CLT Apartment Tour

You've been waiting for this day and it's finally here! A little over a month after we arrived on Plymouth Rock in Charlotte, the magical day is finally upon us. I hesitated a bit before actually going through with this - pictures of the inside of our apartment for all the world to see??? But it's all part of being a blogger. So, sit tight, grab some cookie butter from Trader Joe's -- have you tried that stuff? There are no words. It is probably the most delicious thing I have EVER eaten.... and watch the show!

Also - this is my first time blogging from Jake's new Macbook Pro (actual photo below taken as I was writing this blog. Wait for it. Mind blow right? Matrix/Inception style.... a blog within a blog within a blog). 

Do you ever pay attention to airport codes? I seriously love them! I refer to Portland as PDX, Detroit as DTW and now... Charlotte as CLT. I also like CLE (Cleveland) and ATL (Atlanta). Anyway, I was talking to my dad the other day and he was asking me what the airport code is for Charlotte and I had to laugh.  Like father, like daughter, right?!?!

OK, OK... without further ado - I present to you our CLT Pad!

Kitchen (it's a one butt kitchen)

Island - yes, I was having some lighting problems...ignore that.

Living room view from bedroom door

Close up of my first real grown up collage. As put together by my lovely husby. 

Close up of our new ottoman via Crate & Barrel

View of living room from TV Stand (porch door to the left)

Close up on my infamous bookshelf decor. 

AND Now.... onto the BEDROOM.... 

The Master (and only) Bedroom!!!!!

A close up of the details

Loving my new full length mirror!

Jake's desk for school (as styled by me) in our bedroom

Who doesn't have a full size front loading washer and dryer in their bedroom???? 

Bathroom off of bedroom  

Storage shelves 

I'm digging the dark wood

Can you spot the Target knock off? 

The end! ... Wait...no, I forgot the walk in closet! How could I forget? It's my favorite part of the whole place... well, aside from the pool, that is. 

Don't worry... Jake's clothes are off to the left

The sunset tonight was a beauty (photo taken from porch)

There you have it! Now you have seen it all... well, except the pool, and the gym and the mailboxes but you get the picture right? 

Work&Rewards

I have been working on my fitness, health and eating plan for the past couple months. I feel like trying to lose weight is such a struggle.  It's a day to day battle and when I make good decisions, I constantly want to reward myself with food - dessert, menchies, etc. But that is like taking one step forward and two steps back. Remember that Paula Abdul song??? 

Fruit @ a PDX Market

Jake and I generally try to eat healthy during the week and then sort of splurge on the weekends by eating out at new restaurants - especially since we are exploring our new city. I try to make good choices during the week but it's not always the easiest thing. 

Some of my current hot button issues are:

• making time to exercise {at least} 3x a week,
• prepping lunch for the week and actually eating it, 
• and rewarding myself with something other than food.  

I saw something on pinterest that said - "I am not a dog and therefore, I will not reward myself with food."  Haha - I like it!  I have not been consistent with journaling all my meals in myfitnesspal either. So I feel like you {I} can say all you {I} want but it's your actions that really determine if you {I} get results or not. I have been really working on self-care for the past several years and a BIG part of that is eating right and exercising. I would love to hear your comments, insight or advice about the whole fitness/exercise situation.  I think I just need some extra motivation and help with setting goals.  Maybe I need a more concrete way to measure my progress? I would love to hear any app recommendations that help tracking progress. And I leave you with this quote by Kate Moss - Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels.

{{Stay turned -- I am working on an apartment tour in the next few weeks - we just have to finish hanging our art!!}}

The Canlis Experience

I promised that I would do a review of Canlis and here it is. Since I've lived in Seattle I've heard raving reviews of Canlis but couldn't justify the $$$$ 4 dollar sign pricetag. We had talked about going for several years but didn't make it there until we knew we would be leaving {to celebrate our 2nd wedding anniversary coming up in August}. As I mentioned, Jake and I spent a week exploring our beloved city including Riding the Duck, visiting our favorite restaurants, going on the Seattle Underground Tour and just soaking everything up including friends and family.  It's really impossible to get enough time to see everyone you want, and I'm sorry if we missed you! You are definitely in our thoughts and on our list for our first visit, which is of course TBD at this point. We love you friends and family!!

Where the valet magic happens!

Anywho - back to Canlis. We made reservations a couple weeks in advance. And they had to take our credit card info to hold the reservation. I guess you get charged $50 per person if you cancel your reservation too late. So keep that in mind. Anyway, we definitely did not cancel. We arrived a little early and pulled up to the valet guys waiting in the parking lot. They took our car but didn't give us a ticket or anything. I had read about this previously so I wasn't surprised.  Somehow, they secretly know who you are and at the end of your meal, they have your car ready and waiting! There must be some sort of elaborate communication system between the different hostesses, servers and valet guys - I don't understand it - but I do like it! Very impressive and I felt very special.

