So much to do!

I feel like I have been so very busy here lately (which is great), but that I still don't have much to write about! The stuff I have been busy with is not the most interesting blog material, which I guess is just how life goes sometimes.

Ben was in NC this past weekend for his bachelor party, so I had my first period of time alone in STL. It's times like those that it really hits me how far away I am from my friends! While it was nice to relax (and that's mainly what I did), it would have also been nice to have people around to call and hang out with. I'm sure I will meet lots of nice people as we get more settled in here, but right now we're just kind of in limbo, and it's a little weird.

I have managed to organize and pack up a few of Ben's things in his room, which is nice. It gives me some space to put my clothes! It's overwhelming to think about moving all of my stuff again plus packing up his stuff and moving it too, but it will be such a relief to get out of this tiny apartment and get things put AWAY. I can't wait!

I've also been spending a lot of time on tiny wedding details that just couldn't be done any earlier. It's been nice to get things finished, but it is a tad bit daunting to think about all of the TEENY details that need to be decided and communicated to people in those final days before the wedding. On one hand, I can't believe I have to wait close to three weeks to get this show on the road, but on the other hand, I can't even imagine the wedding actually being here and then begin over. It's going to be strange not to be planning it anymore.

Today Ben and I have big plans to go get at least one library card, and I am SO relieved! I've been going crazy without access to a library, and I still don't have one piece of "official" mail with my name on it, so I can't go get my own card. Any good book suggestions for me??? :-)

News of the day

We received a wedding gift in the mail today (the first one we've gotten in the mail since I've been here in STL), and I had to document it. For two reasons: one, any and all wedding gifts are fun, and it's especially fun to have them brought right to your door; two, we received our first set of the dishes we registered for, and we're oh-so-grateful (thanks, Gloria! :-).

Photographic proof follows!

Giant Bed, Bath, and Beyond box

Cute gift wrap (each box was individually wrapped, too!)

Unwrapped box (aren't you glad I'm so thorough with the documenting?)

Colorwave, baby

We got four of these place settings....so cute, and I can't wait to break them out in our new apartment!!

AND, we got the sugar bowl and creamer set to match!

That was definitely the best part of my day so far. I've had a headache all day that is just not going away, so I have an early night planned with my Imitrex...BLAH. Yay for cute dishes, though! :-)

Randomness

After our fun and eventful day on Saturday, Ben and I did a whole lotta grocery shopping on Sunday...grocery shopping is the only kind of shopping Ben enjoys and one of the only kinds of shopping I do not enjoy. But we bought our food for the week at good prices, and now it's done for a while--THANK GOODNESS! We spent the rest of the day watching TV and relaxing...fun stuff.

In other fun news, I think I finally pressed enough buttons on the camera to fix whatever setting was causing EVERY SINGLE PICTURE to turn out blurry. In honor of that, here are some random pictures!

Day Three of cross-stitch (which may or may not have occurred on Friday, and which may or may not still be how my cross-stitch looks today!)

A view of some of my stuff piled up here.

Bella looking annoyed. She's at her new favorite spot--a nice windowsill.

Laura, PawPaw, and I last time I was home. I love this picture!

Coming up: a succession of pictures from when I had my bridal portrait done--in reverse chronological order. :-)

Kate, in the changing room at the portrait studio--with my beautiful bouquet!

Me and my sweet, wonderful sister before we left!

Kate, trying to work with my bangs which we had some issues with

Kate working her make-up magic before the portrait...thank goodness she is willing to do this for me. My make-up is always beautiful!

Me, during bridal portrait day. Hair? Check! Bouquet? Check! Good mood? Questionable!

Our Day

Ben and I have had a really productive and fun Saturday. It's so nice to be able to spend all day together, and I know I should really treasure it now, since I am really hoping to have a full time job to fill most of my days here soon!

We started our day early with some cinnamon rolls--YUM. Ben wakes up pretty early each day for his job, and since my body has been an hour ahead of the time here, I usually wake up with him on the weekdays. That translated to our Saturday morning too, although we both did sleep about an hour later than usual!

We then got ready to head out apartment-hunting. We took some pictures beforehand, but of course they turned out blurry, yet again. In the blurry pictures, Ben is holding his extremely laid parking ticket payment that he finally mailed today. And I'm holding a thank you card. We're both excited about finding a new, bigger place to live (sometime I'll post pictures of our cramped existence at the moment!).

Our apartment hunting ended up being successful, but it started off slowly. The first place we visited was pretty nice, but the only apartment we could afford was pretty small. They did have a great floorplan with two bedrooms, and I really liked the complex itself, but we both felt the apartments were not nice enough to be as expensive as they were.

Our second stop was at a really large complex with a complicated system of floorplans. We looked at two different ones, but since they had different phases of apartments, each with 3 types of floorplans, we were never exactly sure what we were looking at. Ben liked this place more than I did, and their floorplans were pretty spacious. I, however, didn't love the complex itself, but they did have great rent specials that would have made a bigger apartment more affordable for us. We left it on our maybe list.

