Spotswood House

If we decide to remodel another house we are going to do the kitchen and bathroom at the same time and pay someone to do all of the drywall. We have taken on the drywalling ourselves in the bathroom remodel and it is taking for ever ever to finish. I’ll get to the remodeling update in a minute but I must share my new, latest obsession…Mid Century Modern Hawaiian Tiki Culture.

Most of our house is painted soothing, cool, shades of gray, green and blue but we went all out in the kitchen with a teal blue. I have had a hard time trying to tie that to the rest of the house. I decided I wanted to buy a gaudy Hawaiian print fabric to make cafe curtains for the big window in the kitchen. I couldn’t find anything in the price range I wanted so I ended up buying a shower curtain. This little puppy should be arriving soon.

So why Hawaiian? It ties perfectly to the mid century modern design look I’m going for when that kitsch was popular. I started searching for Hawaiian figurines and tiki mugs to decorate the kitchen. I haven’t been on Etsy in so long but they ended up being the best spot for what I was looking for. Unfortunately, the prices aren’t what I wanted but such is life. Here are my latest purchases.

tooth pick holder?

Vintage hula girl.

While searching for my Hawaiian items I found a set of tiki mugs on my trusty Marketplace. I’m debating whether or not I should buy these.

While still searching for Hawaiian items I found a super cool retro reproduction website, http://www.retroplanet.com. Here is what I am eyeing from them.

Ok, it looks like I’m going a little bit overboard. Now is a good time to segue back into the bathroom remodel.

We have the bathroom floor grouted, first coat of mastic is on the wall, the cutout is done for the medicine cabinet, and we just bought the bathroom sink faucet.

Grout job from start to finish.

Drywall/concrete board taped and mud-ed.

The medicine cabinet opening done and electrical outlet moved.

We bought the subway tile for bathroom walls.

Instead of hanging the tile in a subway style, we decided to do a modern stacked style. Here are some examples.

The main thing left to buy for the bathroom is lighting. Here are some that interest me.

We stayed at another Airbnb this past weekend. Here’s the link: https://www.airbnb.com/rooms/32516664?guests=1&adults=1 I waited too late to book the place we reserved last time so I booked a new listing, with zero reviews. I was a little bit nervous but the place ended up being cute and simple. The only downside is the bed was a queen, ugh.

Our one room bungalow.

The Airbnb had the most beautiful original wood doors and floors.

Here is the view from the backyard, so peaceful.

That’s all for now. I am so so hopeful we can get the bathroom walls tiled this weekend.

We took a weekend off from home remodeling and went to the exciting city (just a little bit of sarcasm) of Wilmington, Delaware. Located only two hours from DC, Wilmington just happens to be the birthplace of me. The reason why we decided to go to Wilmington was to pick up a painting I found on Facebook, lol. I have been watching this painting for about two months and it’s finally mine, only $20. Something I didn’t know about Delaware, no sales tax. That was a nice surprise.

In all seriousness, Wilmington is a cute a little city and we did have a wonderful time over the weekend. In fact, we will revisit in the warmer months to take advantage of what we missed out on this time.

Here’s my painting.

A little background on Wilmington, the du Pont family owns everything. They didn’t invent gun powder, they perfected it and expanded their empire into the chemical and automotive industry. They have opened several family estates  to the public as museums, gardens or parks. We visited the original du Pont house, Eleutherian Mills and Longwood Gardens, over 1000 acres of gardens, woodlands, and meadows.

Originally, we wanted to visit the Nemour Estate, another du Pont family home but it was closed for the winter. That’s when we stumbled upon Eleutherian Mills. We spent about two hours touring the house and seeing the grounds. It was such a pleasant surprise.

Here is the house from a distance.

Adam standing in front of a 300 year old Osage Orange tree.

This is the side of the house. It was build in 1802. Not too shabby for your first home.

Here is the house up close.

We also toured their offices which were built in 1837. The stonework is absolutely beautiful.

This is no ordinary typewriter. It was made with gold paint and ivory inlay.

