Building a Nursery

Planning. Shopping. Building. Organizing. All essential to designing a proper nursery. We had a lot of work and research to do, since it turned out that we would be welcoming 7 new members to our N1109 family.

You read that correctly...SEVEN. SEVEN BABIES.

Baby plants that is.

Ha HA! Gotcha! Get it? Babies live in nurseries...plants live in nurseries...baby plants...oh goodness I crack myself up sometimes.

Okay, let's face it, even I have to admit the cheesiness of that introduction and the lack of cracking myself up. But it was still fun, and I just couldn't resist. And this weekend we did in fact welcome seven new plant friends into our borderline urban/suburban home.

Saturday afternoon Maura and I got back from our respective activities and were trying to figure out what to do with the rest of the day. She was feeling crafty and I was totally game, but we just weren't feeling inspired. We sat at the kitchen table, each gazing into our laptops, begging Pinterest to give us a fun, crafty idea that we could finish in a few hours. An hour and two chocolate milkshakes later, we still had nothing.

Then out of the blue...herbs! Let's grow herbs! I don't remember who came up with the idea at the time or how we agreed to pursue this particular project, but we both decided that we really wanted to try and grow herbs in our 11th floor, downtown Rockville apartment. After all, we all cook with them enough, why not? After a bit more online price-checking, it was time to begin our mission. THE mission. Soon we were in the car and on the road to stop number one: IKEA.

Yes, I said IKEA. Before we could buy the herbs we had to be sure we had a place to put them. C'mon people, keep up with me here.

I have to admit, I have actually never been to IKEA before (strange, I know, but true). And may I just say, that place is HUGE. It was fun at first, winding through the pathways and seeing all the fun furniture, but after a while it got a bit overwhelming and claustrophobic - even more so with all the Saturday afternoon idiots wandering around. We weren't having much luck finding a suitable and affordable table for our babies, either.

Then, ironically enough, we stumbled across a well-priced baby changing table that would have served our purposes wonderfully. I actually thought it would be pretty awesome slash hilarious, having a changing table as a plant nursery. But just then, Maura found a nice looking shelf that seemed like an even more perfect fit that we just couldn't say no to - of course, she found it on her phone and it was at Target. So, after driving 30 minutes to get there and wandering around for almost an hour, we left IKEA empty-handed and headed back to our own neighborhood to buy our shelf.

Next stop was Home Depot (side note - I can't help but laugh about being excited to go to Home Depot - my dad dragged me there countless times as a child and I absolutely despised that store. Now I was happily prancing in to buy plants). We wandered shyly into the nursery, not too sure about what we were getting ourselves into. We gathered a handful of herbs that we thought we might use the most and Maura bought some seeds for some extra flowers. After grabbing all the necessary pots and soil  (which turned out to be for "in-ground" use - oh well, we'll see how that turns out) and nervously telling a store employee that we had absolutely no idea what we were doing, we checked out and rolled our new family members to the car.

Both of us were oddly terrified as we walked out of that store:

"I hope we don't kill them all"
"What are we getting ourselves into??"
"OMG WE HAVE NO IDEA WHAT WE ARE DOING"

Clearly neither of us are ready for human babies yet.

After picking up Chinese food and bubble tea, we came back to the apartment and built our shelf/nursery/plant holder. We then proceeded to make a mess in our kitchen as we attempted to put our little babies in their new beds A.K.A. pots.

"Need some more dirt?"
"Is this enough dirt?"
"This dirt is getting everywhere."

Dirt. Not soil. Not possibly the wrong soil. Just dirt. Two giant green thumbs right here. It was awesome :)

This is how the final set-up turned out:

We plan to fill all those shelves soon. And that black trash bag is holding the bag of dirt.

It's only been a few days, but I'll let you know how our babies are doing as they hopefully grow and don't die!

Side note 2: We actually have eight plants total now. My Opa saw my apartment for the first time and brought me a lovely orchid. Our family just keeps growing!

Elevator Speeches

As I waited for the elevator in my apartment this afternoon, a little boy (probably around 4 years old) and his mom came up. This conversation was too good not to share...

