Party Recap

What a night!  It was such a wonderful party.  We had about thirty guests, and it was so great to see all these people from different parts of my life - high school, college, work, singing, randomers - come together and make friends.  That's really one of the best things about throwing a party, I think: you facilitate new friendships.

The party technically started at 5, but my friend Hannah drove down from Philadelphia early to help me get ready.  (Thank you, Hannah!)  People began arriving around 5:15 and by 6:00 nearly everyone had shown up.  The drinks were flowing fast, and I thought that if I set out the food earlier than I had planned we might slow the inevitable descent into inebriation, but no - the food disappeared quickly, too, and the drinks kept being poured!  The Pimm's was gone early, and the white wine sangria followed soon after.  I actually had to make a quick run to pick up wine and beer - I was afraid we'd run out!

We all ate on the porch - my parents' house has a wonderful screened porch in the back - but then after dinner most people dispersed into the garden.  When I looked outside after clearing up the remains of the food, I saw about twenty people sitting in a circle on the grass around bottles of wine and candles that they had brought out.  The rest of us joined them outside as the sun set until the bugs drove us back to the porch.

People started filtering out around 10, but a group of about 8 stayed until 11 sitting around the table on the porch finishing up the cheese and dips that I had out out as appetizers.  A couple of holdouts - you know who you are - remained on the porch arguing about politics until 12:30, at which point I decided my sanity was more important than being a good hostess and ordered everyone to guest rooms and beds.

I'm sorry that I didn't take photos of the food or the drinks or the presentation of everything - you'll just have to take my word that everything was beautiful!  I did take lots of photos of friends, though, so I'll share one with you here:

It was such a lovely evening.  Having all of my friends in one place and watching them have a good time was one of the best send-offs I could wish for.  (And the toast they presented to me was very, very sweet.)  Thanks to all for coming!  And for those of you in London: I hope to throw another garden party there soon, so keep your ears open for news!

Happy Memorial Day Weekend!

THE DAY HAS ARRIVED!  What day, you ask?  The day of my garden/goodbye party!  (All too soon, my friend Hannah says, who clearly is not ready to get the party started.  Or she's not ready to see me leave.  You decide.)

Anyway.  The party.  I didn't post yesterday because I was running around like a chicken with my head cut off trying to get as much done in advance as possible.  That, plus the fact that everything I have left to do needs to be done at the zero hour, means that I have some downtime now.  It feels very strange to be just sitting here, not being productive!  Luckily, it is an absolutely gorgeous day - it's 87 and brilliantly sunny, and a light breeze is making the slight humidity bearable.

I'll post photos of the food and the party tomorrow, but for now let me tell you about the menu:

(I'm expecting about 25 people, but given my track record that could mean 15 and it could mean 35.  Keeps me on my toes!)

Grilled Pork Loin with Rosemary and Garlic
Grilled Shrimp
Orzo with Zucchini, Summer Squash, Tomatoes, Mozzarella, and Pesto
Spinach Salad with Cranberries, Goat's Cheese, and Slivered Almonds
Avocado Salad
Lemon Cake
Chocolate Buttercream Cake
Fruit Salad with Whipped Cream
Pimm's
White Wine Sangria

What does this menu tell you?  First, that I am a bad Jew.  Pork and shellfish?  My ancestors are rolling over in their graves.  Second, that I like things that can be prepared ahead and served cold or room temperature.  Let me quote my idol, Ina Garten: "If I am racing around getting drinks for everyone and hen running back and forth to the kitchen to get hot hors d'oeuvres out of the oven, I have missed the point of having a party."  (The Barefoot Contessa Cookboook, p. 39.)  Amen, Ina.  I will prepare as much as I can in advance - including the mixed drinks - so that when my guests arrive I can enjoy their company, which is why I am throwing the party in the first place.  Third, that I love both Epicurious and The Kitchn.  I love my mother's impressive shelf of cookbooks, but I do also very dearly love the internet for exploring new recipes.  And fourth, cooking and baking for my friends makes me happy.  As I have said before, entertaining is my way of showing my friends I love them.  Is that weird?  I can't believe I'm the only one out there who is like that!

To close: if you're looking to make something yummy and fun and inebriating for the holiday weekend, check this out!

Thank You and Goodnight

Today was my last day at work.  Leaving was a lot sadder and more difficult than I had expected!  I joined the organization in early September 2009, so I hadn't been working there for that long, but it was an amazing experience.  I learned a lot - I was mentored by two of the kindest and most capable women I have ever met - and I feel like I have grown so much, professionally, in the past nine months.  Putting up permanent "out of office" email and phone messages made me a little teary, honestly.