This is one of the original desks, so classic. Looks like something you could find at Restoration Hardware.

This might have been Adam’s favorite part, touring the machine shop. It was pretty cool.

 

We made a pit stop at the very first house I lived in. Mom and dad, what were you thinking when you bought this place?? Just my luck it’s for sale again. Here’s a link if you want to check out the interior. No, I don’t think that is a stripper pole in the living room…

https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1213-Grinnell-Rd-Wilmington-DE-19803/72993298_zpid/

I would say the highlight of our trip was Longwood Gardens. You absolutely must visit this place if you are ever in the area!! It is located in Kennett Square, Pennsylvania. It is so unbelievably beautiful. I can’t imagine what it looks like in Spring or Summer.

First we toured the Peirce House (they owned the property before the du Pont’s bought it). It has a conservatory right in the middle of the main house and a restroom hidden in the library. I am no gardener but I wouldn’t mind having a conservatory in my house.

The main conservatory at Longwood Gardens is massive. They have over 4600 different plants and trees. I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves.

I asked a lady if she would take our picture and she said, “no, my hands shake.” So she made her husband do it. I am sure he was so thrilled.

That was our quick trip to Wilmington, Delaware. Now, back to reality. We’ll be back at Spotswood House this weekend for more bathroom renovating.

Howdy folks, we had a very productive weekend at good ol’ Spotswood House. Why did we get so much done; because we ended up renting an Airbnb so we could stay the night and save some time on the commute. Hopefully, we won’t have to do too many more of those. Before I get into the remodeling update, let’s talk about the Airbnb. OMG, this thing was so cute!

We stayed in a garage apartment except it wasn’t over a garage, more like attached to the side of the house with a separate private entrance (see below). This is hands down the best value for an Airbnb we have experienced. We paid a total of $72.26. I would post more pictures but the pictures don’t do this place justice. I was thoroughly pleased. In fact, we will probably be making another visit until we get this bathroom squared away.

Here’s a link to the listing if you think you will ever find yourself in Orange.

https://www.airbnb.com/rooms/22718540?guests=1&adults=1&s=YQ0fQsxx

Let’s move on to the bathroom. The highlight for me was getting the floor tile put down. I can’t wait until we get it grouted. Here’s some shots of the progress.

This is what the bathroom looked like when we got started. Remember, I lost all of those pictures but I was able to retake this one. Tub is in and insulation replaced.

We framed out a niche for the shower surround. As you’ll see in a picture further down, we abandoned that idea. The amount of work just wasn’t worth it.

Here’s a shot of the shower plumbing. We have cardboard laying around the tub to protect it.

Adam working on the plumbing for the bathroom sink

Adam securing the tub in place. Whew, that was an adventure trying to get the tub level but it had to be done. We used our fair share of shims.

Concrete board going up.

The niche getting covered.

All concrete board is up. Next, we’ll have to smooth the walls out so we can add wall tile.

Tile cut for the toilet drain.

We cut all of the tile and laid it out. Then we pulled up all the tile and laid the mastic down and re-tiled, seriously!

Here’s the floor all laid down. We have it spaced out perfectly, hopefully. Adam was much happier with my floor tile selection than he was with the kitchen backsplash. The cuts were so much easier to make.

Here is where we left off. It felt like we had soooooo much left to do on this bathroom but I am starting to see light at the end of the tunnel.

Here’s an update on the fabric I was thinking about purchasing for another chair I need to recover. I ended up going with a completely different fabric than what I shared but not by choice. The first fabric I wanted cost too much. The second fabric was drapery fabric, not upholstery fabric so that was out. Then, I found this fabric and pulled the trigger. It’s very groovy and only set me back $31.

I have started to eye removable wallpaper. I absolutely HATE the process of removing traditional wallpaper so removable wallpaper is very appealing to me. I have been spending countless hours browsing options. Here are some that really caught my eye. I am going to pull the trigger soon either to do a small space in my house or to do the laundry room at Spotswood House. All of these options are available at either Home Depot or Lowes and they will ship to their store for free pickup. There is removable wallpaper options galore and they can get pretty pricey. I found Home Depot and Lowes to be fairly reasonable but word to the wise, removable wallpaper is not cheap.

