Mint Ice Cream

I love mint ice cream.  In fact, I could really care less about ice cream as a dessert until there's mint involved.  So, I was really excited when I finally found these at Fred Meyer:

The "Purely Decadent" coconut based dessert is about 10 times better than the "So Delicious" soy based flavor.  It's creamier and the mint is much more powerful.  All soy based ice creams have a soy undertone, so I tend to go with nuttier flavors usually.  You can usually taste the coconut milk in these products, too, but I didn't taste any crossover in the mint chip.  Both are made by Turtle Mountain, so proceeds go to helping endangered sea turtles.

Ian chose a color for our bedroom (and Ben painted it, because he is the world's greatest house guest.  He should have his own reality tv show...) and:

Instead of "yellow grass" like it was billed as, it's mint ice cream, too.  I still like it.

Future Table Details

I am so excited to be getting our table made.  Finally!

We commissioned it through Royal Oak Metal Craft.  They are also building us three chairs and a bench to match.  The set is costing us a small fortune (okay, not really, if you look at the cost of high end dining room sets) and it will weigh a ton, making it very difficult to move.  Who cares, right?  It will look fabulous.  Just don't try to scoot your chair up to the table.

I hope the chairs aren't that heavy.

It will all be under way as soon as we talk with the wood guy.

That's the table from restoration hardware.  The bench will simply be a miniaturized version (no casters, of course).  The chairs will have metal frames and backs (with simple oval cut outs in diminishing size) and wooden seats.  All the wood will be laid in to protect the edges, as it's very old.

This table is a big deal.  It means so many things:

-more cooking

-actually inviting people over (maybe even meeting our neighbors)

-less square footage wasted in our apartment

-a housewarming party (can you call it that when you've lived in a place for 9 months?)

Oh, the relief I will feel.

Is there one thing in your home that you feel if you accomplished would make your life immensely better?

P.S. Happy Father's Day!

Wall Plans

Phew.  The apartment is de-cluttered and the rest of the decorating and finalizing can begin.  The main things coming up for the apartment are: 1) the dining room table (we finally commissioned it, it will look a lot like this one from Restoration Hardware, with chairs and a bench to match)  2) painting!  3) framing and hanging photography and art (luckily, my brother works for Larson Juhl)  4) acquire house plants

Here's what the apartment looks like right now, complete with  bare eggshell walls:

(living room) Full bookcase.  It's too dark to tell, but there isn't a bunch of crap sitting on the chest next to the t.v. anymore.  Yay!

  

(living room) Plants on the shelf, art below it and on the other wall.  I have a simple collage frame to go in that spot above the heater.

 (dining room) It's going to be fun hauling that wood over to the metal shop.  Luckily, they had someone they could recommend to do the wood work.  Living in an apartment makes even simple sanding and cutting down pretty difficult.

(dining room)  Sad corner.  I'm not sure whether I want a hutch for that spot (hard to find) or if I'm just going to stick a plant in it.  Obviously, those walls need art.  The walls will be powder green in this room.

(living room)  This is the accent wall.  I'm going to paint it blue.  Rob and Danie got us that awesome map.  You scratch off places as you travel to them.

The guest room is still a catch all, but at least it's inhabitable now.

(bedroom)  Our bedroom needs color and art on the walls.  Badly.

That picture frame on Ian's night stand has a cut out from our crazy Korean wall paper in it (you can see the wall in the background of many of the photos in the Jecheon blog, it was pink with huge white flowers).

So, things are happening!  But, I have to work in the morning, so I'd better sleep.

Little Things

Our bookshelves have been purged and cleansed.

I really need a camera...

Our apartment should soon look like a place where adults dwell.  By the way, bookends are surprisingly difficult to locate.  I asked someone on the floor at Target if they had any and he responded with something like, "Geez, that's not really common anymore."  What? I'm pretty sure people still have bookshelves, even if they've all gone Kindle.  Bookstores have them, but they're ornate and pricey.  I found ours at Ikea for about two bucks a pair.

Clutter Be Gone!

Ian and I are trying to clear out our apartment of unwanted stuff.  We try to live by a simple rule: if you don't use it for a year, you probably don't need it.

We've lived in our apartment for 9 months and we're still not really moved.  Bare walls and clutter.  It's not a comfortable space to say the least.  Finally, that's changing.  In the coming weeks, when everything is up to snuff, I will post pictures of it.  

Update on the kitties: when they're not biting each other's faces and throats, they're getting along famously.

Puzzle Pieces

Things are coming along nicely in our apartment, so I thought that I would share some of the progress.  Keep in mind that each of these photos is extremely contrived.  It's still chaos in here, but I moved it around a bit to allow the place to show it's potential.

Be sure to knock on wood, but I'm confident we'll be done (painting and all) when February rolls around.  We'll be ready for our housewarming party in time for Ian's birthday (2/24), so they'll coincide nicely.  I'm starting to feel pretty good about things around here.  It's been difficult because I haven't wanted to be in our apartment at all.  Also, friends are starting to feel a little weird about my unwillingness to have anyone over.  Time is of the essence.

It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like...

A great big mess.

Projects are officially under way around the apartment and where there was once clean, empty floor space there is now, well... this.

Ian is cleaning and refinishing the steamer trunk that his parents gave us.  When the living room is put together, it will act as a coffee table.

The kitchen isn't fairing much better right now.

I made these ginger butter cookies by adding fresh ginger to the simple butter cookie recipe in the Betty Crocker Cookbook.  I sliced some candied ginger and put a small piece on top of each.

And, though I won't go into specifics (since it's for Christmas), I'm learning to use this guy.

It's difficult for me to get in to the Christmas spirit this year.  I'll be working on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, so I'll miss out on a lot of the holiday get togethers.  It's also very difficult to decorate a home that isn't furnished.  But, we're making the most of it.  We bought a live, potted Douglas Fir the other night.  Live Evergreens can't be inside for very long, so we're picking it up next Wednesday or Thursday.  We met Mom in Centralia and she gave us some of the Christmas decorations we had over there along with some hand-me-downs and those will go up next week with the tree.

For now, we have this swag up in our entry to make the place smell a little Christmas-y.  

Home, Woefully Under-furnished, Home!

Welcome to The Urban Agrarians!  We're home!

After a couple of months squatting with generous family, we are finally getting settled in Portland.  It's pretty exciting.

We have a couple of projects in the cannon, but it's still slow going as our minimalist lifestyle is less by choice and more by circumstance right now.

Too cool for bookshelves.

Couches are for ninnies.

But, our radio is rad.

And our kitchen is stocked.

Coffee is crucial to my 5am mornings.

We won't have internet until the beginning of December, so there will be some dead air after Thanksgiving.  But, stay tuned for explorations of Portland and the beginnings of our DIY projects.

It's good to be back.