I'm obviously excited about moving to London and starting this new adventure, but I don't think that it's really sunk in yet that I'll be leaving not just Washington, DC but a life that I have built here.  I'm leaving a job, familiar haunts, routines, friends, family.  I wonder when I'll realize that this chapter in my life is over - I wonder when I'll realize that I'll never get it back.

(Guilt) Trip to the Grocery Store

I'm throwing myself a garden/goodbye party on Sunday.  The garden bit is spot-on: it's Memorial Day weekend and the weather is supposed to be lovely here in DC.  The goodbye bit is a little premature: I still don't have my visa.  (I should get it any day now - today is the five-business-day mark that the consulate told me about - so I'm just waiting and biting my woefully unmanicured nails.)  But my family's taking a mini holiday to the shore next week and, if everything goes as planned, I'll be off at the start of the second week in June, so this really is the best time for a shindig.

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I sat down yesterday and crafted a menu - undoubtedly one of the best parts of party planning - and it's so nom I can hardly wait.  I have about twenty friends coming, to I'm going to do a big main and four sides/salads and three desserts plus Pimms and white wine sangria.  (There will be a post with pictures on this later - never fear.)  I'll have to do a fair bit of grocery store coordination: I'll be hitting up possibly three different supermarkets to get everything I need at the best quality and price.  No matter how frugal I'll try to be, though, a party for twenty plus people still packs a pecuniary punch.  (Oh, alliteration, how I love thee.)  Thank God I'm getting paid on Friday!

I just saw via The Kitchn a new study by Bundle called "How America Spends: Food and Drink."  It ranks cities in the US by how much the average household in each city spends per year on food and drink.  It's very cool, visually: it gives you how much the average household in each city spends on dining out, on eating in, and the total of both combined, as well as how big each city is compared to the others in terms of population.  The US average total is $6,514.  The average total for Washington, DC (which is where I live) is $10,049.  Yikes!  It's definitely people like me who bump it up - oops.  Very interesting, though.

Frock Fridays

I read in Glamour that Topshop has started a makeup line, so I hied myself over to their website to check it out.  The makeup is exactly what you'd expect from Topshop - lots of basics in fun, trendy colors.  I got sidetracked from my purpose, though, and found this gorgeous gown.  I hate myself for loving it, because it's from the Kate Moss collection and I am staunchly not a Kate Moss fan, but I do.  I think you might, too.

More on Visas and Jobs

My visa application has been delivered!  FedEx told me so on Tuesday.  And - bonus - I got an email on Wednesday from the visa office in New York confirming the delivery and saying that they were beginning the process and that the estimated time it takes for them to make a decision is 5-10 business days but that as soon as they've made a decision they'll email me.  Efficiency defined.

I have the visa website bookmarked on my laptop - I check it all the time to make sure I haven't misunderstood any of the directions or explanations! Just in case you're curious, here's the breakdown of visa processing times according to the website:

Of the 66 Tier 1 applications processed in February, 65% were decided within 2 business days, 72% within 3 business days, 84% within 5 business days, 90% within 10 business days, 93% within 15 business days, and 100% within 30 business days.  Let's say it takes an extra three days for the visa to be mailed after the decision is made.  No, let's not - Betsy, stop trying to do math - simmer down.

According to my friend Helen, though, it generally takes 4-5 weeks if you apply from the UK, so I'm almost definitely in good shape no matter how long it takes.  (It's all relative, right?)  Of course, this is all assuming I get the visa - yargh!

On the jobs front, the rejections have been pouring in fast and thick.  I'm not complaining about this, because I actually am receiving the rejections - the organizations are sending me emails saying, "The standard of applicants was very high and unfortunately..."  I'd much rather get an email like that than not hear anything!  I do think I've been setting my sights a little high in terms of the level of jobs I've been applying for, though, and so I'm trying to come back to earth a bit by applying to assistant positions.  Maybe I'll have better luck with that - one has to start somewhere, after all!

Now that my passport is out of my hands this is all starting to seem very real!  I'm already making plans for June overseas: a day at Lord's, a weekend in Dublin, nights at the Blues Bar, a wander around Shoreditch with Jon to find artwork for our flat/house,  crashing the honeymoon of the soon-to-be Mr. and Mrs. Justin Neal, dinner at The Old Brewery in Greenwich... the possibilities are endless!  Well, if I don't have a job my time will be endless but my wallet will not be.  Ah, the conundrum of the unemployed.