Until next time, toodles poodle.

We spent this past weekend working on the bathroom at Spotswood House and I took all kinds of pictures of the progress but then something horrific happened, I forgot my iPhone passcode. So I had to wipe my phone and I lost all of my pictures (no, I didn’t store them in the cloud). I mean, we got the tub in last weekend, that is huge progress. Adam finished replumbing for the shower kit and got most of it installed, he cut a niche out for the shower surround, we took the window out and boarded up the hole but no pictures to speak of. This weekend I am hopeful we can get the floor tile put down. And while we are on the subject, I will share with you the tile we purchased. It is different than the original tile we were considering but pretty similar. I just love geometric patterns and this fit the bill. The price was right too 🙂 Something deceptive about the picture is the tile size. They are 11 x 13 which is a little bit bigger than I wanted but we’ll make it work.

As a recap, here is the tile I was originally considering

Here are some samples of bathrooms with the black geometric pattern on the floor. Pictures make it so much easier visualize! I think I want to stick with the lighter grout to really make the pattern pop.

Switching gears to the chair we (I mean Adam) reupholstered. Adam sewed double corded piping to go around the exposed staples. He chose double corded piping because he is crazy! But it turned out pretty good for his first time sewing any type of piping. I have lots of pics, partly because I love this chair and the fabric we chose so, so much.

Of course I’m now ready to move on to our next upholstery project and I just so happen to have another chair that needs some lovin. I thought I would share some of the fabric swatches I am eyeing. Which one would you choose?

Finally, I will close with another one of my second hand purchases. This time I bought something from the app OfferUp, which I find to be very hit or miss but you never know when you’re going to come across gold and gold it was.

I was going to put this light in at Spotswood House but I liked it too much so it went in the guest room at my Alexandria house. You also get a tiny sneak peak at my guest room which I can show in more detail when I finally get the room cleared out with all of my extra furniture which I am trying to sell online and can I just say it is the most excruciating process. I have already had two people not show for a dresser they claimed to want.

Ok, top left picture is the stock picture from the World Market website. The chandelier is selling for $249.99 but I got mine for $100 yippee. The top right and bottom shot is the light hanging in my guest room.

 

I will be back soon with more pictures of the remodel, barring any other iPhone disasters.

Over the Martin Luther King Holiday weekend we visited Adam’s family right outside Knoxville, Tennessee. While we were there Adam played with his dad in the garage and I went shopping with my mother-in-law (MIL) and sister-in-law (SIL). I picked up a couple cute odds and ends but my big score was a mid century modern (MCM) dresser and nightstand I found on Facebook Marketplace. Hey, even though we were out of town I still had to look. MCM furniture is very popular and I was the first person to message about the dresser and nightstand. The owner said he had over 28 people contact him about it but I was first!

I check Marketplace ALL the time. Even if  I have only 5 minutes at work to spare I will check Marketplace. That’s when I score some of my best finds, looking during off hours; and I have scored big this week. So get ready for MCM overload. Here we go…

Here is the dresser and nightstand I got in Tennessee. The dresser is in almost perfect condition. The nightstand needs a little bit of work on the top but nothing we can’t manage. I got both of them for $100 which is hilarious because my SIL and I went to a retro store and the same dresser and nightstand would’ve been about $800 or maybe even $1000! A huge thanks to my in-laws who are currently storing the dresser for me. Guess we’ll be making another trip back to TN soon.

Here are the knick knacks I picked up at Retrospect Vintage Store. Their prices were very reasonable. The off-white vases are really light bases. Not sure if I will just use as decorative objects or have Adam rewire for lighting. I just love the shape of them. I’m not sure if the little mouse figurine is meant to hold matches, toothpicks, or something entirely different. I couldn’t resist getting it.

