Ashley's Rowhome

Random pics

2011-04-18T19:28:00.000-04:00

So I guess I suck at blogging even when I have boatloads of time.

Update on the job situation:

Things moved amazingly fast on that front, then slow. I actually got a call about an interview from the first job application I submitted (for a different position) and had an interview and an offer within a week. Yay me. Except due to processes at the employer, I don't start til May 9. My summer vacation comes early. I'm planning a trip down to South Florida for the end of April.

Here's a few pics I've taken recently to summarize what I've been doing:

Shopping! I got this new welcome mat today. I walked by it and did a double take. At only $9.99 I couldn't walk away without it.

I wish my front flowers were doing better. I planted a few red tulips that were looking good to the left of the door that have mysteriously disappeared (bulbs and all) before I got to snap a pics. The biggest pot has perennial orange lilies that are not back yet.

I'm jealous of the red tulips in front of the Hopkins Bayview campus:

On gardening, My indoor window boxes in the kitchen:

Spearmint, a small pot of Armada Roses, an orchid.

And waiting to go outside:

Tomato, Cukes, basil, rosemary, chives, lettuces (spring mix seed packet).

Here's the current sorry state of last year's lovely patio:

aka a trash pile from a project of replacing the upstairs windows. Ideally the lettuces will go in the shoe holder on the fence. The rest will live in the raised bed that is currently covered in windows to keep the rats out (ick).

Also I recently got back in to Acting! I was in the Vagina Monologues and most recently The Good Body, both by Eve Ensler. For the latter I made a collage for the set:

The idea is it is the messages from "the media" women get about what is beautiful (GOOD) and the products that will make us that way. All in the shape of an "ideal" feminine figure.

Since I had the cast party at my place, it's actually clean enough to share pics.

(Action shot of Sushi the cat. Cats are always getting up in my pics)

The chairs were a refurb I did with my Mom last summer. A before and after post will follow, but I think they need something else, like cute pillows.

Cooking/making messes. Because I'm sitting around/surfing the net a lot I get random urges to try out a new recipe I find. Cue Strawberry Scones at 3:30 to use some ugly berries in my fridge.

Here's the mess I made of the kitchen:

I used this recipe because I had everything on hand (uses yogurt instead of cream, I used a lowfat vanilla instead of the recommended orange flavor). I gotta say my batter was way runny and they came out more like muffin tops. The OJ-powdered sugar icing is delish.

Mostly, I've been running errands. Trips to Home Depot, getting my car its maintenance (two trips to an auto shop), shopping, giving my friends rides at hours most people are working, etc.

Here's a kinda artsy shot driving over the Key Bridge.

Ok, maybe I'll remember to blog more. I still have to show off the projects in my bedroom!

One.

2011-03-30T11:06:00.000-04:00

One job application in. I think I will be awesome at the position, in a seemingly brand new department at a hospital. Too bad I messed up their online application process and had to end up submitting my name twice. Oh well, it's not like I'm claiming I'm highly technical.... Oh wait, I am... Sigh.

As soon as I finished updating my resume and cover letter my ADD (and the morning's coffee) kicked in and I ended up re-caulking my bathroom window and back door, and touch-up painting the half bath. After about 6 years (I'm assuming) the toilet paper holder just wasn't staying in the wall, so I had to move it, re-mount it, fill in the holes, and repaint. My parents will be glad to know that the toilet paper is no longer mounted directly below the hand towel, which led to water drips on the roll.

I'm definitely more in the maintenance phase of my house. While fixing the TP holder I noticed the floor could use a caulk touch-up and the air vent could look better white. Out of caulk and spray paint. Home Depot run is eminent.

Gregory sensed I wanted to take a pic of something and sprang to action.

And here is the status of my plant babies. Most of the ones on the right were planted two Saturdays ago, with the rest started Friday (productive first day of unemployment). Paper egg carton is a spring mix of lettuces, unlabeled white ones are tomatoes. Also: cucumbers (tallest sprouts), rosemary, chives, basil, some tomato sprouts, peppers.

Back to blogging

2011-03-26T11:32:00.000-04:00

So it's been a while since I've dropped by here. I think I even have a few sets of projects pics I completed but didn't post.

Overall, my house is pretty much "done" but I do have a few pieces of ugly furniture I never improved last year.

I was busy, but due to a surprise "elimination of my position" I now have loads of free time. In order to not go crazy with boredom as I will now spend the majority of the day in my house, I am setting goals for myself:

Research my career (engineering/IT for healthcare, if you were wondering)
Search and apply for jobs
Work on final house projects
blog completed house projects
Search and apply for jobs
Exercise more (Kinect in my basement, and walks around the park when it warms up!)
Cook good food for myself and friends
Keep a healthy garden (seeds are started!)
Volunteer at Banner (get out of the house)
Network
Search and apply for jobs.

The last time I was out of work it was for 3 months and I pretty much stayed in the house all the time clicking "Apply" to anything remotely related on CareeerBuilder, and went a little crazy over time.

This time will be different, This is also a time to focus on me and think of life outside the 9-5.

Patio complete!

2010-07-05T15:41:00.002-04:00

8 days after it began, construction was complete. The contractor said 3 days. Contractor man, why can't you just overestimate and tell me 10 days, then leave me really happy when its completed early? Instead I'm left frustrated. If someone asks I'll say it was good work, but have to tell them about how it took more than twice as long as your estimate, you woke me up early for stupid questions, and you rushed cleanup, leaving concrete speckles on my door and trash cans. Sigh, enough negativity. Here's the pictures!

Before:

(of course I waited until the crew showed up to snap pictures)

Cellar door that I would never have been able to open. And look at the nasty broken concrete!

Old gate. No privacy.

Gregory the cat wondering why this looks so ghetto. And in case you were wondering, IKEA Lack tables were not meant to get rained on.

During:

Goodbye, wall!

Goodbye, door and stairs to basement!

After:

Hello, place for Prius!!

Hello, private patio! (Gate is open in)

Hi, herb and vegetable garden!