Boy: Why are we going upstairs, too?
Mom: Because that's where Nick lives
Boy: I knew that
Mom: Then why did you ask?
The little boy then proceeds to explain how when there's a fire it's better to take the stairs than the elevator. Smart kid.

Then once we're in the elevator...

Boy: Brrr, I'm cold!
Mom: Well, I told you to put your sweater on.
Boy: No, it's warm in here.

Then as I got off the elevator...

Boy: Is she leaving?
Mom: Does she look like she's leaving?
Repeat the last conversation in various versions as I walk down the hall. Too. Funny.

Kids just say the darndest things! What made this even better? He was wearing a fedora!!! And for those of you that may somehow magically remember this, this was a different little kid than the 4-year-old, fedora-wearing cutie that I saw when I first moved in. So many little people in fedoras saying hilarious things! OMG I can't handle the cuteness!!!

Embracing My Inner Old Person

I would like to introduce you all to a friend of mine:

This is my shopping cart. Yes, I have an old lady shopping cart at age 23. And I think it's awesome! I haven't come up with a name for it yet, since I'm apparently not creative at all when it comes to making up names for anything (watch out, future offspring). But Shopping Cart makes my life so much easier! If I don't have a car to go grocery shopping, it's a life saver. Even if I do have the car, Shopping Cart will still help me carry everything upstairs. Still think I'm weird? Let me see YOU lug four bags of groceries (including a gallon of milk) across a parking lot full of maniacs, then play Frogger crossing Rockville Pike, then walk back to your apartment, go up the elevator 11 flights, and around the corner to the very end of the hall. I bet you would wish you had Shopping Cart with you, too.

And that is the only part of my life that even slightly resembles being an old person..........

Okay, who am I kidding? There are actually several parts of my life that make my loved ones wonder, and sometimes make myself wonder, if I am actually 90 years old.

As many of you know, I'm a pretty active person. I love being on the move, trying new things, being around people, and I'm finally getting some semblance of a social life back now that I'm living on my own. I'm even starting the process (yes, it's turning out to be a bit of a process) of signing up for Events and Adventures, the singles activity slash dating club (well hello, Future Husband, you look rather dashing in your hiking/kayaking/skydiving/happy hour attire). But I'm all about balance in life, and sometimes you just need to take a little break from all the crazy hustle and bustle. For me, sometimes that means doing things ever-so-slightly differently than the average 23-year old.

Take right now, for example. As I write this post (actually, as I've written just about all of my posts), my Pandora station of choice is the Frank Sinatra station. I LOVE Frank Sinatra and all those crooners from back in the day. There's even a Frank Sinatra station that normally plays in the lobby of my apartment building, making it incredibly difficult to leave for work in the mornings. Instead I just want to curl up with a book in the comfy chairs in the lounge and bask in those wonderful sounds.

I also love drinking tea in the evenings. I'm drinking a cup right now in fact, a scrumptiously soothing cup of Earl Grey tea. And yes, for those that are going to point out the obvious, I realize that this blog is called Heather's Coffee Break and not Tea Break. Get over it. If I actually managed to write in the morning I would be drinking coffee. I love them both!

That's not so bad, right? Frank Sinatra and tea? I actually know several people that enjoy both of those things!

But wait, there's more...

Sometimes I would love to just be sitting in a rocking chair, on a porch, overlooking some gorgeous landscape, wrapped in a blanket AND sipping tea (or coffee). Any one of these could totally be me when I'm actually an old person:

And aside from relaxing, what about my mini panic attacks when I'm up past 11 on a work night? It's ok to worry about that, right, getting a good night's sleep? Totally normal...

I feel like I could go on and on, but 11 PM is approaching faster and faster and I'm already starting to get a little antsy. But let's face it, there's a part of me that's just an old person at heart. But you know what? I'm totally OK with that. I have fun in life, but I enjoy my down time as well. So rather than trying to fight my inner old person, I'm just going laugh at it and embrace it.

Side note for my worrisome loved ones: I promise I don't actually play Frogger on Rockville Pike. I'm a good girl and use the crosswalk (although let's be real, even that can be like Frogger sometimes)!!!

Side note 2: when I did an image search on Google for a clock showing 11:00, all of the pictures that came up were showing other times. Really, Google? Really?