I went thrift store shopping with my MIL and scored more bird wall art. I picked this up for $1. Seriously, $1. Now some of you might think I paid too much but I just love this quirky stuff.

I ate so much when we were in Tennessee. If it wasn’t nailed down, I was shoveling it in my mouth. We had Zaxbys a couple times. We absolutely love Zaxbys but we don’t have one anywhere around DC. So any time we visit some place that does have a Zaxbys we are so eating there. On Sunday we went out to eat with Adam’s whole family at a place called Calhoun’s. I sat next to my nephew and he and I devoured a basket of bread…I like him! Anyhoo, I bring all of this up not to actually talk about the food but to talk about the bathroom. As soon as I walked into the bathroom I saw the most beautiful antique tile flooring. I am so in love. I think I want to try this in a bathroom if we buy another renovation project. The pattern is so simple but so cute!

Now I want to switch gears to present day. I have had some really good luck this week on Facebook Marketplace. First, I found a MCM tv stand for $45. I knew this thing would go quick but once again I was the first to message. Now, I can’t get too excited because I have messaged people first before only to lose out to someone who offered to pay more or who was able to come earlier. So, I was being extra nice and very flexible to try to score this tv stand and it worked. Now, the tv stand is more like a formica but for $45 it’s still really sweet! The yellow peeking out from behind is another tv stand I bought which I now will turnaround and sell on Marketplace. Total furniture soap opera, I know!

So, you might be asking yourself where is she storing all of this stuff she buys. And I don’t have a very good answer because it is piled up in my house while we still work to complete Spotswood House. All of this stuff will eventually go there. Which brings me to my next topic, flipping furniture. I have a problem of picking up perfectly good furniture from other peoples trash. I picked up this filing cabinet months ago and it has just sat in my house. I had grand visions of painting it and fixing it up or even taking it to work and putting it in my office but ultimately I decided to list it on Facebook Marketplace. I sold it in one day for $35. Not bad for paying nothing!

I will close with my latest Facebook Marketplace find. I wasn’t even looking for anything in particular but a bar set popped up in my feed (I’m sure Facebook uses algorithms or tracks my usage/preferences to determine what I see in my feed but I don’t care). I love collecting vintage bar supplies and this is just perfect! $20, and I’m totally good with that. As you can see, my Facebook Marketplace addition is on and popping. I am watching 16 other items as we speak.

I am beginning to think I am genetically prone to addiction. I’ll be back again soon with more Facebook finds I’m sure 🙂

 

As I sit in my living room freezing cold, I decided to channel my MOST favorite tropical vacation…Costa Rica…and finally do my Part 2 review. I left off last time with our visit to the rainforest. This post will include a lot of food references because I just started a low carb diet in preparation for our next tropical trip (more on that later) and I want to relieve every delicious moment again.

Ok, so after our cardio blasting rainforest tour we went to a local hole in the wall for a “traditional” Costa Rican meal and it was soooo good! As you can see, I had to have hot sauce 🙂 The meal consisted of chicken in a creamy white sauce with some type of succotash, rice, and salad which consisted of lettuce and a pico de gallo like topping. I’ll admit I was really skeptical of this place but everything was really good. Adam was more adventurous and tried one of everything.

After lunch we went to a local sloth encounter. We literally drove into a neighborhood to the end of the street and you had this mini rainforest park. We got to see another sloth, so cute!! Look how close I am!!!! The picture is foggy because we got caught in a down pour.

This is a section of the park.

The next day Adam and I split up so he could go deep sea fishing and I went back to Tamarindo to shop and eat! The one thing I wanted to do was eat at Green Papaya because they had swings you could sit on while eating (I’m so easily impressed).

Here is the entrance to the restaurant. They have a small indoor air conditioned section and it was so hot I considered it for a brief moment but I had to eat outside on one of the swings.

I searched all over the internet to find a menu for Green Papaya so I could intelligently explain what I was eating but no such luck. This was a spicy, shrimp, garlicky, cream concoction I ate with tortilla chips and more hot sauce/paste on the side.