Without a good ending for this post, I will just take my leave of you.

Will You Go, Lassie?

Even though it's been raining and unseasonably chilly for what feels like weeks, I've had a sweet Celtic spring/summer song tripping through my head.  It has a few different names, though I learned it as Wild Mountain Thyme.  Our chorus sang it at my graduation from the sixth grade, and even though (or maybe because) sixth grade wasn't a particularly happy year for me I remember the song - and that day - very fondly.

The chorus is as follows:

And we'll all go together
To pull wild mountain thyme
All around the blooming heather
Will you go, lassie, go?

You can search for it on YouTube - I don't want a put a specific link here because there are so many lovely versions online, and you really should find your favourite on your own.  But do look for it, and enjoy.

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A Quoi Ca Sert L'Amour?

I've been tracking my visa application (thank you, FedEx!) and it's "on FedEx vehicle for delivery" in New York - it should get to the consulate by 10:30am.  I am in a very good mood, and so I share this adorable YouTube video with you.  Love the song - it's A Quoi Ça Sert L'Amour, sung by Edith Piaf and Theo Sarapo.  What a sweet cartoon, too!  (Here's a decent translation of the lyrics.)

The Waiting Game

I sent my visa application to the consulate in New York this morning!  I could have my visa in two weeks - I'm optimistically hoping I'll get it by 28 May so that I can catch my flight on 1 June.  If that happens, I'll be in London on 2 June and will be able to finally start this next chapter of my life!  But for now I just have to wait.

(This is all assuming that I am granted the visa, of course.  I'm not letting myself do the "what ifs" of being denied.)

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I am already prepping to leave:  I'm having some girlfriends over on Wednesday evening for dinner and a clothing swap/sale - I have way too much to pack, and this way I can give what I won't pack and what I don't fit into anymore to good causes ( = my friends)!  I've also planned a garden/goodbye party for the 30th.  It'll be a good way to get all of my DC friends together to have one last big hurrah before I go.  I am starting to get preemptively homesick, though...

No news on the jobs front.  The number of open positions in development at arts and education organizations seems to be shrinking, so I'm not submitting as many applications as I was a few weeks ago.  I don't know if/when it will pick up again, but I imagine that having my visa will boost my employability (is that a word?).  So maybe soon I won't need to be applying for as many jobs as I have been because I will be more successful with the few I am pursuing.  Let's hope! 

At this point, though, I just want the visa - I don't mind that I don't have a job lined up.  At least, I don't mind too much...

Hooray!

MY DOCUMENT ARRIVED!  I CAN APPLY FOR MY VISA!

I have work all day tomorrow - have to get there before 9am to prepare for our event tomorrow evening - but my visa materials will go in the mail first thing on Monday.

SO HAPPY.

Suriously.  I could have my visa in hand by the end of May.  I could still get on my flight on June 1.

WOOHOO!

Frock Fridays

Love the lace and the ruffle - you'd think that together they'd be twee, but somehow this dress comes off as very ladylike.  Not sure what you could wear it to.  I know I'd spill something on it within five minutes!  But still - with bold gold accessories and a nude heel or colored peeptoe pumps?  Nom.

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Madness

"But I don't want to go among mad people," Alice remarked.
"Oh, you can't help that," said the Cat: "we're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad."
"How do you know I'm mad?" said Alice.
"You must be," said the Cat, "or you wouldn't have come here."
- Lewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

This is, and has been, a crazy week.  Work is chaotic - to put it mildly - because we're facing a big function-filled weekend.  There are so many little pieces that have to go into making each event run smoothly.  I keep having nightmares that a colleague is doing x but that she'll think I'm doing x and we'll realize on Saturday that x hasn't been done at all.  I usually rely on to-do lists, but I've got so many right now that they're starting to cancel each other out!

On the bright side, it is sort of distracting me from the document/visa mess.

On the not-bright side, it's making me snap at everyone.  Sorry, guys.

Maybe I can be Emma Watson: in a beautiful dress, in a lovely ornate room, with nothing to do but drink tea and eat cake.

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Frustration Yargh

I.  Am.  Frustrated.

I am still missing one elusive document - my certificate from UCL - which, if you remember, I need in order to apply for my visa.  To recap: it was mailed from the UK on 14 April, right when the Icelandic volcano was doing its thing.  It still hasn't arrived in the States and, to make matters worse, I don't even know where it is.  Royal Mail, over on the UK side of the pond, says it has left their hands, but USPS, on the American side, says it hasn't come into their hands yet.  So I ask you - where the expletive is it?