From left to right, Basil, Tomatoes (I forget which kinds made it from seeds, so I will be surprised later. Some Big Boys, Cherry, and heirlooms were planted at different points), Jalapeno pepper, green peppers, chilli pepper, eggplant, and squash. Not pictured: Dill, parsley, and Blue Basil to the left, Cucumbers to the right.

Grill where the awful metal door was. Wildflower seed sprouts on the table.

New locking gate. Red chair and cute pillow from Home Depot.

I also have a bunch of pictures on how I built the vegetable bed (it's pretty much the size of a coffin, and of course I had to get a pic of me laying in it. Because I am weird.) that I'll save for another post.

I'll probably hang some flower beds off the fence for more color in the future, but I'm invested enough time and money into this area for this month.

Time to grill some farmers market goodies (peaches, corn, eggplant) and steak tonight! I don't want this long weekend to be over.

Construction!

2010-06-24T11:35:00.001-04:00

Construction! is going on in my back "yard." Having contractors around has been...interesting. I got a million (or 6) quotes from different people who came recommended by neighbors, and went with the cheapest (big surprise). After meeting him a few times to talk about the project, I signed a contract Saturday morning and gave him a check for a third of the project cost. (A bit scary handing that check over) He told me he would start Tuesday morning at 8am, given there was no problem getting the permit on Monday. I called and checked on Monday afternoon that everything was good, and he said he'd be there at 7:30am. (Which is when I'm usually rolling out of bed and into the shower, grumpy.) I got up (and dressed) early and his crew appeared at 7:15! I guess early is way better than late or not showing up at all.

They've started early the last few days. Yesterday he rang the doorbell right as I was getting out of the shower, causing me to run down in my pink robe, and got another peek at the robe as I had just hit the snooze button when the damn doorbell rang. Plus, the house sounding like it is under siege (pounding, scraping, jackhammers) is freaking out the cats.

I'll do a post when it is finished with before, during, and after pics. This will be a busy weekend, as though I could have asked them to build one for me, I'm convinced I have to build a raised flower/vegetable bed by myself. My plants (most from seeds) will finally have a home!

Here's a pics of my flowers out front. Sunflowers (from seeds) and daylilies I bought at the Farmers' market last year that decided to come back for this spring!

Ahhhh....

2010-05-29T21:46:00.000-04:00

After an early morning of helping a friend with her moving away yard sale, hitting the Waverly farmers market, gardening, and grocery shopping, despite multiple invites to drinks, here's my Saturday night in:

Mmmm... berries for dinner.

(I am wearing shorts, they're just true to their name.)

garden: before

2010-05-26T22:25:00.000-04:00

OK, so my back area is one thing I will not be DIY-ing. Not at first at least. The way I see it, I need a concrete wall knocked down, break-up current concrete, reinforce with rebar (which I have embarrassingly called rhubarb in public), pour new concrete and add a privacy fence to have a parking pad and private patio/garden and be happy. Once we get up to the finished fence, I have ideas ideas for making the most of the concrete.

This plan (currently in the picking a contractor phase) is not stopping me from starting my summer garden. I started with a couple packs of seeds, and have moved my seedlings into increasing larger pots. Practicing my patience to nurture those seeds...

(Except one day I cheated and bought some berry plants.)

Crappy back area now:

Gross, right?

Greggy is only allowed outside with supervision, so he loves when I'm out gardening.

(Please ignore the huge styrofoam blocks. The only part of a giant ceiling fan packaging that can't be recycled. And the peeling IKEA table that was not meant for the outside.)

Close-up of the bigger pots. Raspberries, strawberries, and a couple tomatoes.

Grow strawberries, grow!

Some deformed raspberries

Today's raspberry harvest. I should start a CSA!

And my topsy-turvy tomato planter:

All these pics are actually a week old, because I even procrastinate on blogging.

Now the little white pots on the table that held cucumbers have been replanted, and some yellow flowers have appeared on my tomato plants.

And the sunflowers and lilies out front are getting closer to their debut. Pics will come when they decide to show their face.

More projects

2010-05-05T20:00:00.000-04:00

My kitchen was recently featured on Better After, so if you came from Lindsey's lovely site, welcome!

Here's another little project involving slapping paint on ugly wood. I found this little sucker at a yardsale and walked away with it, a teapot, and a paper towel holder for $11.

It needed a few nails to keep the rim on, a good sanding, and some attention.

A lot of sanding. Looks like an animal used the lower shelf as a chew toy.

Luckily I picked up a handheld power sander. (craigslist <3)

And felt powerful.

Then after a couple of coats of red and white:

And the kitchen miscellany collected quickly.

And because I love surprises...

..I added leftover fabric from one of my first projects to the drawer!

More to come, when I get a free weekend. I currently have a nighttable and two plaid 70s chairs to makeover in my livingroom. And a wine cabinet that I've had for almost a year, that I think will be the first wood item I DON'T just paint over. Actual staining will be attempted!

This weekend is visits from family, neighborhood things, and painting a bedroom and installing a ceiling fan.

Wednesday Night Steak

2010-03-24T21:18:00.000-04:00

Haven't blogged in a while, so here's a quickie.

Picked up a book at the library that inspires me to learn to bake my own bread. Stay tuned to see my adventures.

While picking up flour, yeast, cornmeal, etc to prepare, I grabbed a NY Strip. It's a nice day, why not grill a steak on a Wednesday?

Lizzie the housemate returned from England just in time for impromptu steak and raved about my preparation. I thought I'd share the joy. I didn't take process pictures, as I didn't think to post about this until it was cooked. And I can't tell you specifics on how long I cooked it, just a few minutes on each side until I guessed it was ready and it was!

Here's the magic part. Salt the sucker with loads of Kosher salt. You want so much salt you can barely see the red of the meat. I read about this here: How to turn cheap choice steaks into gucci prime steaks which has an explanation and cute little illustrations of salt crystals and rosemary springs invading the meat. I guess I followed this to the T before, and did it by memory today. Once I covered my 1"+ NY Strip with loads of salt, I coarsely chopped a couple heads of garlic and a twig of rosemary (from my 1 year old and still going strong rosemary plant, natch) and smushed it into the salt layer with a fork. Then I used another plate to flip the steaks over and repeat on the other side. Leave them alone for 45min. Chop a potato or two into wedges, drizzle a bit of olive oil over top and bake at 400degrees for about 45minutes. I'm pretty impatient, so I think only heated the grill for about two minutes with a quick spray of Pam before I threw the steaks on. Here's the final product:

Steak, crispy wedges and a pool of Ranch dressing. Mmmmmmm. And the orange craziness is home brewed Thai Iced Tea, which is not as good as from a restaurant, but still pretty tasty.