If you weren’t sitting on a swing you were sitting on a wooden stump and the swings line the entire perimeter of the restaurant.

One final shot of Green Papaya. OH MY GOODNESS this place was so much fun and the food was AMAZING.

I can’t find a picture to save my life but Adam brought his fresh caught mahi mahi back to our resort and they prepared it blackened style for us. I am not a big fish fan but this fish was sooooooooooooooooooooooo freaking good. O-M-G!

Another thing I really liked in Costa Rica were the fruit juices. I’m sure they weren’t remotely healthy but dang they sure were good.

Bye Costa Rica, can’t wait to see you again.

I will close with our next booked tropical adventure. First, a little background. Each year I like to take a nice US vacation, a tropical vacation, and a European vacation. This past year we did Hilton Head, South Carolina (I don’t really consider it “super” nice but it was all we could squeeze in), Costa Rica, and Sweden and Germany.

This year for our tropical vacation we are going to the Turks and Caicos or the British West Indies if you want to be really exotic. Originally, I was looking at Key West but after pricing it out (Key West ain’t cheap) I decided we might as well just do the Caribbean.

I will give you a hint if you want to book a really affordable, super nice vacation…JetBlue Vacations. This is the second trip we have booked through them and we saved a fortune. They practically throw the flights in for free. If JetBlue flies out of your local airport definitely consider looking at them for vacation packages in the Caribbean.

I cannot wait for this trip! Has anybody else been to the Turks and Caicos? If not, feel free to join us. We’re going during a major holiday.

I haven’t written a Spotswood article yet, but considering I have the day off thanks to 12 inches of snow, I thought I’d give it a crack.

To keep it consistent with Lindsey’s style of posting, let me start off-topic: Souvenirs.  

We started picking up souvenirs on our international trips to help remind us of each place we visited. But during our recent trip to Berlin and Stockholm, we got a little carried away. I mean, really carried away.

In Germany, I tried the Red Mulled Wine at the Christmas Market and decided to keep the mug. Berlin also has bear art statues all over the city, which I thought were pretty cool.  So, I picked up a little “Buddy Bear” in the Berlin Squares III design. Lindsey literally brought home a piece of history, a real piece of the Berlin wall. In Stockholm, I picked up a Dala Horse which are small handmade wooden horse figurines. We also bought a little grey Vattar, which is a nature spirit that lives underground and protects the land and people from harm.

While out shopping in Gamla Stan, I saw this piece of hipster poster art and couldn’t leave home without it. I love dragons!

Ok, enought about souvenirs. Let’s get back to Stockholm.

I. Loved. Stockholm. It’s cool- literally all the time. It’s hip. It’s clean. It has very nice, hospitable poeple, great food and a great transportation system. It’s got history, art, water, and a great big old warship. It’s a happening place to visit!

One of the first things we did in Stockholm was visit the Royal Palace. It was beautiful. The carvings, the clocks, the furniture, the art. It was amazing! Some of you may know that I love the French artist Jacques-Louis David and I get a little excited when I see his works.  It just so happens that while walking through the Palace a particular clock caught my eye… a gold clock depicting my favorite David piece, the Oath of the Horatii!

See the resemblance?

Here’s a few more shots from inside the palace. Amazing stuff, huh?

Now, that’s a dining table!

A ceiling and doorway…

Sitting rooms???

Look at these wood carvings in the walls and doors! The left one is literally carved into the door.

Our next stop was the Vasa Museum. Long story short, the Vasa is a 95% original 17th century, 64-gun warship that sank on her maiden voyage in 1628, just 20 minutes after launching. The icy fresh water kept her preserved (no worm damage) and she was raised back in the 60’s. It’s utterly amazing. Some of the sailors that died were recovered too, some still wearing their shoes and clothes!

The carving on the back of this ship are almost all original… amazing craftsman ship. Get it?

A large full-scale model…

Walking around town was really cool. There are lots of little narrow streets, statues, rivers, and cool things to snap pics at. We spent most of our time walking through Gamla Stan and Sodermalm. 