No one is taking responsibility for this missing document, which is even more frustrating.  USPS says only the sender (Royal Mail) can look into the problem, and Royal Mail says they can't open an official inquiry until 28 May, 25 business days after the document was originally sent.  So I just have to sit and wait.

In the meantime, I have requested from UCL a Letter of Certificate, which will apparently stand instead of the actual certificate in terms of what's needed for my visa.  If all goes well I may have the letter in hand by the end of May - but I'm too scared to be optimistic anymore.  If I were being optimistic I would put myself in London in mid-June at the very earliest.  But no, I can't be optimistic.  Being optimistic just bites you in the bum!

I'm sorry, I know this is a grumpy post.  It's all just very frustrating!

Political Exclamations

Warning: this post has lots of exclamation points.

Gordon Brown resigned today!

David Cameron is the new Prime Minister!

A Lib Dem / Tory deal is close to being approved!

ZOMG!

For more, check out the news.  BBC, the Times, NYTimes, whatever.  You should be getting your news there anyway, dear readers.

Fashion Smashion

Encouraged by the fluctuation of the pound against the dollar (£1 = $1.48 today) I've been daydreaming about shopping at some of my favorite English stores.  You've got to love the internet - it allows for online window-shopping!  I've settled on three not-so-basic additions to my summer wardrobe, assuming I get to England eventually and assuming I suddenly come into lots of extra cash.

Toast is a great clothing/housewares store in Islington and Notting Hill - the locations tell you something about their ideal clientele.  Not sure where they shot their summer catalogue, but I want to go there!  Love this dress - the colors are fun but not too loud, and the swingy skirt is perfect for meandering down cobbled streets by day and dancing by night.  Essentially, I want this dress + a vacation somewhere hot and historic.

Okay, so this bag is pretty basic.  It's from NW3, the new "contemporary" line from Hobbs.  I usually go for massive purses that fit my entire life, but I like the compactness of this messenger bag.  I picture myself in something nautical and/or striped with this slung over my shoulder, headed out for a Saturday stroll with my man.

I remember my introduction to Whistles - I had just made a new friend from class, and we went on a girls' shopping spree soon after I arrived in London.  Whistles was the first place we checked out.  She picked up a couple tops (on sale!) but I couldn't choose between all the dresses.  Those were my weaknesses at Whistles - the dresses - but I find myself falling for this suede biker jacket.  It's slightly glamrock with the offset zipper and the big collar, but still soft and girlie.  Perfect for throwing over dresses and tees on cool summer evenings.

Does anyone have any other shop recommendations?  I'm going to need some new places to surf online while waiting for all this document/visa nonsense to sort itself out!

Happy Mothers' Day!

I think that Hallmark calls this holiday "Mother's Day" with the apostrophe before the "s," but I'm changing it because today I celebrate all of the mothers in my life.  I'd like to dedicate this to them.

First, of course, to my mother, who loves me even when I pick fights with her because I'm secretly scared of moving three thousand miles away from her.

To Nana, who is always only a phone call or email away and whose nudging I welcome more than anyone else's because I know it means that she wants me to do my very best.

To Grandma, who is ever excited to hear about my adventures and who takes me and my endeavors more seriously than I sometimes do.

To Kate, who has been my adopted mother for years now - I'm so glad we've gotten closer since I have moved back to DC.

To all of my office mothers, who mentor me in so many ways.

Thank you - much, much love.

And, because we have something else to celebrate today, I need to send thanks and love to Jon, the most amazing boyfriend and the best man I know - happy birthday baby!

Election Day!

Brits are going to the polls today - in droves, I hope! - to vote for their next Prime Minister and to fill contested seats in Parliament.  I've been fascinated by the whole process, and have been reading as much as possible about it all.  I just learned recently that the head of a party in Britain is automatically that party's candidate for Prime Minister - did you know that?  So different from how it works here in America (too bad, Howard Dean).

As I wrote in an earlier post about the election, I don't feel qualified to comment in too much depth about what's going on.  That being said, I do feel qualified to tell you about what I'm learning!  (Thanks especially to the Times [London] and the New York Times, which has a good basic article about the election here.)

A poll for the Times has the Tories leading with 37% of the vote, with Labour at 28% and the Lib Dems just behind at 27%.  This doesn't mean, though, that the Conservatives will will a majority in Parliament - in fact, probably no one will, and lots of tiny parties will possibly come into play.  As interesting as anything else in this nail-biter of an election is that an extraordinarily high number of voters (there are about 44 million registered voters in the UK) are still undecided.  Polls are open until 10pm, and we probably won't know the outcome until the morning.  This is all very exciting!

