AVL.

i've a guest post up on east side bride with fellow southerner naurnie.  i tell you what you should do in asheville, or really where you should eat, and she tells you pretty much everything you need to know about nashville.  i've not really lived in asheville since i flew the coop for college, but it's turned into a lovely city filled with creative and talented young people. when we were back living in nc two years ago we wouldn't bat an eyelash at the four hour drive if it meant dinner and a show.  and in secret mas and i talk about going back a lot more than we ever imagined

image and food from cúrate.

photography.

wouldn't mind having a few of these for our walls.  i mean, right?

photos by marianna rothen, check 'em they're all pretty amazing.

the cherry blossoms.

they're starting to affect the way i dress.  i can't help it.  i love them so.

dining room.

so we've got this room, it's mostly for eating, though i've been using it as my office as of late.  it's directly between the kitchen and the living room.  the walls are 80% grey (so is the ceiling).  the trim is painted black.  we've a single pendant light in the center and an old school (like 1920's) large wooden tripod in the corner by the window.  our chairs are black, our table teak.  this is also the room that contains the majority of our alcohol, though hidden in a built in cabinet.  our glassware is on display.

we've yet to hang just about any art in the entire house.  it's hard when the furniture hasn't even been decided on.  but the thing is, i'm liking our dining room.  sans art on the walls.  it's simple, clean, and all about the company you keep at the table.  mas has a 16x20 photo of chickens that he's convinced is a good idea to hang on one wall, but i'm not.  it seems better suited for the kitchen.  i think i'm winning, only because mas is being a super nice guy, but what's the general consensus?  if you walked into a room without a bit of art on the walls would that be off-putting?

bill's america.

i came across this site, radical cartography (through pinterest of course) and have fallen deeply and madly in love.  it started with land value in nyc and then jumped over to education in dc.  but when i found bill's america, well i figured out what we're making HUGE and putting on our wall.  our americas - roads driven style.  we've done more than one back and forth of this country.  that should be celebrated, no?

still full.

last week mas and i headed up to new york, him for a few business meetings and me for a trip to new york ... it had been a while since i'd been, so why not?  we hopped on the train and while en route i sent a very frantic email to my most trusted food source asking for her most fave *cheapish* food spots.  she replied with an even more urgent text message with a good five options (i love you celia for understanding the importance of not missing even a single meal when in a city filled with food).

we proceeded to eat ourselves stupid.  it went pretty well for a while, though i did have to skip dinner one night because i was so full from the previous two days that i felt like vomiting all over the place.  here's a list, you know in case you were curious ....

porchetta // cafe clementine // cafe habana // the bar in our hotel // la colombe // bouchon bakery // laudurée // num pang // the city bakery // and that is honestly all i can remember.  oh, oh colony grill, which is in connecticut, we had to head north for a little family get together, hot oil pizza, who knew?

oh, also, i got a new pair of shoes.  i looooooooooove them.

gingham walls, update.

so do you remember, way back when, me saying i was going to paint our vestibule gingham?  it's finally happened.  there was a lot of thinking and researching and painting and repainting.  and after, um, ten coats of paint i think we've got it, and more importantly, i think we LOVE it.  we are toying with the idea of taking the almost black down to the light grey, to be actual gingham, but i'm not sure.  thoughts? 

also, fucking gingham painted walls.  i cannot tell you what a hassle they were.  i mean, seriously.  at first i was certain that one made such a pattern by adding glaze to half of your paint and then subtly layer one coat over the next.  boy was that WRONG.  it turns out that if you use glaze you get this horrible consistency that shows every last brush stroke.  it took four coats of the glazed black paint to start looking decent, and at that point it was no longer a glaze.  it was a straight up solid - waste of time.  

but then, it was magic, while eating with our friends (at their new and beyond wonderful eating establishment, bell street farm, in los alamos) one of them let me in on a little secret.  a little secret that made me want to bang my head on the most perfect farm house table.  that layering technique is really just a third, or in our case fourth, color.  so simple, so smart, so easy.   i'm such an idiot.