It was then around lunch time, and I was feeling discouraged because I wasn't in love with any apartment complex, and I was becoming more and more sure that I would never be happy in an apartment outside of NC! (I may or may not still feel that way a tiny bit in my heart...j/k!).

But, after a nice Subway sandwich, we headed to complex #3, and as soon as I saw the inside of the apartment, I knew this was where I wanted to live. The interiors of these apartments have been recently renovated, the appliances are nice, and they have washer/dryer in every unit! The kitchen is also pretty big with more counter space and cabinet space. It has two bedrooms, and one nice bathroom.

The floorplan!

We're so excited to move in next month, and I can't wait to post pictures of our new place with some of our great wedding gifts finally in-use!

P.S. Here is a clear picture of my Day 2 Cross Stitch progress. Day 3 was my most successful so far, but I haven't taken any pictures of it yet!

Cross Stitch, Day 2

Rambling

Yesterday (with the help of my lovely Garmin), I ventured out of the apartment ON MY OWN. And headed somewhere completely unfamiliar! And didn't even get lost. In fact, I am now pretty sure I will get lost here less times than I have gotten lost in Winston-Salem. I get lost almost every single time I'm in Winston by myself. And I've been to THREE places here by myself so far and haven't gotten lost yet. I think my odds are pretty good. And now I'll get lost here for sure next time I go out, but oh well.

ANYWAY, I went to Hobby Lobby yesterday, which is actually outside of the city of St. Louis. If I were a pro-blogger, I would have taken a picture of the actual store. Not-so-shockingly, it looked like every other Hobby Lobby in the world, so I guess you'll just have to picture it in your mind. If you've never been to a Hobby Lobby--well, let's just say I highly recommend it! I love it and if I weren't poor and unemployed with thousands of dollars worth of student loans, I would love it even more.

I was at Hobby Lobby on a specific mission for the wedding reception, and I'm excited about what I've got planned. I totally planned to insert a picture here, but the picture is so blurry it wouldn't show you a darn thing. Let's just say it involves a picture frame with several pictures. Exciting, huh?

I also bought a lovely embroidery hoop because I am working on cross-stitching a souvenir I bought last time I was at the arch. The hoop has made it MUCH easier, but I am not even going to admit how much time I've spent on the tiny piece of it that is finished. Here is a picture of my first day's work (sans the hoop). The picture of yesterday's work (with hoop) was blurry as well. Cest la'vie.

Very beginning of my cross stitch project

In housewifely news, I cooked dinner last night. Cooking dinner stresses me out. It is fun to try to prepare something to be ready when Ben gets home from work, but I have a lot more fun

cooking with him. I think that's my plan for tonight. In good-fiance news, Ben said he really liked the dinner and took leftovers to work for his lunch today. I didn't think it was all that good myself, but I have years to perfect my cooking skills! :-)

Dinner

And, as if this post isn't long and rambling enough, here are a couple of the random pictures I menioned in my last post. I think I will wait to post the rest later!

The stadium when Ben and I went to a Cardinal's game back in April.

Another view of the stadium with the arch!

My day as a housewife (house-fiancée?)

Since I got that interview behind me yesterday, I feel so much lighter and happier. And since I have no job and don’t know my way around town very well yet, I spent most of today taking care of some chores that needed to be done/have been driving me crazy. And I have pictures to prove it!

After breakfast this morning, I walked myself and a bunch of laundry down to the Laundromat. It’s only a couple of blocks away from the apartment, but it definitely feels longer lugging tons of clothes, the laundry basket, the detergent, the quarters, etc. After spending all year doing this himself, Ben is adamant about having a washer/dryer in our new apartment, and I am happy about that! Anyway, here is a shot of the bulging laundry basket before.

Before Laundromat

I wish it was see-through so you could really get an idea of how much stuff was packed in there. There were definitely three sets of sheets, multiple towels, etc. etc. And a lot of the big stuff was there from when my family drove me up this past week—the sheets and towels especially—so I was happy to get some of it washed!

And, so I feel accomplished, here is a shot of all the fresh, clean, folded laundry before it got put away! Don’t let the excitement of my life overwhelm you! :-)

Fresh clothes

OK, I do realize that my housewife skills are obviously lacking a bit. I bet that nice clean fresh laundry would look a lot neater on a nicely made bed. Maybe bed-making will be a goal for tomorrow!

Empty basket!

After my laundry escapades (which were tiring!), I decided to tackle the kitchen. It's tiny anyway, and since I've been here, things have just been slung around wherever they land--leaving us with a lot clutter and NO counter space. Not to mention the pantry! Here are before and after shots of what I worked on.

The kitchen counter, covered in clutter

Nice, neat counter

The pantry--not overflowing, but unorganized

Nice, organized pantry

The kitchen work was actually a lot less taxing than I thought it would be--which made up for the fact that the laundry was harder than I was imagining! :-) That has been most of my day so far (minus some time lounging on the couch and watching TV). When I was uploading these pictures today, I also uploaded a lot of cute ones from the past couple of weeks that I hope to post soon!