If you're British and registered to vote, GO VOTE!  You can't complain if you don't vote :)

Visa/Jobs Update

In case anyone's interested (here's looking at you, Nana) here's a documents update re: my visa situation.  The lovely woman at UCL is sending me another letter, so I should receive that early next week.  Hooray! One down, one to go - in theory, at least.  I called Royal Mail, and although the woman there was as helpful as possible she said that I couldn't open an investigation into where my certificate was until 25 business days had passed from the date of the certificate being sent.  That's 28 May.  I can't wait that long - argh!  But I'm still trying to think happy, positive thoughts.  Think them with me, please!

(I have to say, this visa horror story is making me totally paranoid right now.)

I had my job interview this morning.  I think it went well.  I don't want to say too much in case I jinx it, but they said I should hear back from them by the end of the week, so either way I'll be out of my misery soon.  Fingers and toes are all tightly crossed.  (I'll let you know what happens, obviously.)

T Minus 3 Days

The UK elections are just around the corner: 6 May, to be exact.  I know I've given the Brits grief about their election process and I am sorry if I've offended anyone (though you have to admit that some of what has been going on for the past month in terms of election snafus has been humorous).  God knows, too, that the US election process is far from perfect, so when I laugh I do so with the understanding that I am throwing stones from one glass house to another.

As far as I'm I'm aware, the UK elections have mostly flown under the radar in America.  Sure, Jon Stewart has poked fun at the debates and at "bigotgate" (see my earlier posts) and CNN has a running blog about the whole thing, but most of the coverage has been pretty innocuous - until yesterday.  Yesterday I read an op-ed piece in the weekend section of the New York Times by A.A. Gill, a critic for the Sunday Times [London].  It's scathingly bitter, worryingly so.  An English friend-of-a-friend commented that Gill is famous in Britain for sounding off; the problem is that this sort of thing is expected from him in the Sunday Times and people in Britain know to take his writing with a mountain of salt, but NYTimes readers won't know how to interpret him.  Jon agreed: "He's a very funny and clever writer renowned for his cynicism but he also enjoys taking an anti-English stance... Gill's playing things up a bit because it's a position he's been working hard to take for the past thirteen years."

I don't feel qualified to comment too much on whether or not what Gill says in the article is true.  I'm not British, I'm not there, and the election isn't impacting me directly (yet).  Plus, there's that glass house thing.  But I would be interested to hear what you think!

What's in a Blog?

One of the best (and worst, I suppose, but let's not focus on that now) things about the blogging community is that anyone can become a voice of authority on whatever s/he chooses.  I love that some of my favorite bloggers seemed to have just woken up one morning and thought, "I love cooking/decorating/photography/whatever.  I want to share it and my knowledge thereof with the world."  The blogosphere has become this amazing community of people who want to actively enjoy their passions with others - I love that.  It's great that I can visit a blog and know that the day's post was inspired by something that just happened.  It makes me feel like I'm part of a wider world of people who cook/decorate/photograph/whatever, and that community can be invaluable, especially when you're moving to a new place.

This is sort of related: I read a post recently - I fell down the rabbit hole of clicking on a link that led to another link that led to another and so on - about the emotional authenticity of blogging.  "How much," the writer asks, "does a blogger have to reveal to engage with their readers, do you think?"  She apologizes, saying that she just isn't capable of opening herself up entirely to her blog and to her readers. She received tons of comments on the post, most of which said that as long as she was herself she'd have interested readers.  I hope that's true.  I'm finding that there's a fine line between what I share and what I don't share here; I know that my family reads my blog as well as strangers, and what I would tell my family I might not reveal to strangers - and what I might tell strangers I might not reveal to my family.  It's tricky, really, and I hope I'm negotiating the balance alright.

I thought about all of this because I've been trying and absolutely failing to define my blog.  I'm inspired by so many creative people out there and I've been trying to squish all of these inspirations into my blog.  That's why you're finding decorating photos and recipes and political commentary and links to jewelry and stationery and - well, that's why you're finding this mashup of a blog as it is.  I'm sorry if it's messy, but it's everything I like, and it's everything I want to share, and, honestly, it's everything that I am.  So now that this blog has been up and running for a few weeks, I just want to say this: I hope you're enjoying reading it as much as I am enjoying writing it.