And in case you're wondering? Perfect medium rare.

And yes, I am eating at the decoupage table in front of the TV. Dining room tables are for dinner parties.

I picked up a cute nightstand to refinish, and found pics of something else I haven't posted yet, so house project posts will resume. Currently I'm busy planning a neighborhood block party (there are over 300 hamburger/hotdog buns in my car) for Saturday to get people outside to socialize and also discuss the importance of filling out the Census. Be counted!

RIP Grandma Sue

2010-02-26T21:32:00.000-05:00

I've been in Florida with my family since Wednesday organizing a celebration of my grandmothers life. She has had varied health problems for years, but has been in and out of surgeries and rehab centers since October. She passed Monday.

This has been a good time to spend with the family. I'm actually terrible at keeping in touch with family and friends unless we are in the same zip code. Luckily, my grandparents got the chance to visit me and my humble (or not so, since I feel it deserved a blog) abode in August. My grandfather told me yesterday that she was so proud of me and my house, and my craftiness. We have spent the last few days organizing her craft hobbies. We found enough faux flowers to create over 20 arrangements for the service, stamps and cards to create homemade thank you cards for the neighbors who have brought us days worth of food, and all the supplies needed for memory boards of photos.

My job has been to scan and organize old photos into a slideshow for the service. These are some of my favorites:

Not sure why there is a garter involved (not a wedding). Spunky lady!

Here's a couple of us over the years:

(That mumu was one of her faves, and is still in her closet over 20 years later.)

And here's one from August:

She was a short little lady (I'm about 5'5" and she's on the step!), but did not fade into the background. She let you know what she wanted and when she wanted it. She's always been independent, but makes sure everyone around her is taken care of too.

We're estimating over 100 guests at the service tomorrow.

My $13 Kitchen facelift

2010-02-15T23:16:00.003-05:00

Yay! The snowing ceased (I'm ignoring the little recurrence today) and I made it out of the city over the weekend to purchase supplies for my dream kitchen backsplash (well, until I can replace it with some hot mini-mosaic tile).

Almost 2 rolls of Scotch mounting tape (which I actually found at a dollar store), and about 11 Ikea placemats later, a new look!

But first I want to give props to my inspiration, from this post on Curbly, transforming a rental kitchen with dollar store placemats.

Before:

I hate the pinkish tile that clashes with the beige-toned marble.

But the thought of ripping that all off (all the way up around the window too) and losing my kitchen for days stressed me out.

Here's a couple of hours over 2 days, no mess...

After:

TaDa!!!

I know it's not for everyone, but I love it. My kitchen pops! Has personality!

Here's in progress:

Measure the area, mark off cuts in dry-erase (which wipes off when you need it to), chop with kitchen shears, stickies on back and place it on the wall! Shiny side on the back will provide extra uses for the extra placemats I bought in case of failure.

And the outlet plates help to hold them on.

Magically, the green dots match the mat and towel I bought ages ago.

Also part of the kitchen upgrade was a wine glass rack:

And a storage shelf, which needs some upgrading before pictures.

Productive weekend!

Please stop snowing

2010-02-07T16:57:00.000-05:00

To clarify, it's not current snowing. I measured 22" outside my front door from Saturday. While I could have trekked over to the park and had more sledding fun, I'm still not 100% from LAST weekend's cold. I figure freezing and exercise will not be good for me in my weakened state. So I stayed inside, watching movies, doing my homework, and contemplating future house projects.

I have a new idea for my kitchen.

It involves 13 of these (measured about 12, but one extra for mistakes):

(Ikea placemat: $0.99)

And something to do with this area:

I hate my backsplash. It has the most awful pink tinted tiles. I want to have an awesome mosaic tile backsplash, but that would require peeling the pink ones off, and probably losing my kitchen for at least a weekend. I think for $13 of placemats and some heavy duty double-sided sticky tape it's worth a shot at a change.

This project is dependent on me actually digging my car out of the snow and making it out to the White Marsh Ikea. This is much more likely to happen if we don't get a blizzard every weekend! (Two in a row, but who is counting?!)

Weather gods, please stop torturing me.

Dresser Re-Do`

2010-02-03T21:53:00.001-05:00

I bought this cute little dresser for $50 on craigslist, which was even a bonus for being less than a mile from my house. Buying local!

It was the perfect size for the bedroom I am renting out as furnished. (She is from abroad so she doesn't have the insane amount of accumulated clothes I have stuffed in mine) The only problem is that the darker wood didn't match the fresh light or white furniture that fills the room.

Before:

Damaged wood, and a kinda grimy contact paper lining inside.

I'm sure someone will say it looks better as wood and hate the after, but sanding is hard and white goes better with the room.

After:

Okay, so I totally cheated. No sanding or primer. Just two coats of white semi-gloss, blue spray paint on the knobs. Time will tell if I will regret cutting corners, but it looks good and is charming for now. I think the white really brings out the design on the bottom.

In progress...

Here are the supplies:

(purple toes!)

What's that brown paper you ask?

Surprise!

The drawer liner was a big pain in the ass. I had to be as precise as possible in cutting it to size, line the drawer sides with protective cardboard, spray a layer of adhesive in, and try to stick the paper down. Correctly. The first time. Sigh. What a pain. The paper is a roll of wrapping paper I saw at the dollar store. (near Eastpoint Mall, which I will agree with a recommendation that it is the best dollar store) There was a drawer (or two) that required an extra strip of paper to fill out an edge.

All in all I'm really happy with it (as is the roomie who uses it), but I think it needs a bit more. A stencil on the side or top? I don't know.

Procrastination!

