TEACH ME MARTHA

Everyone who knows me knows I try hard to live by Martha's rules.  It can sometimes make me (and Mr. Eric) crazy.  But it's fun to strive and it's good to have goals right?  Last week on Home Design with Kevin Sharkey, Kevin, the decorating guru at Martha Stewart posted 10 Lessons He Learned from Martha.  Well, I've also learned a lot from Martha about crafting, baking and throwing a mean Halloween party. But, as a new home owner I'm finding that there are a whole lot of other things I need to know now that I've never even thought about before. If anyone can teach me, it's Martha. So without further ado, here is my list:

10 Lessons I Need to Learn from Martha

1. How to plant a vegetable garden
2. How to make pretty covers for my radiators
3. How to tile a floor, a backsplash and a fireplace
4. How to repair plaster walls
5. How to load a dishwasher
6. How to maintain a fireplace and start a proper fire
7. How to unclog the drain of an old tub without a removable drain cover. Grrr.
8. How to repair window screens
9. How to prune a seriously overgrown rhododendron
10. How to remove and then hopefully hang (new and pretty) wallpaper.

I know with Martha's help I'll be able to start checking things off this list soon. Fingers crossed.

images via MarthaStewart.com

ALREADY?

So yesterday at the bodega the counter guy snuck a peek at the NJ Transit pass in my wallet while I was paying and gave me a "You from New Jersey?"  Immediately I got defensive and gave him a "Why?" which I really wanted to be a "No!" or a "Well, I just moved there" or even better a "You shut your mouth!"  Then I had a scare that maybe I looked Jersey already.  In two weeks I had grown a pouf or turned into a Real Housewife.  Thankfully, it was only the pass.  But what's funny about my defensiveness is that I AM actually from New Jersey.  Born and raised.  15 years of New York will sometimes make you forget that.
image via Bravo TV

PACKING IT UP

or when this:

turns into this:

We moved. And yes, it was entirely as hellish as one could imagine.  No matter how organized you think you are, moving out of a place after 8 years will throw your world into total chaos.  And it did.

BUT, we have some amazing friends and family and without them the day would have been 10,000 times worse.  So super big thanks go out to Eric's parents, Sue, Tim and Lauren.  They worked tirelessly for 6 hours to help us pack and lug all our junk down 3 flights of stairs.  Andrea, John and Tyler helped us unload on the other end.  And the superstar of the day was Bob.  He drove the insanely huge truck that thankfully grew 8 feet from the time of the reservation through Manhattan and got our goods safely to our new door.

** mini shout-out to Weetzie who decided to add peeing to her car ride repertoire of pooping.  she's a peach! 

DEEP BREATHS

So it actually happened.  We bought a house. Lil' ol' us.  Can you believe it?  I certainly can't and that's probably why, 3 days away from the big move, my mood has been jumping from sheer excitement to sheer terror.  Deep breaths.

The closing was pretty uneventful.  Except for a little "bank's not ready" scare, we closed on time.  I didn't know what I expected a closing to be but what it is is approximately 30 minutes of signing your name and then you hemorrhage money.  Fun right?

Even more fun, packing.  Yup, that is what we do.  We pack and we tape and we purge and we pack. Mr. Eric lifts, I take anti-inflammatories.  And because packing is time consuming and tiring we decided no cooking this week.  Instead we've embarked on one last delivery tour of Greenpoint / Williamsburg!  (Maybe embarked it not the right word since we aren't leaving the house. Whatevs. Details, details.) We've covered pizza, Thai, then pizza again.  We'll round out the week with some Vegan sandwiches and possibly some Chinese food.  We shall hug all our delivery men goodbye and then we will tend to our heartburn.

The point is, we are home owners!  Yippee...Holy Crap...Yippee...Holy Crap!