Frank Sinatra photo from imdb.com. 
Tea photo from http://www.loosetealeaf.com/blog/
Rocking chair cartoons from http://www.cartoonstock.com/directory/r/rocking_chair.asp

A Post for the Sake of a Post

Well, folks, it looks like that time has come. I knew at some point there would be a time when it would be much more difficult to keep up with my blog post a week goal, and this is that week. Not only do I have almost complete writer's block, but I feel like I hardly have any time. This week is going to be a fun one, but a very busy one as well. I have something going on every single day after work as well as throughout my entire long weekend. Trying to sit down and come up with something entertaining to write about just seems like such a daunting task.

And yet, before I finally sat down and started writing this, I was pretty much just procrastinating for half an hour. I had a very productive evening when I got home, but once things finally slowed down, I just sat on the couch and stared into space...and then at my many split ends (which apparently only white girls get by the way, according to my coworkers. They had a hard time grasping that the ends actually split). I could have also used that time to get some more chores done as well, but of course that didn't happen. Procrastination can just be so much easier than productivity!

Still, I figured I still needed to write something and I probably won't have time to do it tomorrow for my Tuesday deadline, so here I am. It's kind of like those days when you have to force yourself to workout even when you really don't want to. It's kind of a half-assed workout, but hey, at least it's something. That's kind of how this blog post is. It's not that I don't want to write, because if I had it my way I would do this all day every day. It's just one of those nights where the creative juices just don't seem to be flowing.

So while I brainstorm next week's hopefully much better post, here are some of my random thoughts for your enjoyment. Or boredom. Or brain cell destruction. Who knows, let me know how it works out for you when you're done:

1. THE POPE IS RESIGNING!!! I couldn't go without mentioning this since this crazy news just came out today. Oh Benny, how we'll miss you. It's also crazy to think about how I was living history just 5 years ago with my friends and classmates when he came to visit CUA. So. Awesome.
2. Speaking of working out, I should probably do that. Those 30 crunches I did this morning count, right?
3. I tried to kill a bug in my bathroom with a roll of paper towels. I knocked him off the wall, but then he just crawled into a little crack where I couldn't get to him. Stupid little bugger. And I also wasted a paper towel because there is NO WAY I'm going to use a paper towel that touched a bug.
4. Now I feel bad about wasting a paper towel. Two actually. There are poor people in this world that could probably think of a million things they could do with each of those paper towels. #firstworldproblems #guilttrip
5. I don't understand hashtags. I don't even have a Twitter. None of it makes any sense, but for whatever reason they're still fun to use.
6. I got to talk to a nun with an Australian accent today. Need I say more?
7. Half of the strawberries I bought this weekend turned out to be moldy and/or squishy. In order to make the most out of the remaining good ones, I decided to make strawberry sauce. Pretty much made it just like applesauce, but with strawberries. It's not bad, we'll see how it works as a breakfast topper.
8. Why am I still writing this? It's after 11:00 PM and I have to get up early tomorrow. Sigh...
9. I plan to write a post soon about "Embracing my inner old person." It's going to contain several awesome topics, including the minor panic attacks that I have when I stay up past 11 on a work night and listening to the Frank Sinatra Pandora station on a regular basis. Neither of which I happen to be doing at this very moment.......
10. I promise I'm actually an active 23 year old! I'm even going to a concert this week!! Yay, youthfulness! See, I'm not old yet! Right?....RIGHT???

Ok, well that's enough of my random insanity for now. Hopefully something more solid for you all next week!

"Les Mis": A Unique Theatrical Experience

When the lights came back on in the theater on Saturday night, my friends eagerly turned to me and asked the ultimate question: "So what did you think?" My response...

"It was OK."

The truth of the matter is that I walked into "Les Miserables" wanting to love it. I was going to this movie with friends that were seeing it for the second time...and you know that a movie must be good if there are people willing to pay $12 for it more than once. But as I sat through the 3-hour long mega musical, while I did find myself enjoying it, I wasn't blown away by it like the rest of the world was.

And then something interesting happened. For the next three days, I found myself thinking about this movie all the time. The themes within it, the characters, plot twists, theatrics - I kept going back and thinking over the meaning of everything and wanting to pick it apart and analyze it like one of the many books I mentally devoured in my days as an English major. Every time a movie keeps me thinking that much I realize that it's had an impact on me, and I suddenly realized that I did, in fact, want to see "Les Mis" again.