2010-02-03T21:35:00.000-05:00

It finally takes a decision to spend an evening working on my MS coursework to procrastinate on the school work to blog. That and hearing people actually read this! (Hi, Adam!)

Updates:
(It's been so long since December!)

During the snowstorm (when I wasn't sledding) I was furiously decoupaging (a la my table) a little something for my grandmother's 75th birthday. She recently asked my sister and I to come up with a list of memories of growing up and visiting her house (which is mere blocks from my parents' house). I incorporated clip art representations of the memories and photos of us into a decorative platter. There's a small pic, glare and all, to mask the embarrassing pics of my youth. The ribbon was something I had laying around to wrap it, but I like the addition. It hangs on her dining room wall. My art is spreading.

I left the Baltimore snow of the last post and had a lovely vacation in Sunny South Florida. It's nice to visit the parents and see the gradual changes of my childhood home to the modern world. For a while, I would drag my wireless router on vacation to freely use my computer, now they have their own! A beautiful (Philips) HDTV finally replaced the big clunker (and bigger than mine, jealous!). I was called over to my grandparents house to work on the problem of "My internet is slow. Outlook doesn't work" to find that their 5 year old computer only had 256MB of RAM. Sigh. An upgrade to 1GB allowed Outlook to run without freezing.

It was a lovely trip and I got to have holiday dinner with both sets of grandparents and more. Yummy ham and london broil and my signature cheesy potato casserole. By Christmas evening the eating was over and after multiple family events over the two days I had to go out and go drinking. I first stopped at a little Hollywood dive bar to see my high school buddy J's band jam. He puts free music (his and mixtapes of various artists) on his site, so you should definitely check it out. After a phone call I was rushed to Ft Lauderdale with a promise of a middle-school reunion with my two best friends of that era. Because I allowed myself to drink by planning on bumming off of the rides of others, I had to endure a $26 cab ride to transport from high-school friends to middle-school. Seeing the Sarahs was a fabulous time, but I definitely can not keep up with South Florida...the bars are open until 4! I'm conditioned by Baltimore's last call at 1:30, with the bar clocks set to be fast.

(I'm currently taking a break to watch my cat tear through the house, chasing a big ass fly. I saw it coming near me, and I woke the sleeping pet to take care of it. The fly is big and slow so I think Gregory can catch it. I tried, but I'm no Obama.)

After vacation, I came back and underwent LASIK surgery. Totally worth it. No pain in the surgery (the worst was removing the tape from my lids at the end), and discomfort the first night (I had to keep my eyes closed for 3 hours and couldn't sleep, despite the TylenolPMs they gave me). Sometimes I still feel like I'm wearing contacts and I still reach for glasses in the morning, even though I can see the clock (which I never have been able to do).

At the end of January I took a weekend trip up to Boston. Visiting Chris was wonderful, and we just ate and drank the town with little agenda. We had lovely conversations about how grown-up we are (me a homeowner and him doing really well on the relationship front). And both of us at the young age of.....shhh. The hundred year-old house he rents a room in made me yearn for the comforts (and efficient heating) of my modernized home. I can totally see myself living in Boston at some point. And my company is headquartered up there...hmmm...

Back to Baltimore for a while, back to projects. I'll follow this up with a couple quick posts about my recent furniture make-overs. My current project is decorating the blue wall in the basement, then a wine rack in the kitchen (Dilemma: buy something for around $30 or attempt to DIY something for about $10? Laziness might win on this one) Super bowl party this weekend, so the house will also be clean, if anyone can actually get here with the 1, 2, 3? feet of snow we're supposed to get, depending on who you ask.

Snow!

2009-12-21T11:43:00.000-05:00

That was an empty trash can. It is now full of snow.

We had a bit of Blizzard here in baltimore, trapping most city dwellers in their houses and off the streets. My car (which I forgot to take a picture of) was completely covered and blocked in. Luckily I have lovely neighbors with shovels who dug me out.

But I did not risk the weather on Saturday, instead trekking it over to Patterson Park to sled down a big hill by the Pagoda. There were close to 50 people there, with all levels of sledding equipment from boogey boards (not so successful), to tubes, to trays and cookie sheets from the kitchen (what we had!). As I always forget to turn the camera back on myself, I'm awaiting an upload from a friend for a pic with my face, but here are a couple nice shots:

More pics to come, and new projects too!

Momument Lighting

2009-12-04T12:06:00.001-05:00

You may or may not know that Baltimore has the ORIGINAL Washington Monument. While DC's may be taller and more impressive, can you climb up it (no lines to visit) for a $1 donation? Great views of the city from the top, but it's a one time occasion for me, as those 200+ stairs nearly killed my lazy ass.

Here's a gorgeous pic from Wikipedia:

Last night I wrapped up the drama of getting old housemate's stuff out and getting the bedroom spackled and vacuumed in time to make it out to a Baltimore event: the Lighting of the Monument. I'm not one for standing around in the cold for parades and firework shows, but this was pretty awesome. I grabbed a few friends and hit up a great pre-party at Live Baltimore's downtown office for free snacks and hot chocolate (and $1 for Flying Dog beers or to spike your hot cocoa), walked 3 blocks up to the Monument (collecting a free 7-11 reusable shopping bag along the way. Who knew "the sev" was so community minded and green?), and got a great spot near the show. Despite sound issues that left most of the crowd questioning "What are they saying?", and a stage not set high enough for mortals to see the dancing Santas and whatever else was up there (but the babies hoisted on shoulders looked like they would have a great view), it was an awesome show. A bit TOO awesome, if you ask me. Multiple color lasers? Check. Extended firework show? Check. Creepy intense rock versions of Christmas songs? Super weird. Maybe it was our angle, but the music and the explosions felt more like the apocalypse than Christmas.

Here are some choice "OMG they're blowing up the Monument!" pics, which are sadly from my iPhone, as I suck at toting my actual camera around:

The bluish strings of lights are the Holiday lights that warranted the ocassion. Not too impressive, but the fact that they are LEDs are!

So much smoke!

Nice.