As we were getting seated, our server pulled the table away from the booth {it was on wheels!} and I had never seen that before, so it was nice and I didn't feel like I had to "squeeze" between the booth and the table. Yes, I am an 80 year old lady inside a 28 year old's body. Now that we have that cleared up.... We had a really gorgeous view of Lake Union including Gasworks Park but it was hard to get a picture of it based on our angle. So you will just have to imagine it!      

We perused the menu which basically had two options - either a 3 course menu {app, main course and dessert} or a 4 course menu. We both agreed that we wanted to try the 3 course menu for $85 bucks a pop. We originally thought we didn't want to get wine so we could keep the price tag down but we threw all caution to the wind and got a $50 bottle of wine! Woohoo! Sidenote: we had no problem finishing it.

After we ordered, they brought us each out these 3 amuse-bouche.

Morel Mushroom Tart, Salmon Creme Fraiche, Fried Egg Yolk

 

 

For our appetizer, we both tried the Canlis Salad! I have heard amazing things about the salad and it did not disappoint!  The recipe can be found here. A couple surprising ingredients were mint and a coddled egg (dressing). Definitely try it if you haven't had it before.

The Canlis Salad

For the main course, I had filet mignon and Jake had the halibut.

Filet Mignon

Halibut

Our dinners were exquisite. I really really enjoyed my filet mignon - the sauce was very flavorful and tasty and I just wanted more and more. The piece of meat was kind of small, but that's usually the case. Overall, the filet mignon was my favorite part of the meal {second, only, maybe to the dessert, which I can't even pronounce let alone spell}.

My dessert (Mille-Feuille), with a special message for our 2nd Anniversary

The dessert we each ordered was made up of milk chocolate, bananas, caramel and peanut butter. I found the details on the Canlis website and it's called Mille-Feuille.  I think it's french! Our server took a photo of us with our special desserts! So fun!   

Canlis for our 2nd Anniversary

The best smelling hand soap I've ever used! I even looked it up on Nordy's and ordered some for myself!

Bathroom selfie!

After we finished our dessert, we sat there for a good 20+ minutes and reveled in the view, finished our wine and just enjoyed each others' company. Overall - it was an amazing dinner and I can't wait to go back. Our server was very helpful and attentive. I remember my dad telling me that he judged a restaurant by how often they refill your water -- and let's just say our wine and water glasses were never empty! I just told Jake that I want to eat at Canlis everytime we go back to Seattle. This could get expensive. But, life is short.

Seattle/Portland Staycation

Jake and I did a bit of a staycation {read: vacation in the city you live in} before our big move last Friday. Here is a recap for you in case you haven't been following along on Instagram.... but really, who hasn't been?

July 1 - Move out of our Magnolia, Seattle apartment + pack up all of our worldly possessions in two smallish pods. Pods get picked up and travel to our new apartment in Charlotte, NC in 6 days. 6 days, people. That is just incredible. I believe the journey was SEA>CHI>CLT. That is one hell of a roadtrip. Thank you mister truck driver man for trekking our belongings cross country so we didn't have to. I joke with Jake that our stuff has traveled to more states than I have. 

Our Magnolia Apartment (goodbye, my love!):

Our pods, patiently waiting to be packed:

See you in a couple weeks, cars! Have a safe trip!

July 1 - July 5 - Stay at quaint bed and breakfast place we found on airbnb.com. Try not to spend all our money shopping at U-Village {Anthro, Jcrew, Starbucks... you know the drill}. Eat out at some delicious restaurants including Canlis {restaurant blog posts to follow}.  

Our lovely B&B (found via airbnb.com):

The Seattle Skyline, via West Seattle Pier:

 

July 6 - Goodbye Party in Everett. Some of our friends threw us a wonderful, very special party in their backyard complete with hommemade strawberry lemonade and pulled pork and snickerdoodle cupcakes. The list goes on and on! They went way over and above any of our expectations. We love you, friends!  

Apparently I have no pictures of this??? Stacey, can you send me any if you have any?

July 7 - 10 - Head down to Portland for a quick trip to see friends and family, explore the city and eat at really good restaurants.  For example, after waiting in line for about 45 minutes, we had Portland's own Salt & Straw ice cream that everyone has been raving about. We tried the following flavors: arbequina olive oil, sea salt with caramel ribbon, pear with blue cheese, raspberry lemon basil sorbet. We loved the sea salt and got a real kick out of the olive oil flavor. I actually kind of liked it! 

I'll add some Portland pics once our internet is set up @ home!