 As I've thought it over more, I think I've come to realize that the main reason I only thought the movie was OK was because I wasn't prepared for the theatricality of it. It's something unlike anything I had seen before, and sometimes when you come across something different you're not sure what to make of it right away...but how sometimes it does eventually grow on you. So here are my thoughts on the movie, both those points that I may not have appreciated as much right off the bat, as well as the more important points that have stuck with me since: 

The Sticky Spots (aka my slightly more childish side trying to handle an intense movie)

• Your typical musical has a dozen or so main songs and the rest of the story is normal conversation. This movie/play is just about all singing, including the parts when people are just having a conversation. As much as I love music, I found myself breathing a mental sigh of relief each time there was a snippet of normal speech.
• It was a little too long. While the movie did keep my attention throughout its entirety, three hours in one sitting is just too long for me - I get far too fidgety and movie theater seats aren't that comfortable. Two and a half hours, fine. Three - I've hit my breaking point. Why do you think I had to watch the "Lord of the Rings" movies in two sittings each?
• Multiple people singing at once. As beautiful as their voices were musically, these scenes made my band geek side and my English major side clash. Music - very pretty! Words - I can't tell what they're saying! What's going on in the story???
• It really irked me that the story was based in France and all the characters had British accents. While I probably enjoyed listening to the British accents more than I would have French ones, it lost an authenticity brownie point in my book. 
• The cheesy Shakespearean-esque love story between Cosette and Marius. It had its plus points, mostly because I'm a sucker for cheesy love stories, but for the most part this one just annoyed me. Amanda Seyfried just annoys me in general, though, so that could be why.

The Awesome Parts (aka where my nerdy/artsy/literary side comes out and I see the beauty in the movie)

• The quality of the movie as a whole really was incredible. The theatrics were flawless and the music was amazing. I'm still blown away by the fact that everyone sang their parts live during filming and the songs weren't prerecorded. I now know why it's been nominated for so many awards. 
• LOVED the character evolution. I could write an entire blog post just on this, but for now I'll keep it simple. Jean Valjean and Javert (the two main characters) were especially intriguing, but all the supporting characters were really interesting to follow as well. 
• The overall story line. Let's face it, it's a great story. It keeps you hooked the whole time and the plot is very well-developed.
• The religious themes. This in particular is the reason I kept thinking about this movie. Jean Valjean is Christian love personified, and I have to admit that his role was truly inspiring. My roommate, however (one of my friends who has now seen it twice), also pointed out the fascinating contrast between Jean and Javert - how the two practice the same religion but do so in such different ways. While she pointed it out to me (and while I'm slightly disappointed I didn't think about it more myself to begin with), I've taken it and run with it. Maybe another post on this sometime as well. 
• The influence of love. The story circulates around misery and a country in shambles, but the acts of love and the impacts that they have on the main characters are absolutely remarkable. This aspect of the movie is also something else I can add to my list of things currently influencing me to love more in my own life. 

As I finish up this post, I'm realizing that the more I write about the awesome parts, the more I want to see this movie again. Who knows, maybe some day I will be one of those people that falls in love with it. 

End note: for those of you that have neither seen the play or read the book (like me), or are hesitant to see the movie, I still recommend that you go. Just be prepared for a very different movie experience than one you might normally have. 

It's Time for a Blog-Over

In case you haven't noticed, "The Coffee Break" has changed just a smidge. If you haven't noticed, you might want to head to the doctor and get yourself checked out. Eye doctor, brain scan, whatever...you could have some serious issues. But for those of you that have noticed, congratulations! You've earned a perfect bill of health from Dr. Heather.

And now, for a quick tour. First stop, the design. New colors, brighter, fun fonts...what do you think?? If you don't like it, well you can just be quiet. Go get your own blog, you can do whatever you want with it. There's no need to hurt my blog's feelings!

In all seriousness, though, I'm open to suggestions to make it prettier! The format will probably be continually changing for a bit. I plan to add some labels, probably some extra tabs, potentially a photo background, and maybe even flirt with the colors some more (What's that, turquoise? Dinner you say? I'd love to!).