Hiked back towards downtown after the show for a Downtown Partnership after-party with wonderfully free wine and food. The food buffet from Lebanese Taverna reminded me that I should eat there for dinner. (Hey, if these organizations/restaurants fed and boozed me for free, they totally get a shout-out on the blog. Keep that in mind, businesses!) Great night with new and old friends!

Busy weekend approaches. Interviews for new housemates, holiday parties, and other fun stuff.

Time for Change

2009-12-01T20:46:00.001-05:00

I totally meant to do a whole "THANKSGIVING!!" post, as I hosted my first big family function at my house, and it's one of my favorite time of the year (FOOD!). But because of the news below, I will keep it short. Family came from Florida. It was wonderful to see them and show off the house! We ate lots! We slept in-between. (I didn't even take pictures of the food, as my dad was in charge of it, but my Turkey was gorgeous, with herb butter packed under her skin for a nice golden brown crust!) Successful long weekend and I can't wait for Christmas!

Sigh.

Now the change.

I am now in need of a new housemate. It's the first of the month (when rent is typically due). Instead I got a call one of my renters is moving out TODAY. Nice notice there. Kinda stressed about it, as I obviously want to keep on track financially and not have to pay 2/3 of the bills and such.

Sooo....

Want to be my new housemate?

Craigslist: Share spacious Patterson Park rowhouse

And I don't think I've shared these pics yet, so here are some of the main floor:

Island in kitchen and my red motif

Looking into half bath and kitchen

Kitchen to dining area and the stairs. You may remember the Pagoda print on the left from here

Living room from stairs

My wall of mirrors, key hook (branches from Urban Outfitters, so cute!), mail slots, and a Bodine print of Baltimore

I love the brick reflection on the mirrors.

Okay, must clean house for tours/interviews of potential housemates (I already have like 6 decent replies, so I'm not too worried) this weekend before going to Ohio for work next week! Ack!

America's Best City Parks

2009-11-19T14:49:00.000-05:00

Awesome.

From Forbes.com:

America's Best City Parks

"Patterson Park in Baltimore, for example, is steeped in history; it was the site of Union encampments during the Civil War, and houses several unique, historic buildings. It's also full of present-day pleasures--skating rinks, pavilions and playgrounds--that connect the surrounding neighbors to the space."

Basement projects

2009-11-16T16:43:00.003-05:00

I guess I've been too busy to blog. I had my first successful work trip: a few days spent in the hospital (an ICU, no less) and I didn't come back sick! (Adding to my figures of healthy days spent in hospital: 700 or so?; sick/broken days spent in hospital: 0 Good karma?) I've also been working on wrapping up the year in terms of doctor/dentist/eye check-ups and planning for next year (LASIK!). Also, due to the impending Ashley-hosts-first-Thanksgiving, I'm really pushing myself on getting the house where I want it decoration-wise. Yesterday's beautiful 72 degree Sunday was spent at IKEA and Walmart buying (among other crap) winter-y scented candles and pictures and frames to fill out the last blank spaces on the first floor. (I finally have a plan for a handsome Owl trivet I picked up from Goodwill and painted blue!)

Since I lost energy last night to actually hang things, the pics of the main floor will have to wait. First up, the basement:

Project: Free coffee table I grabbed while buying a futon 2 doors down.

Before:

I saw potential.

After pics and the rest of my basement after the jump!

After:

Here it is with a coat of (Rustoleum?) Key Lime Green spray paint and about half a yard of IKEA fabric ModPodge'd on top. The Green also was used on the redo of the IKEA clock I posted previously.

I love how the green brings out the details.

OK, so minus my decoupage table, my main living room is pretty muted in colors. Dark wood, Beigey walls, navy couches. But I do love color and patterns. The basement went a little wilder. I love the IKEA pillows that spice up the plain futon. (Which will most likely get a new look with a full size bedsheet. Easy to transform!) The red lanterns come from my sister's wedding, and the blue tulip lamp was thrown in for free when I bought a secondary dining room table (Thanksgiving!) off craigslist.

And check out the Mondrian-style clock and paintings that I created with a couple little bottles of acrylic paint, a ruler, and cheap blank canvases from BigLots. And there's the transformed glider chair from before! I don't hang out down here as much as I should, but I still love than chair.

There's the (still non-functional) clock more art, above the entertainment station. The blue and white things are mounted DanceDanceRevolution mats I re-did last summer during my summer of being out of work (luckily being hired before the economy went to hell!). Imagine trying to dance on a Twister mat. Now they are mounted on plywood, with no-slip mats on the bottom, and pieces of bathmats as cushioning for your feet. Sigh, if only I actually used them more...

I'm having second thoughts about the rug (another craigslist find - $20!); too much for the room?

Gregory napping in the craft area, which needs more shelving to the left of the "inspiration board". This is way neater than normal.

Not pictured is a bar area with an awesome blue wall behind it. This section needs more lighting and inspiration. Plus, my kitchen is so awesome that I haven't got this set up as the party room yet.

Phew. So now you've seen my basement (in parts). I guess we'll work our way up? I most recently finished a little catch-all table for the kitchen stuff, but am not loving it there. If I decide to find it a new home, my blog followers can have first dibs!

One of my favorite holidays

2009-11-04T21:58:00.000-05:00

I'm going back and forth about which I would consider my favorite holiday. Halloween has dress-up and candy (and aren't we all little kids at heart?), Thanksgiving is all about eating awesome food and lounging around, and Christmas has the best music and decorations (and also good food). So I can't decide right now. We'll call it a tie for now, but I had a pretty kick-ass Halloween, so these others better follow suit.

Pre-Halloween festivities were lively this year, with a charity masquerade party the week before and a JHMI costume party on Friday, it was all about Saturday. I planned a party, where I always stress out a bit more than normal and have to clean and decorate.

I handed out candy for the first time as the head-of-household and while i had been warned of the roughness of our neighborhood kids, I was pleasantly surprised! I had an awesome bowl that has a motion-sensor triggered hand coming out of the center to "grab" anyone that dares to take candy from it while cackling "Happy Halloween!!" I let the kids reach in a take a piece--"only one! save some for the other kids!"--and loved that they were scared, then amused by the hand-grabbing action. Many wanted to stick their hands in again to give it a "high five." Most of the kids that came to my house were grateful and polite, especially after I warned "This is the hand of a child who didn't say Thank You!!!" Heh heh heh.