St. Louis

I am safely in St. Louis for the foreseeable future!! At least until mid-July, of course. The rest of our trip (here and back to NC and then back here again) was a huge whirlwind. My mom, sister, and I made the trip back to NC all in one day, which wasn't nearly as bad as it sounds. It took about 11 hours, and we all took turns driving. I was glad to spend a couple of nights home again. And I was super-glad to spend time in Chapel Hill with Laura, Kate, Allison, and Ben this past weekend. We had lots of fun!

Of course, once Ben and I finally arrived back here on Sunday night, we were absolutely exhausted. I spent all of yesterday sitting on the couch (well, most of yesterday!). And today I had an equally exhausting job interview. I am beyond relieved to have it behind me because I am always so nervous! Now Ben and I just have to survive living in his tiny apartment, made even smaller by all of my boxes of stuff sitting around. And apartment shop while he isn't working. And probably buy some groceries sometime soon.

I plan to be back soon with some pictures from the moving adventures. And although I'll have more time to update now that I'm here, I don't know that I will have anything interesting to update about! We'll see!!

Our Trip, so far

Well, we made the first leg of our trip yesterday afternoon/evening.  There were no major mishaps, and everyone arrived in Tennessee in one piece!  Traveling with Bella was much better than I thought it would be--she didn't meow the whole time or anything, and she even managed to use her litter box in the car one time at a rest stop.  She was miserable though, and she scratched my sister at one point--poor La!  Bella has somewhat settled into our hotel here, and I am sincerely hoping she will be easy to catch when we get ready to leave this morning.

As for all of my stuff, well, ALMOST all of it fit in our cars, which I think is an impressive feat!  I had given up the idea of bringing my huge TV along, so that stayed behind.  And I left behind 3 boxes of various holiday decorations that we won't be needing anytime soon (including, unfortunately, my pink Christmas tree!).  However, we are lucky to know that Ben's sister and her boyfriend are willing to drive out after the wedding and bring any stuff we've left behind.  Thank goodness, because I know I couldn't make it through the Christmas season without that tree. :-)

I drove the whole way yesterday (which wasn't bad at all), but I am looking forward to relaxing a bit as Laura drives some this morning.  We're going to leave here pretty early, and we hope to arrive in St. Louis mid-afternoon.  Here's to hoping that this leg of the trip is as a good as the first one was.  I hope to have a post soon with some pictures of our adventures!

Bridal Shower Pictures!

Thanks to my great friend Jennifer Leigh, I have these wonderful pictures to share.  They're all from the shower that took place at my grandma's house.   

My sister pinning the beautiful handmade (by her!) corsage on my dress!

Me, being sassy

Some of the wonderful gifts Ben and I received

We made wedding dresses for barbies out of toilet paper--here people are showing off their hard work and 'sewing' skills!

Gift opening time--I was (and am!) really excited about our silverware.

The freshly unwrapped gifts taking over my grandma's kitchen

That's all the pictures I have for now.  I might be back with more later.  I'm still gearing up to start the long drive tomorrow, so I'll be busy!

Milestones

Well, time has just continued rolling right on since my last post, and many of my to-dos have been crossed off of the list. While it feels great to get things accomplished, and while I'm getting a little bit more excited about moving (and a little less scared/sad), it's still odd to think that my time here in Chapel Hill (and NC, for that matter!) is coming to an end.

My shower at the library was wonderful. I was so touched by how everything (from the table decorations to the food) was completely based on things I love--it made me feel so special! I promise I'll post pictures some day, but for now my camera and camera cord are in two different locations. Suffice it to say that the table had plenty of PINK. :-)

The shower at my grandma's was also wonderful. I was overwhelmed by how many people showed up, and I was overwhelmed by how much work my sister, my mom, and Kate did. They had made plenty of food for everyone who came to the shower, plus another 50 people or so!! :-) Ben and I got so many nice gifts--we're a lucky couple!

I worked my last shift at CHPL this past Monday--a sad milestone for me. Working there has been one of the best experiences of my 6 years here, and I am just going to miss the people and the atmosphere SO much.

I also had my last Bachelorette viewing with my friends from SILS, and it was so sad to realize we wouldn't be watching/making fun of the rest of the season together. These goodbyes are hard and a little weird for me to handle. Most of the goodbyes I've said in the past little bit have been to people who are staying at least within driving distance. The move to St. Louis just seems so permanent.

BUT, on the brighter side, now only the packing/loading cars/moving monster looms over my head, and I cannot wait to get all of that stuff finished. Luckily, it's looking like everything will fit into the two cars, but I'd like to know for sure!! And of course there are always last-minute things to pack, which drives me crazy. If it was up to me, I'd have the cars completely loaded about a week ago! My apartment is such a disaster, and I cannot find half the things I need when I need them. Moving is such a giant pain!

Ben and I have been looking online for apartments in St. Louis, and we've found a couple of complexes we like. Seeing pictures and floor plans of places we might actually live is exciting and fun. I can't wait to visit them in person and get that decision made as well.

Overall, I'm feeling overwhelmed, excited, and sad. This is such an interesting time in my life, and it's so full of big changes.