Alright, so how did Friday’s little trip go?
Pretty well!
I found a home that’s worth a second look, at the very least. It doesn’t have the rambling, wide-open property around it that made me fall in love with the last place…but it has other things that are equally great (and maybe even greater), like everything we could possibly want in terms of space (the last place was a little bit on the small side). I’d have my own office (one that’s not in the kitchen). Kendrick would have his own space to record in. There’d be plenty of room for guests to stay. For two people who have spent the past five years living in either 450 (Hell’s Kitchen) or 800 (UES) square feet, that is RIDICULOUS. It feels like a laughable indulgence. Also, holy god, would we have to buy a lot of furniture. I would have to start stalking my favorite CraigsList blog.
Another con, just because I’m playing Devil’s Advocate, here: the house doesn’t have a ton of built-in style. It’s got some cool design features, but the previous owners didn’t do a whole lot with them. But I think that might actually be a plus: I’ve spent the last couple of days imagining beautiful things that could be done to transform it into the kind of place that would feel like a home, and it’d be our home from top to bottom…not the home imagined by the previous owners.
Here’s the thing: from what I can tell from the properties we’ve seen so far, we’re going to have to compromise – either lots of space inside, or lots of space outside. To have both would just be out of our budget. And while my instinct is to seek out small places with a good amount of property, because a) I’m used to small spaces and the idea of filling lots of rooms is overwhelming, and b) it’s so exciting to me to picture having a big yard…this is New York, not Hawaii, and there are a few months in the year during which you’re more or less stuck inside. And it might be nice to have a house that we can grow into over time, rather than one that we have the potential to outgrow.
Anyway, we’re going back to look at it. We’ll see.
The trip itself, by the way, went totally fine, despite all my nerves. Indy was alternately asleep and fascinated by the goings-on, so there was very little drama on that end, and I wore sturdy boots this time (my beloved Clarks Orinocco Jumps), so I was able to mountain-goat it all over yards and staircases.
More fun stuff from the weekend:
I combined two of those not-yet-released Hunger Games shades…
And kinda like the effect.
These Superbowl Sunday bagels were obviously awesome.
And this is my favorite picture from the weekend (and probably one of my favorites ever). I totally jumped the gun on posting those first two…plenty of adorable moments ensued in the hours that followed.