The party was a complete success with lots of lovely people in great costumes. With extra help with cooking and decorations (housemate's friend from the UK visiting) my task list went super fast and I was still able to throw together a costume outside the typical "Slutoween" getups that are mass-produced for women. Here's my take on "Zombie Barbie," with an itchy blonde wig, a way-too-pink dress from GoodWill (which I ripped up for effect) and my darker eyeshadows.

Quite scary, no? When the booze ran out we hiked to Fells Point to see the mess of hundreds of drunk people in costume. Halloween is apparently the holiday reserved for acting like an ass. But I guess that's St. Patrick's Day too?

Here's some more pictures of the house, as its kinda the name of the blog.

Coming soon, pics of my second coffee table, and maybe some non-Halloweened pics of the house. If I can manage to take pics, I can blog during my work trip to Jackson, MS, where I better get some Sweet Tea and Country-fried something.Woo for first work travel, but sad to miss my Baltimore life and my kitty for a week.

Better After!

2009-10-23T10:52:00.000-04:00

So honored to be featured on one of the DIY sites that has become one that I check daily for new ideas.

My clock and chair on Better After

If you found me from there, stay tuned! Projects and decorating are wrapping up and I hope to blitz a lot of pictures soon. (My camera is vacationing in Boston with my housemate and iPhonecamera isn't that impressive.)

Here's a before of a coffee table I found outside for FREE in Fells Point (a historic area of Baltimore) while buying a futon off craigslist a couple doors down. Score!

Stayed tuned!

Now off to have a productive "incidental" day off of work. Doctor, check. Talk to contractors working on house next door about future too-big-to-do-myself projects, check. Call police/ambulance for intoxicated vagrants leaning on my house (not on today's schedule), check. Clean bedroom, check. To Do: HomeDepot for a new mailbox, Dentist, MVA for an MD license (I have only been living here for about 6.5 years. I think it's time to become a real MD resident.), and hopefully time to bake something tasty before the Masquerade party/benefit in my 'hood before getting cute and heading over. Whew! Better get busy!

DIY first aid

2009-10-03T11:27:00.000-04:00

I suck at life sometimes. During an after-work happy hour, I managed to dislodge and swallow my temporary dental work...which was on my front tooth. Now my chipped-since-I-was-12 filed-down (my custom veneer is being made and coming in 2 weeks) is exposed, and sensitive to cold (and feels weird on my tongue). On top of that, while I was cahtting on the phone about going out, and reaching for a cupcake under my fancy cake plate, I dropped the heavy glass cake plate lid, taking most of the cupcakes with it, shattering it on the floor, and appartently gashing my leg in the process. (like my dad, someone has to call out that I'm bleeding before I realize I'm hurt). Friday night: glass, blood and cupcakes on the floor! Yes!

Needless to say I stayed in last night and made a morning trip to Rite Aid to get Butterfly Closures and Waterproof bandages to fix up my leg (per the recommendation of a doctor/Public Health student who happened to stop in for breakfast). Most awkward part? The gash is behind my knee, so I had to do some yoga moves to get the band-aids on. Seems to be a sucess so far. (Will it hold up through dancing in Fells? Or should I sit today out?)

Not a success? Trying to temporarily repair my tooth with some DIY filling paste. I got it on and made it look halfway decent, only for it to fall off 30 minutes later, even before I tried to eat or do anything strenuous. Oh well.

Post-vacation musing

2009-10-02T14:46:00.000-04:00

Though I spent most of my waking life in South Florida, this little vacation solidified my decision to put down roots in Baltimore, in a city setting.

Sure, my parents house (which they've owned since I was 2) is a good medium between urban living, and way-out in-the-'burbs, and is accesible to the highways and big cities (Miami and Ft. Lauderdale). It has a nice yard, and a place to put your car (my poor Prius is sometimes blocks away from home!), but you still have to get in that car to actually do anything. Until a recent batch of break-ins in the neighborhood, it also didn't seem like the adults interact too much (since the days of the kids playing together is long over).

In contrast, the friends I stayed with in South Beach had a lovely condo that was stumbling distance from the beach and a mall of shops, bars and restaurants. I love this idea, but I still have to put SoBe (yes, I said it) in a nice-to-visit-but-wouldn't-live-there category. I guess it's partially that I hate apartments/condos, with having to pay building fees, and hoping the company that manages the building keeps everything up as they are supposed to. (Bad experiences with apartments in Baltimore) Maybe I feel that people have less of a community feel in buildings? I guess I also got a bad vibe from the people of SoBe, an appearances and designers and money are super important vibe, that's not really me. But hey, bikini season year-round!

One thing that really made me buy in this neighborhood after renting a room 5 blocks away was the sense of community. Sure, its not the safest place in the world (some kind of drug dealing post outside the old house and 2 break-ins as soon as I moved in), but the really special thing was how everyone really came to my side when the shit went down. Lots of kind notes of support from the neighborhood mailing list (neighbors near and farther away), and direct neighbors who swapped cell numbers with me to be able t warn me if they saw anything else suspicious. (Along with "You need to get a gun! And a pit-bull!", advice I took with a smile and a mental "HELL NO") I like that I'm a short walk to a couple great neighborhood bar/restaurants, and a short drive to work and everything else in the city.

Baltimore, specifically Patterson Park, has charmed me, and I'm here for now, even if I will soon have to start wearing a coat.

Busy Gal

2009-09-30T20:57:00.000-04:00

For my first weekend away from the new house, I visited family and friends in South Florida. 4 days and I managed to avoid direct sunlight and the beach! (As some people work hard to keep freakish fake summer tans all year long, I work hard to keep my complexion pale and cancer-free, if only in protest of all the "you need some color, whitey" declarations.)

