James and I recently moved into a 2 bedroom, 1.5 bathroom apartment in Orange. We are still living out of boxes. Well, more accurately I am still living out of boxes. I have yet to figure out how to organize my clothes and bathroom stuff. What kind of bathroom doesn't have drawers?? Anyways, it's a nice, quiet, safe complex only a few minutes away from both of our workplaces. We can even come home for lunch, which is great when we don't have time to pack a lunch. The second bedroom will be used for crafting/sewing and guests, though currently it's holding all the unpacked boxes to keep them out of the way. The complex doesn't have all the amenities (like a gym, etc) and doesn't have a washer/dryer in the unit, but it is really nice, and walking down to the laundry room isn't too bad, since it's relatively close to our unit. The dogs seem to enjoy it, but we'll see how they feel about it come summer, since the A/C is right next to their kennel. We had to get a new fridge, and managed to get a deal on a really nice french-door, bottom freezer one that's huge. It had enough room for tons of food, but more importantly, our Brita dispenser fits too. We use too much water for one of their pitchers to be practical, so we got the big dispenser, which is amazing. However, fitting it in a small fridge is no small feat, so it's important that it fit in our fridge with enough room for food as well. Overall, I'm pretty happy with the unit, and it even has a bathtub (can't wait to enjoy that with a long soak).
I have a few craft projects currently in the works and just went through a month-long period of voracious reading. The cooking front has been a bit boring. With the move, we don't have many of our staples (still in Coronado, or found out they had expired...in 2008....) and we've been exhausted. I worked Tues-Fri last week, with two days in Del Mar, and the nights were spent unpacking the kitchen and living room, both of which are completely unpacked, if a bit messy. So there will be new posts in the near future, dealing not only with books, recipes and such, but also with craft projects, tv show reviews, movie reviews and a peek into my daily life (which I'm sure will enthrall everyone).
Tomorrow, our hunt for a bedframe continues. We had sold James' old sleigh bed, and had been using the bedframe my parents had in Coronado. Since we couldn't take that with us, our box spring and new mattress are sitting on the floor of our bedroom waiting until we find something appropriate. James wants solid wood, I want a slight sleigh headboard that isn't too high with no footboard (which he also likes), nothing too ornate, and we both want something affordable. We have a few feelers out to Craigslist people, but our four hours of searching today yielded only one real possibility, and even that stretches our budget a bit and comes from a source with not-so-great reviews. Maybe we're being too picky, but we can deal with a mattress on the floor for now. Since we didn't want to move the beautiful (but heavy and big) bookshelf we got when we moved in to Coronado, we grabbed the foldable bookshelves that had been sitting in storage and made use of them in the living room to hold our (my) books, in addition to the shelves that are part of the entertainment centre. (And this is the pared down set of books...) Everything seems to be coming together nicely...I just need to spend a few quality hours in the bedroom and bathroom figuring out how all that stuff is going to work (especially the bathroom...I may have way too much makeup)
Last night James' computer battery gave up and died. The charger's light was green, indicating a full battery, so I asked him to hand me the cord since my computer was getting low. As soon as he pulled out the plug, the screen went black. Upon turning the computer on again, we discovered the battery read 0% and when more information was pulled up, declared it was not charging. Wonderful. And his AppleCare expired in September. We checked a few sources online and tried a few recommended tricks (this seems to be happening a lot to 2006 and 2008 models) but nothing worked. Nothing for it but to buy a new battery, which the Apple support line guy said would be $80, but the website says will be $125. My computer is still working, but the casing has cracks all over it and two pieces have already chipped off. This makes no sense, since I take good care of my electronics, especially my computer and if I have to tote it around, I always put it in a good, padded case. Anyways, James is very happy with his Christmas present of a tablet now since he can use that without being leashed to an electrical outlet.
Speaking of Christmas presents, I'm enjoying mine. My purse organizer that James got from Etsy seller Divide and Conquer is AMAZING. It fits in my purse perfectly, is sturdy enough that it doesn't flop over and has more than enough pockets, including one that's long enough to hold my home-made receipt organizer (I sense a tutorial in that...). I'm also loving the iPod he got me. My old one's hard drive was shot, causing it to randomly skip to the next song, or restart itself. I had gotten the classic for the space, but James got me the biggest iPod touch, which has no hard drive, so no more issues! Yay! Since he bought it through Amazon, they had a deal for $100 off with a year-long subscription to Audible. Since I've been obsessed with audiobooks lately (yay for libraries) James got the subscription and I've been busily listening to books ranging from The Sherlockian to The Alchemyst (the Michael Scott one, not the popular "deep" one) and the Jake Ransom series. My parents got me an amazing grater, that I'm enjoying using too. It doesn't look like much, but we used it when we made muffins after Christmas and it made short work of the zucchini I had. It worked just as well as julienning it. My parents also got me a gorgeous seahorse ring that's currently being resized. I can't wait to wear it; it's so pretty and seahorses always make me think of the wedding. They also got us a beautiful pair of Waterford candlestick holders shaped like seahorses, which will look beautiful on our dining table. Which has no chairs. Oh well, it'll still look pretty!
Well, that's all for now. Who knows what the next post will be? See you soon!