Next stop, my blog's name. I spent all weekend trying to puzzle over some fun and quirky new name, but couldn't settle on anything I liked enough to commit long-term (I did not go to Jared). Still, "The Coffee Break" just seemed pretty bleh, so I figured I would at least have the title match my URL. The official name is now "Heather's Coffee Break." Apparently I just need to add my own name to give something a little more pizzazz. Man, I'm just so awesome! [time for the Litany of Humility, anyone?] Welcome to the world, new blog name! I see a bright future for you!

And now for our final stop, because I like to talk/write too much and can't write a post that stops here. This last stop is a brief snapshot, a snippet if you will, about the history of the last 48 hours to pick a new blog name. While puzzling over various names and frightening my roommates each time I shouted out a new suggestion, there was one in particular that I kept coming back to: Pork Chops and Applesauce. Yes, I know it seems INCREDIBLY random, particularly because this isn't a food blog, but I don't care. There are many reasons this name would be a good fit for me:

• I'm totally ok with a random name since I write about a random assortment of things.
• Pork chops and applesauce are pretty random in their own right. You wouldn't expect them to go so well together, and yet they do!
• This was the only dinner that my mom knew how to cook when my parents first got married, so for a good stretch of time they were eating pork chops and applesauce a LOT. 
• It has an awesome and funny connection with the Brady Bunch (that of course concludes with a wholesome life lesson)! Check it out...

So why didn't I use this magnificent name you may ask?

The dang domain name was taken!!!

I  was so sad, because I had really let this title grow on me. I decided that I would hunt down the blog-name-stealing bandit and type in the URL...hoping that I would at least find some interesting food blog that I could come back to later. But what I found shocked...nay, flabbergasted me. A page in all pink...a Yankees fan (sorry Yankees friends, you know I still love you)...a grand total of 3 posts...from 2004...with a title that didn't even match the domain name!! I was so upset. Crushed, that my fun and random blog name, tied with family memories and the Brady Bunch, was going to such a waste! It would be so loved here! But alas, it simply wasn't meant to be for this humble blog of mine.

I won't let it get me down and out, though. I've officially decided that I will one day write a book called "Pork Chops and Applesauce," and it's going to be awesome. It'll be the #1 best seller in the New York Times and will probably win a Pulitzer. So take that, miss blog name bandit.

This...is...IMMUNITY!!!

As dawn approached, there was an impending battle looming over the horizon. There would be no guns, no cannons. Only swords and shields..........

.........wielded by little white blood cells.

This is what I think is currently going on inside my immune system right now.

While I am not yet sick, I fear that some ominous illness may be right around the corner. I've had no distinct symptoms, but ever since yesterday morning I've had that weird feeling that my body is fighting some strange disease. A disease that I most likely picked up in the sneezing, coughing hack-fest that is the DC Metro.

In my normal routine to attempt to ward off the [insert winter disease here] epidemic, I of course started chugging orange juice and popping Airborne tablets like they were free candy. But in an unusual way, I started wondering how these actions were actually helping my immune system, and somehow that led to me picturing my white blood cells holding swords and fighting an epic battle against the evil slimy germs.

As I let this lovely little part of my imagination get away from me, I started to picture my white blood cells as the gang of soldiers from 300, fighting off the monstrous Persian germs that are threatening to enslave my health for all eternity. Based on the fact that I've still managed to avoid serious illness up to this point, I imagine that White Blood Cell Leonidas has already kicked the Persian Germ Messenger into the well screaming, "This...is...IMMUNITY!!!!"

(I promise I'm not high on cold meds).

I have to admit, though, as crazy and weird as I might sound right now, there is something highly satisfying in picturing your immune system waging a successful battle to prevent your sickness...particularly when it involves white blood cells slashing green germy blobs in half with a sword. And hopefully my white blood cells will fare better in the end than the 300 Spartans...if all my white blood cells died then I'd be pretty screwed. But so far, so good! I think they just killed the Germ Rhino.

And just to stay on the topic of 300, if you've never seen 300 spartan apples you should totally check it out! Look, I even got fancy and made the title of the video into a link!