winter wonderland in the slope

walking in a winterland!

that's what i did yesterday... except i didn't make a snowman - i just did laundry and stuff.

this is the veiw from our front door {well not our front door door - but the door to the outside of the building - this is what we see when we step outside}



and this is what we see if we look right... super pretty right



this is looking at our block from the other corner



our building. from across the street - SO MUCH SNOW!



7th ave was pretty well plowed - some of the sidestreets however {like all of them} were not. it was so cool because there were groups of people walking around with snow shovels and guarding streets - helping people dig their cars out and young men helping little old ladies cross the street. store keepers are all out shoveling the side walk and EVERYBODY's out - it's like a party - kids sleding down the street and resourceful shoppers using sleds to transport their groceries. people letting people pass and saying "excuse me" and "thank you" and everybody is being neighborly... I LOVE IT!!!





me in front of the laundry mat





it was cold but the wind was the worst! it hits your face and in some of the pictures it looks like it's snowing... but it's not it snowed ALL DAY sunday... but not at all yesterday - just fluries



we got icicles on our kitchen window. so exciting! i heart icicles



i got snow boots yesterday. REAL snow boots - not just ones that are cute but not really functional in NY snow {mitch is so proud} they are so nice. and though they are ugly... i think they are kinda cute too. but more than that they are waterproof and warm and have AMAZING traction! i love them


see: they have this super smart technology in the grips - when the temp drops the rubber grips freeze so you get better traction. cool huh

merry christmas!

merry christmas everyone! i hoped you all had a beautiful holiday

the north face

mitch is working at the North Face in SoHo. he loves it times 2!

Happy Halloween

Me and mitch love love LOVE halloween! pumkins and costumes and treats oh my!

park slope gets CRAZY for halloween. thousands of trick or treaters and so many people on the streets and a parade and everything.

this year we went to the Brown's annual Halloween Mac & Cheese party. it was so fun. you didn't have to dress up but more than half did. good times and we tried some stellar mac&cheese.


Brock and Audrey came as a cow and a cowgirl.




mitch came as dracula/an old fashion vampire {not one of those "fake" vampires from twilight or true blood - he needed people to know that} and i came as Hermione Granger from harry potter.
mitch got some crap for not being harry potter from some people but he had so much fun being a vampire {he likes the scary part of halloween} and we've never gone as a "couple" for halloween we were newsies one year together but that's it. we will someday though. we're looking forward to being mary poppins and burt - but it will take more than 3 days and $30 to prepare. so for now we went as dracula and hermione because mitch just finnished salems lot and i'm making my way through the harry potter books.







audrey said we needed a picture of mitch biting my neck: so here it is

note my books. i came so prepared: history of wizardry and witchcraft, potions, and tranfiguration {with prof. McGonagall}

matt brown as the sweedish chef

The Pretty Parts of Redhook

we finally found it!

we were told Redhook was pretty {the place-not the brewery-which is now in new york-ish} but we didn't believe them. we tried to find it numerous times... just to end up at ikea {which is fine} but we wanted to see the cute shops and the waterfront and the broken down trolly...

well we found it! we went to the redhook harvest festival and got lost trying to find it and in the process... ENDED UP IN THE PRETTY PART OF REDHOOK!! i was so happy - you don't even know! i'm still so happy!

so know we know: all the cute cafes, wine shops and boutiques are on Van Bront ave. and all the side streets off of Von Bront are little cobble stone roads. i want to live on coffey street. and if you just walk down von bront, do you know where you end up? the waterfront! it's a beautiful thing.

pretty cool huh

so we made it to the Redhook community farm where the harvest festival was... and decided it would have been alot better if it wasn't across the street from IKEA. but it was still fun. full of families and hipsters and urbanites oh my.


i got corn on the cob from RICE. it comes covered with mayo and cheese and something else but i wasn't brave enough for that so i got it plain. it was sooo good and sweet. Rice is a very hip place- lots of tofu and unrecognizable things on their menu. i got matches from them too {ps: i'm a pyromaniac now - goodbye to the girl who was afraid of fire - hello to the one that just likes to watch things burn}





the farm has chickens on it. my favorite one was the one that looked like a monarch butterfly - i couldn't pet it though because only four people were aloud in the coop at once... and kids get dibs {they don't put that on the sign though} and there were bunnies too.



we shared some cider. it was sooo good! mitch said it's,

"the best cider i can recall - but i can't commit to the best cider ever"

i don't know the cider was pretty good - it had chunks of apple in it and everything - but mitch made a really really really good cider when we were living in Ballard {that's my top pick} and i think even the cider we had at the apple orchard was better.

we are now officially cider connoisseurs. check it.


leaving Redhook and heading back to the slope we met up with drew and anna at Pacific Standard to catch the Cal game. i had an alternate agenda - i wanted to play settlers of catan - and i figured i could wait out the game {what?! it's not like they're the cougs and football can be boring if you don't care}

but the game was going so badly {they were playing USC - it wasn't going to go good} so we got to play settlers WHILE the game was going on. ROCK ON! super fantastic.

a piece of the country

welcome to upstate new york! it's amazing how the scenery changes by getting a couple hours out of the city.

we had a fall church retreat that we went to. yay camping!










we went to this really cool orchard. and we u-picked our own apples.























we saw pretty berries; but we didn't eat them - they could have been poisonous. we ate LOTS of apples though. we had to taste them to make sure they were okay you know... plus ron said it was alright- and ron's good with rules - he wouldn't have said that if it were illegal.






after apple picking and apple eating we headed back to the shop area for hot cider {delicious} and famous apple cider doughnuts


the doughnuts were AMAZING. they came out

hot hot hot

and delicious... sooo delicious! best doughnuts ever - there was a big line but they were totally worth the wait. the line was so huge because they couldn't make them fast enough to keep up with the orders. and you were limited to 1 1/2 dozen per person. we shared a half dozen between the four of us {we were all super good - because we could have eaten sooo much more till we were sick!}





we weren't really "roughing it" per say... but we were fully prepared to. the camp sight had cabins and a mowed lawn and real bathrooms {i appreciate that} but we were all caught off guard when the temperature hit 21 degrees saturday night. i was very fortunate because mitch got me a sleeping bag that is for 20 degree weather so i was set. and we all hung out by the campfire.













one of the guys has this stellar star gazing set up. so we went stargazing - it was alot colder away from the campfire but totally worth it. we saw jupiter and the for moons circling around it {pretty wild} and the milky way galaxy and the 7 sisters {andromida} and this cool constellation mitch discovered called alexandria. {he's pretty sweet to me}



we don't see stars here at all. when we went to montauk it was the first time we'd {okay just me - because mitch has been back to seattle} seen stars since moving to NYC.





when you wake up in a tent at 8am it is VERY bright

mitch loves camping




the next day we went to a harvest festival. it was so disappointing though- it was more like a farmers market. the best part: maple drop candies.











last day of camp