Me in front of the Nobel Museum.

St. George Slaying the Dragon

That’s one narrow street!

Random pics from around town…

We found this little statue while waiting for breakfast one morning. I call it “The Hand”.

I like art, and there is definitely a fine line between art and vandalizing a building. I think these are pretty cool…

 

A fountain below the dragon.

Food. Stockholm had really good food. Everything we ate was really, really good. I mean like 100 times better than that Currywurst I ate in Berlin. The wait staff were all very courteous and they spoke great english everywhere we went. Anyhow, you guys know we love to eat so here’s some pics of us getting ready to stuff our faces!!!

Yes, we tried the Swedish meatballs: Moose, Boar, Pig, and Cow.

Back up buddy! Get’s your eyes off my Swedish waffles!!!

Whew! Now I’m hungry. It only took me 4 hours to write this post! Stay tuned next time when Lindsey will share her thoughts on Stockholm.

Ciao!

 

We have been battling the elements when it comes to the Spotswood House remodel. First it was rain and now we are dealing with snow. So, the bathroom remodel which we hoped to knock out pretty quickly continues on and on and on. The snow does lend itself to pretty pictures though. Here is our Alexandria house.

 

Even though the weather hasn’t cooperated we have still pressed on with small remodeling things here and there. None of the interior doors at Spotswood House match and are pretty crappy quality. So, we found some nice doors on Facebook Marketplace (I swear you can find anything on there) and snapped them up for $15 a piece. The doors were an off-white, bisque color so that would require repainting (the story of my life). But they look like a million bucks now.

Here is what we were working with – hollow plywood doors.

Here is the “new” craftsman style door before painting. They got wet on the drive down to Orange, VA so you see water stains on them.

After painting. Looking good gurl! We weren’t able to get doors for the linen closet or one of the bedrooms (it’s a smaller door for some reason) so we are on the look-out to complete the set.

As I mentioned, my goal is to buy almost everything second-hand for Spotswood House. We went to Baltimore this past weekend to look for some bathroom supplies. I don’t know what it is about Baltimore but they have some amazing building supply stores. They have a monthly building auction too which we haven’t checked out yet but it is on my list to try.  So, our bathroom at Spotswood is microscopic, I mean teeny, tiny so we need to get creative with our furnishings. We got lucky and found a cabinet that is 24 inches wide and 18 inches deep for $25 at The Loading Dock. We are going to float the cabinet, by attaching it to the wall instead of setting it on the floor. Here is our little cutie.

Finally, I bought this chair at a garage sale with every intention of reupholstering it. But it sat for 3 – 4 years I’m embarrassed to say. I even bought fabric for it which just sat untouched as well. But no more. Here is the before picture.

The shape of this chair is so lovely but the mauve velvet is not so pretty. I didn’t want to paint the chair, I like the dark wood color, but wanted to freshen it up with some modern retro fabric.

It took me over three hours to take apart this chair. It was put together with a million staples and I ended up rubbing a blister on my thumb from removing all of the staples. Let me be very clear up front. I have zero reupholstery ability. Once I got the chair taken apart, I relied very, very heavily on Adam to get it put back together.

 

Here is the chair in progress. I should have taken step by step pictures so you can see everything we had to do with the back. You’ll notice we took the button tufting out, that looked too difficult to do but it would’ve competed with the busy pattern.

The pattern isn’t lined up perfectly on the back and the seat but I still think it looks amazing. We are 90% done. We just need to add piping to the chair back.

Here is the before and after side-by-side. Those rugs of mine are trying to steal the limelight. Side note, I love my pink and orange rug. The gray geometric rug is a Facebook Marketplace find. I plan to put it in the dining room at Spotswood House.

That pretty much summarizes what we have been up to lately. Now back to NFL playoffs…which have been pretty terrible and not remotely competitive. Those dang Patriots, U-G-H!!!!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hello again, we just returned from our European holiday in Berlin and Stockholm. I will breakdown the trip in two installments, starting with Germany. Spoiler alert; everything that could go wrong did on the first leg of our trip.

