Colleen and Kenny....

.......are engaged!!!!

Congratulations to two of my favorite people in the whole world! I still can't believe it and cannot wait for wedding planning to start!!! Eeeeeeeeeeeek! They're getting married!!!

We had plans to meet up at The Habitat for Colleen's birthday last night, but Kenny got down on one knee when she got home from work so the night turned more into an engagement celebration for both of them.

She wears that ring so well.

Colleen greets Meredith in the street for some jumping up and down and hugging.

Starr is married so she can relate.

Fiancés! (and Kenny's hand)

Beyoncés!

Little Hollywood

The top of Manhattan Avenue in Greenpoint, where I live, doesn't get much action and I love the fact that it is far walk to the subway because stays quiet for the most part. However, the last few months have been kind of insane for my neighborhood.

First came the production of a new HBO series directed by Martin Scorcese called Boardwalk Empire. It is about the history of Atlantic City's boardwalk from its origins as a quiet seaside resort to the casino empire it is today. For the filming, which is supposedly happening for the next 18 months, they took over the northern riverbank and park and turned it into a set of Atlantic City. Steve Buscemi stars in the series and I bet he'll be hanging out a lot at weird places like Tommy's Tavern.

And for the last couple weeks there has been a major movie production taking over 10 blocks of Manhattan Ave for the Jennifer Aniston/Gerard Butler movie Bounty Hunter. This one make me particularly angry because they have blocked all the streets and there is no where to park my car, they have crowded every block with ginormous trucks that keep me up at night with their bright lights and loud idling [hello, ever hear of the ozone layer?], and because the production people seem to think they are on a movie set and show little respect to the people that actually live here in this residential neighborhood.

That being said, yesterday Abe and I totally watched the filming of the July 4th parade scene and stood in the crowd cheering as parade-goer extras. I had no idea who Gerard Butler was/is, but Abe said he's a Hollywood Hottie. He is wearing the navy blue polo shirt.

You saw it here first, folks!

Right in the Ol' Pie Hole

You may have noticed on my blog's left side bar that I have a category called "My Bucket List". This is a list of things I want to do before I die. Number 1 on the list was "Having a banana cream pie thrown in my face." This is something I've wanted since I was a child and I've talked about it with my friends quite a bit. Well folks, I'm happy to say that not only am I a 30 year-old with the best friends in the world, but I can cross that item off my bucket list!!

Special thanks to Lauren for baking such a delicious pie, Piper for rubbing it in my face real good, Eddie for taking such a good video, Abe for warning about the need to protect my dress, and Colleen for putting a paper towel bib on me. And a big applause to Lauren, Piper, Meredith, Margot, and Colleen for choreographing a seamless production.

I'm How Old?!?!

Today I turn 30. I cannot even believe it. I'm not afraid of the number or freaking out about my life, but I still just can't wrap my head around the fact that I've been around for that long!

Late last night my downstairs neighbor buzzed our apartment and said she was locked out. Then there was a knock at the door. Abe and I were in the bedroom - I was reading and in my pajamas. I was like "Go answer the door!" and he was like "No! You do it!" and I was so horrified that I was in my apartment pants and a droopy tank top, but I didn't want the poor girl to be waiting. So I go answer the door and it took me a couple seconds to realize it was one of my oldest, best friends in the world, Allyson!! She and Abe had been planning this surprise for weeks. I didn't even think she was going to make it down here and I had been telling her not to worry about it because I would be in Massachusetts the day after my birthday and she could see me then. She just laughed at me last night - miss my 30th birthday? As if.

It was wonderful to have the surprise of Allyson in my apartment, and her gift of two gorgeous rings [more on that later] with a really awesome birthday letter [our friendship anniversary is also the same day as my birthday - we met in homeroom in the 7th grade, but she had 2 other BFF's so I invited her to my 13th b-day party to woo her over to my side adn lucky for me she really wanted to be wooed by me.]

BUT - the most amazing part of it all wasn't our 17 year old friendship and the surprise she and Abe successfully pulled off - it was....

An entire tray of her mom's famous baklava that Allyson made for me!!

Now I'm off for a day at Spa Castle and then a night in Koreatown signing karaoke with all my other best friends. I am so lucky to have such wonderful people in my life! Embarrassing photos to follow after this weekend...

Adventures in Reupholstering

A couple weeks ago I came home from work after a horrible & exhausting day. I was in a rotten mood - I can't even remember why anymore, but as I turned the corner on my block I saw a chair across the street and down a few houses. [I'm telling you, I have an eagle-eye for garbage.] It had just started to rain lightly, but I trotted over to the chair and sure enough, my eyes did not deceive me. It was a dream chair!

I paused for a minute before snatching it - did a couple walk-bys and waited for some privacy before going in for the inspection. Sure, I considered the fact that it was in the garbage for a reason and what if that reason was bedbugs [eeeek!!!!], and the fact that it was raining out and the chair was upholstered in fabric, but then a wave of joy washed over me and I grabbed that little chair and sped-walked [heel, toe, heel, toe] the two blocks home. Even Abe had to hide his disgust and annoyance when he saw how excited I was.

In conclusion, I got home and used an upholstery cleaner on the fabric and some good cleaner to wipe down the wood pieces. Part of the deal with Abe letting me keep the chair is that I promised to get it professional reupholstered rather than trying to do it myself.

That brings me to.... what fabric to choose in the reupholstering of the chair?!

I immediately thought of this fabric from the ETSY shop Summersville. Unfortunately, because it is hand printed the sizes available are too small for my chair.

After some heavy searching I came across this fabric from the Alexander Henry HEATH collection. It actually comes in a few colors, but I'm leaning towards the blue...but maybe I'll go black. I haven't found a local retailer, but the reupholsterer said she would try to look for me too.

Actually, as I type up this post the shop doing the reupholstery for me is emailing me samples so I'm kind of live blogging as this project progresses. More to come....

**UPDATE**

My chair has been reupholstered (I chose the black & white) and it gets more compliments than anything I've ever owned! I'm using it in photos to display my pillows in my Etsy shop.