A Saturday drive up to Black Rock Forest
JOURNAL
Weekend Stories: Autumn in Prospect Park, 2020 |42
My favourite season
Weekend Stories: Pancakes, plants and parks | 41
Weekend Stories: Scones and walks|40
N bought English clotted cream which, of course, called for warm scones for tea. I found a recipe on NY Times and satisfied my craving for British-style scones! When I order scones in the US, they do not serve it with clotted cream! Apparently it’s because the American-styles ones use more butter and sugar and British-style is more plain.
This week I’ve been feeling immensely homesick. In particular, I really miss my mum. I regret not going in August before they mandated visitors to pay for the hotel quarantine fee. But then again, if I had went we would not have been able to get married on our original wedding date, nor find our current apartment to move in to.
This time of Covid-19 is a difficult and emotionally burdensome. Hopefully I can visit home next year.
When I take my morning walks around the lake in Prospect Park, I think to myself how I can’t wait to show my mum and take walks with her when she visits. She would love this park.
On Sunday I trekked to Chinatown for yumcha with some friends.
And had ramen for dinner with the husband in Prospect Park. So good!
Weekend Stories: New brunch spots and a Sunday to myself|39
A normal, uneventful work week, although it did involve several outdoor errands in the evening, such as an unsuccessful trek to Queens to look at a bike, a Friday evening cycle back to Downtown Brooklyn to return keys and Verizon hardware. Towards the end of the week I was happy to stay home, which also called for banana muffins on Thursday.
Enjoying the sun in the afternoon on our balcony. Our new apartment faces west, thus we are entrenched with sunlight around lunch time. I finished the leftover salad and admired the evening sun filter through our kitchen and dining table.
Weekend was a quiet one. I went for a morning walk around Prospect Park, explored a new brunch spot with the husband and walked around the neighbourhood. There are Halloween decorations spotted around now! How time flies. Once Halloween goes by, it’s Thanksgiving, then Christmas – and before you know it, you’ve entered the new year.
Husband was out during Sunday and I enjoyed having the apartment to myself for several hours. With both us working from home since April, it did feel like a treat to have the place to myself, alone. I whipped up some kimchi fried rice for brunch, then for dessert I made a cup of tea, sliced an apple and had a portion of the walnut cake.
I finally got around to washing and scrubbing the balcony to install the wooden tiles, read my book in the sun and cooked a hearty curry chicken rice for dinner. I ensconced myself in the apartment for the day, so content and immersed in the moment that I did not take any photographs.
Weekend Stories: Housewarming |38
It was a short work week as I had to take a sick day after feeling immobilized Tuesday morning. After moving, cleaning and organizing everything in the house, as well as the sudden change in weather, it got the best of me.
The below photos are the neat and tidy areas of the apartment I am content with (I placed the snake plant in the living room to liven it up a bit).
I dragged the husband along to a FB marketplace purchase in Tribeca on Friday where we ended up having dinner at an overpriced restaurant. I suspect most of the restaurants in the vicinity would have had the same result.
On Saturday we had to go back to our previous apartment for the final clean up and paint any marks on the wall. I sold several items on FB Marketplace and made a whopping $110 in extra cash. After we cycled back home, we took a rest and then went to the nearest WholeFoods to buy groceries for our French-themed housewarming dinner on Sunday.
The in-laws arrived in the evening and we served them an array of French dishes – beef bourguignon as the main, garlic and parsley potatoes (both cooked by N), french green beans with caramelized shallots, rosemary sweet potato stacks, cauliflower mash and a kale salad with goat cheese, cranberry, apple and pecan salad with french vinaigrette dressing side dishes made by moi). They loved everything and N’s brothers ate A LOT. This made me very happy.
I don’t have a (nice) photo of the full banquet but here is a photo of the leftovers we finished off throughout the week.
Monday was a struggle. I went to bed early to catchup on sleep and to recharge.
Luckily we had food to reheat for the week.
Weekend Stories: A new neighbourhood, a new chapter|37
I am typing this in the dining area of our new apartment. I italicised those words because it is such a novel experience for us to have these dedicated areas in our home. For e.g., N has his foyer/office nook, I have my desk in the living room corner and a reading nook in the room. We also have a balcony which I can’t wait to do up once our balcony cleaning supplies arrive. Although we are further out in Brooklyn, we pay less in rent with more space. I love that Prospect Park is only a ten-minute walk away and it feels more like a family neighbourhood than our previous place (in other words, less trendy, not yet gentrified and not as pretentious).
The week before our move, we ate out at restaurants we haven’t been to yet.
Moving is always a pain. N did all the furniture assembly and I did the organizing which always take longer than expected because you need to wipe down everything before placing anything in it. We moved in Saturday midday and I pretty much organized everything by Sunday night! It was Spartan-like. I wanted to relax and enjoy the space on Monday because I took the day off.
Here is a small glimpse of our living and dining room area:
Weekend Stories: Last weekend in Downtown BK | 36
We are moving next weekend!
Our last weekend in Downtown Brooklyn – our home of three years – was spent walking around the neighbourhood.
Actually, on Sunday we were in lower Manhattan most of the time, frantically visiting home furniture stores to look for a sofa but to no avail. We’ll have to stick with our IKEA sofa couch for now. There are no photos from Sunday. Our apartment is in a complete mess with boxes everywhere. We sold a few items such as our bed frame, N’s desk and chair and my white shelf.
Weekend Stories: Birthday on Labor Day | 35
It was a long weekend and I took an extra day off the day after my birthday which was on Labor Day.
A low-key weekend, grateful for another year with loved ones safe and healthy.
A Reading Edit notebook as a birthday gift to myself.
Weekend Stories: Furniture shopping online | 34
It was a slow week, easing back into WFH life after a week off.
We are moving in three weeks. Our current apartment of three years has treated us well but I am excited for change as well as more space (only by 200 sq ft) and…a balcony! A luxury in Brooklyn standards.
We plan to update some furniture and it seems like I spent most of the day on Saturday browsing Facebook marketplace and Wayfair. I’ve also been decluttering spaces around the house slowly, generating some side cash selling books and miscellaneous items. Can’t complain.
N convinced me to get out of the house despite my hermit resistance to which I thanked him later while we were eating pizza in Carroll Gardens. It was a beautiful Saturday night and we leisurely strolled back after eating a whole pizza pie together.
No photos from Sunday. In summary, I woke up a bit earlier to do some yoga, more online furniture shopping, went out to Atlantic Ave for a Best Buy return, Vietnamese for lunch and assembled our new dining table we got for the new place.