I've done a lot more, too -- mostly in pots, but a lot in the beds in the front of the house.

bought from Craigslist.org for $10. I love it!

the decorated pots are from a series sold at TJ Maxx and Home Goods. I love the colors and details.

got the fleur de lis spike at Pier 1. I could live in that store.

the huge dahlia will live for a while, I hope -- at least through our party next weekend.

A lady who apparently lives on our street (never seen her before) gave us some hostas last night, and I might be getting more of those and some daisies from other people. What I really want are trees, so I joined a Yahoo! group called the Metro Detroit Plant Exchange, and another called Ferndale Freecycle. Hopefully the members in those can help me out -- and hook me up!

arty!

Pretty excited for the arts and crafts show next weekend.

http://www.seoartfair.com/

Local stuff! A great city! Check it out!

milestones!

We've been in our amazing, adorable, cozy house for a month. A whole month! I never want to leave. I love it here! Congratulations to us!

one month down...

Tomorrow we'll have been in our house for a whole month. A month! This house has come so far, and so have we. We moved in to a tiny, bland house with boring, white walls and no character, and we colored the crap out of it and spread our heart all over the place. I love it!

We still haven't really met the neighbors, but their cats have sure been coming around quite a bit. We love having them around in the front yard, but they keep trying to get inside. It sucks -- they're so sweet and loving, and their owner, who lives across the street, never seems to let them in. I found little Emma Frost (yes, we named them all after X-Men) sitting under my car a couple mornings ago. Heartbreaking.

Emma Frost and Nightcrawler. Beast wasn't around yesterday when I was shooting them.

those eyes!

so adorable. :-)

Comcast! Come on!

Wtf, Comcast? They charged us like $151 for a month of service that sucked basically the entire time. A note to others: our internet continually went out for two weeks and our "HD" channels continually became pixelated and difficult to watch. Totally lame. We are about to cancel cable altogether and just survive on downloaded series and Netflix. It's all we need, anyway, and saving money is more important than having four hours of "Clean House" on Saturday mornings (though we do love kicking back to that with some coffee). Anyway, watch out kiddies. Watch out!

greenery

Mild success in gardening in the front yard this week. My chiropractor scolded me for doing it, but with only three weeks until our open house, I need to get the outside...habitable. I realize not everything will get done in three weeks, but I can do as much as possible.

Oh! And then there's the menu! I'm thinking fruit salad, bean salad, several appetizers I've got the recipes for (thanks, Rachael Ray) and hopefully Chris' homemade wheat beer. Mmm. Guess I need to get cookin...

flowers

So, I need some planting advice: my house faces north and south, and I want to make the front (north) look super pretty. I love the wildflower look -- daisies, meadow grass, that sort of thing. Can I plant that sort of stuff on the north face of my house and have it thrive? I'm new to all this, so I'm looking for help wherever I can get it.

three weeks!

The first mortgage check is in! It still seems unreal to me.

We've been in the house since April 12, and I feel like with everything we've done, I haven't updated at all. There's so much to do all the time, and we're constantly updating the decor, the paint and the furniture. We finally hung my lovely World Market curtains, and I think they really pop against our walls.

We also had a bit of a surprise: coming up to the bedroom to find our cats asleep on the same bed. !! It almost seemed as though they didn't realize the other was there, and when our "aww"s became too much for them, they finally jumped off. Still adorable, though.

Last weekend we went to the Ikea store, and even though we tried to get in to exactly what we needed, it was still crazy overwhelming. That place is its own city, man.

Like I said, this still seems unreal to me. Yeah, the bills have started coming and the yard needs to be mowed and flowers need to be planted and we're constantly putting holes in the walls to hang things each day, but I love this house more and more every minute. We haven't even been here a month, and already neither of us ever wants to leave. It's weird -- we moved to Ferndale so we could be closer to all the restaurants, bars and shops we love, but we dig being in our house so much it's the only place we want to be.

We've set a date for the open house (May 29!) so I guess it's time to get to work. The items on the to-do list on the refrigerator aren't going to cross themselves off...