However, I did manage to:

-Dinner with the fam at my favorite Italian place, hitting the garlic rolls hard, despite not being that hungry
-Outlet shopping with Dad (so many more discount sweaters to choose from in a place where sweaters aren't needed!)
- Turn a friend's friend's board games and wii party into a White Party (so Miami!) bringing popcorn, powdered donuts, key lime pie, and chips and onion dip.
- DimSum'ed
- Order a fancy martini, only to ask the waiter to bring some mint to fix it (it did)
- Loudly say to a dog in front of its dining owners: "Oh you poor baby, who put a sweater on you when it is 95 degrees out? Evil owners!" then walked away cackling. (I'd blame it on a dare, but I'm just a bitch)
- More fancy drinks at the Delano (Modern, awesomely decorated hotel lobby bar), only to walk across the street, buy multiple airplane-size liquor bottles to have in my purse for a movie
- Amazing pastries at a Charlotte's Bakery (http://store.charlottebakeryinc.com/). Empanadas and huge dessert section not to be missed.

Lincoln Road mall in South Beach, where many hours were spent strolling, eating, and drinking.

Old roomie Chris and I in mostly white. Love how it looks like he's caught on to a scent.

Amazing chocolate caramel tart pastry that traveled all the way back to Baltimore with me. (I only take a few nibbles at a time to extend the awesomeness.)

Great food and friends. Loved hanging out like old times with my college buddies. Next reunion in Baltimore, mmmk?

Then I continued my De Stijl modern art basement project. The art will soon be hung, but here's a preview.

Bought a cheap, boring clock from IKEA. Took it apart. Painted face white. used my neon green spray paint to match the edge to my table (basement table, yet to be revealed). Painted, re-numbered. Put back together.

I love the finished product! But what I don't love? That it ticks, but doesn't actually move the hands. FAIL. Debating buying a second clock and hoping that mechanism/hand set works, so my painting isn't a super waste.

Fells Point Fun Fest this weekend! Plan to dance it up with Charm City Swing, window shop, and probably get Mr. Yogato FroYo and/or Pitango Gelato. Would both be overkill? We shall see.

Long awaited update (I'm a terrible blogger)

2009-09-19T20:34:00.008-04:00

Yeah, apparently I suck at posting regularly. Lately I've had multiple weekends of successful project days, and a couple of days I deemed project-free days. Good to give myself a break every once in a while.

My mental list of project goals is wrapping up, so the next big goal is to "stage" the house for a photo shoot to send pictures to relatives and far-away friends. (Yes, I watch too much HGTV to know what house staging is and should look like.) That's a project in itself, since my Florida family has only seen images of a table and a toilet.

Big headway has been made on my bedroom, as I've completed the headboard/daybed project no one seemed to understand as I described it. One more trip to IKEA tomorrow will fill out the empty wall and make it much more photogenic.

The project I want to share today is my kitchen photo project. As I've mentioned, I live near Patterson Park, which I consider the Central Park of Baltimore (including an ice-skating rink, boat lake, and a coffee shop named Patterson Perk on one side). Though I have a million windows (Not fun: installing 17 mini-blinds.), my only view is of other rowhouses. I wanted to bring a little bit of the park inside. So, after a leisurely walk through the park with a camera, I decided on my perfect view. The 1890s Victorian/Oriental Pagoda is probably the most photographed structure in the Park (and in Baltimore?), so it's a little cliche, but I like it. Here's the winning picture:

And here's what 36 4"x6" prints look like attached to my kitchen wall:

I really like that this one featured the civil war cannons (Patterson Park and the Civil War) and the red tree on the right, as my kitchen has taken off with a red and green theme (not like Christmas).

Now we have a view of the Park from our breakfast island sitting in the most fabulous Pier 1 barstools (my first house splurge while I was thriftily using craigslist to furnish the place). And instead of paying for one huge print and frame, the cost of this beauty was less than $10! ($0.19 Rite-Aid prints and a box of photo stickies for scrapbooking)

And thanks for all the lovely comments! I didn't even notice they were there, as blogger doesn't shove them in my face like facebook does (i.e. sending me countless emails). I have such awesome neighbors!

Off to have some green curry and watch a movie with my housemates...

Baltimore weirdness

2009-08-15T22:58:00.006-04:00

The last week of the hotel! (aka renting out the third bedroom to people on craigslist in exchange for money and my family in exchange for dinners) The little sis and her hubby are in town for a bit before flying out to China. Hmmm, what to do... Oh! An email from Facebook. The local bar is having live music, and a "Ratfishing Tournament." The premise? Catch a rat on a string from the local alleys. The heaviest one wins a free beer and the respect of millions. I read about this group in a super long City Paper article about rats (their group is called B.A.R.F. I wish I was making this up) and when I heard they were only blocks away, I had to see it in action. Who needs the typical Fells Point night out when you can sip a Blue Moon while chatting up guys slathering peanut butter on sticky traps tied to fishing poles who will sit at the edge of the alley and hope to reel in a fat one?

So after a nice dinner and the bottle of wine they brought me from Napa Valley, we wandered over and took in the action. There were newbies and people who have been fishing for years. The leader of BARF bragged that he had a conversation with the Mayor that went like:
"You need to stop these tournaments. It's bad publicity for the city."
"Okay, you take care of all the rats, and we'll stop fishin'."

Almost immediately, one was caught. 1 pound 5 oz. Here is evidence:

Justin got close enough to hold it, but as the photographer I kept my distance. Jess also stayed away, but got to try on the official rat hat. Very sexy.

After you see a rat on fishing line, what else is there to see?

Up for tomorrow: Farmers' Market, painting my room, and the premiere of Mad Men. Yippee!

Bad and Good things in Baltimore

2009-08-06T15:46:00.000-04:00

So I've had an eventful week. Last Sunday I took a trip up to NJ to get some final furniture out of storage, got home, unloaded, checked my email in my room, then hung out downstairs. From about 6pm-12am I stayed on the ground floor setting up the basement, had a long dinner with the temporary housemates, returned the truck to the airport, then watched Sunday night TV. In this time period someone broke into my upstairs bathroom window, took my computer, charger, and hard-drive off my bed, defecated in my toilet, and left. In this time period there were between 1-5 people in the house. Because of the 22 shootings in Baltimore that night, the police took 3.5 hours to arrive. Fun night. (On top of this, the officer I dealt with was actually quite rude, suggesting that I should have bars on ALL my windows if I have the audacity to live in the city with nice things. She asked many questions hinting that perhaps someone I let into the house had broken in, [ummm, no. my friends flush!] and ran out for another call in a hurry, not saying goodbye or anything reassuring.) I didn't get to sleep until 6am that night, but my coworkers/management were very understanding that I didn't come in until lunch.

Long story short, (because I've told this what seems like a million times) I was finally relaxing into the idea of getting robbed, but that I was alive and fine and learned lessons about security when I was robbed again. Tuesday night they (same guys?) came in through the downstairs window and stole my purse and XBOX system whilst we were sleeping. My purse was recovered in a nearby alley (and they missed the fact that my wallet was sitting pretty on the coffee table!) but the 360 is a lost cause. Boo hoo, it sucks, but its only stuff. Security has been beefed up since then.

Bright side of things: Talked to a bunch of neighbors (in the PPNA and others) and I have a lot more eyes looking out now. Exchanged phone numbers with some. While I never saw the guy, helped the police collect a description from neighbors and when they caught a guy breaking into rowhouses down the street, the police believe he is the same thief. No problems since.

Happier things: Finally hung some art and curtains in the living room. Had a little get-together for Justine's birthday where lovely people brought Tapas and helped clean up afterwards. (The house is perfect for parties, and even has room for a dance floor!) Pictures to come of the main floor, but I still have big dreams for my room and the basement that have not come to fruition.

Headed to WTMD's free Concert in the Mt. Vernon park with friends and future housemate, then over to the Movie on Federal Hill. Let's hope for sunshine! Or at least not rain, as I'm not too keen on sunshine either.

As promised from the last post, here's a pic of my Arizona Iced Tea-themed bathroom. I'm very happy with it, considering I did it completely free-hand and haven't had an art class since middle school. I think the flowers should be a bit bigger, so I might have another painting session and make them bloom a bit more.

There's a tree growing out of my toilet! Yes, I'm crazy enough that this makes me smile more than I should.

Projects!

2009-07-19T11:47:00.008-04:00

Ok, so one of the reasons I started this was to document and share my crafty projects. After I was on my way to buying this house, and therefore done with studying hundreds of for sale postings on the internet, my attention turned to decorating this beast (and I use "beast" in terms of size, she's already a very beautiful lady). I started perusing designspongeonline.com and craftynest.com for fun and cheap DIY (do it yourself) house projects. I've gotten some cool ideas, and thought I'd share my before and afters too.

The projects started before I moved in, as I had almost 2 months to be anxious about the fact that I was moving into a huge house with no furniture. Here are the first two creations, which were done over many hours of watching "The Wire" and "Firefly" at the old house.

Project 1: Decoupage Coffee table

I had subscriptions to Baltimore Magazine, Johns Hopkins Mag, Entertainment Weekly, and Wired. I hate throwing things away, so all of these had piled up for about 3+ months (which means over 12 issues of EW). I wanted to put all the fancy patterns and pics to use, then recycle the rest.

I found a listing for a coffee table on craigslist for $10 less than a mile away, so I picked it up immediately. I misplaced the "before" picture, but it was all birchwood legs, with a cheap looking laminate top, and was majorly scuffed and discolored.

After hours of gluing little pieces of magazine scraps to the surface with a couple of bottles of Elemer's Glue and a spackling spatula, applying a couple of coats of a spray laquer, and painting the legs black, voila!

I kept saying that if it was cool I'd be proud, but if it was tacky I could just resell on craigslist. Needless to say, I'm pretty proud.

Yes, Obama is well represented in the table, but its a sign of the times! Magazines love him!

Project 2: Glider chair

While visiting the parents house in June, I was practically glued to their glider chair in the kitchen/den. I found an ugly one on craigslist for $20 and made it a little more dodern and awesome with some nice fabric and black spray paint.

Before:

Achieved with a couple stitches into the original fabric and a bit of "No-stitch glue" because I am lazy. I think it really pops. Gregory loves sleeping on it too, but that is true about most surfaces in the house. :)

Next post: My Arizona Iced tea inspired bathroom.

And me + Gregory + house!

2009-07-16T19:16:00.003-04:00

Yes, this is an awkward make-the-cat-look-like-he's-not-running-away pic, but here we are with my new house.

Note the new paint job on the door (Thanks, Mom!) and the flowers, which are fighting for their lives in this summer heat.

Off to see a flick on the Hill (first time!) with Polish kielbasa, pierogies, and wine in tow.

Next goal is to get the inside of the house presentable enough to show off, which would be easier if there wasn't so much fun stuff going on! Artscape this weekend! I really need to lock myself in the house and paint my bedroom, as the yellowish-beige on every wall of the house is getting to me, but the Butterfly potatoes and chicken-on-a-stick are a-calling to me.

Welcome to my new home

2009-07-15T09:51:00.002-04:00

Thanks for visiting!

Here's my story: sometime in the last year with the magic combination of a) me having a lovely job that seems to have no intention to stop paying me anytime soon, b) said job willing to reimburse for a MS program, which I plan to take advantage of starting in the fall (part-time = 3+ years!!!), c) the economy going to shit and the housing market with it, d) the lovely $8000 first-time homebuyer credit...I thought it was time to stop renting. I guess in December or so I semi-arbitrarily decided that I should buy a house by summer. Skip through the searching and the 40 houses I looked at and logged detailed notes about in an excel file (I'm such a nerd), and I bought the perfect little (but not so little) house a block from Patterson Park. While it was totally rehabbed recently, there is still much to be done to make it worthy of me calling it home, i.e. fantastic.

Since I got this "I"m going grow up and own something" idea, I've been glued to HGTV and home-interior design blogs. Though an engineer by trade, I'm beginning to flex my creative side more. I see things and think "I can do that!" This will chronicle my successes and failures in designing my house and share pics with my friends and family who are far away but should still suck it up and make the trip to visit me.

Here's the pic of the house before I moved in, and later I'll add a pic of the Ashley-fied version!