We decided on Stockholm because flights were pretty cheap  and we threw in Germany to add some different scenery. This decision came back to bite us. Our original flight departed Washington (on Virgin Atlantic), with a connection in London to Stockholm (on SAS). From there we booked another flight on a different airline (Easyjet) to Berlin so we could go to the Christmas markets first and then finish the trip in Stockholm. Makes no sense, right??! Our entire day would be spent flying. We made it to London no problem but our connecting flight on SAS was canceled due to technical problems. To make a long story short, SAS could not get us on a flight without us missing our Berlin connection in Stockholm since Easyjet is not one of their preferred partners. We went to the British Airways counter (because they are the only airline that could get us to Berlin) resigned to the fact we would have to book a one-way flight to Berlin for 500 euros, total BUMMER. Matt, a lovely guy, from British Airways listened to our ridiculous story, took sympathy on us and routed us straight to Berlin for no extra charge. He was wonderful! Happy ending, right? Flight to Berlin was great, even better than what we originally booked but our luggage didn’t make the flight. That luggage happened to include ALL of Adam’s clothes and ALL of our toiletries. Folks, we didn’t get our luggage until the last night we were in Germany, three whole days without luggage!!!! So you say…no big deal, go to the store and buy replacements…but it is Christmas and Germany takes 3 days off for Christmas, which happened to be the 3 days we were missing our luggage. To make matters worse, Adam was deathly ill. He literally slept the entire first day in Berlin while I toured the city by myself. So enough with the sob story, let’s get into the sights and sounds of Berlin.

One quick side note before I begin. Are Adam and I the only people who do not sit together when they fly? The airline staff always looked at us funny when we showed them our boarding passes and we weren’t sitting together. Here is why we don’t sit together; we both like window seats and Adam is quite a bit bigger than me and likes to have extra legroom (I don’t need the extra legroom but if they keep making the seats smaller, I will need a bigger seat, width wise geesh).

I didn’t do a very good job researching Berlin before we went so we probably missed out on some important stuff. One of the searches I do like to do for each city we visit is the most Instagram worthy sites to see. I would highly recommend adding that search to your future trips.

Ok, let’s start with the Christmas Markets. I read reviews and the highest rated market to visit was Gendarmenmarkt. I was expecting this thing to be huge, acres and acres of booths, not so much. It was tiny but I did have a good time. This was one of my solo visits. I am combining it with the Christmas market Adam and I visited together, Weihnachtsmarkt.

Entrance into the Christmas Market. It cost one euro.

Cashews, walnuts, chestnuts oh my!

Fun, little jazz band

In this photo, they are cooking all of the sausages.

Cheese booth!!

Guys rolling the dough for Flammkuchen – a wood fired flatbread, very similar to pizza and very tasty.

Flammkuchen fresh from the oven.

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Here are some photos from Weihnachtsmarkt.

Sweets and treats

There are people inside the barrel enjoying a meal.

Adam enjoying glühwein – mulled red wine, served hot with cinnamon, cloves, and spices.

So, you probably aren’t used to seeing me in glasses, the result of missing luggage.

Pretty Christmas decorations.

Another top tourist destination is the dome on top of the German parliament building, Reichstag. We waited too long to book tickets and the only time available to visit was 9:45 pm so we weren’t able to get photos of the Berlin skyline.

See the dome on top?

I am wearing a headset for an audio tour; it was terrible. While I am on the subject, the museums I visited in Berlin were pretty bad. The way they are laid out with soooooooooooo many words (I wish I took a picture) it is very hard to stay focused. You need to break up the words with objects, more pictures.

If Parliament was in session they would be sitting in the blue seats below.

We visited the Memorial to Murdered Jews of Europe, Brandenburg Gate, Checkpoint Charlie, the Neus Museum (we didn’t get any pictures but were able to see the bust of Nefertiti  – BEAUTIFUL!!), Topography of Terror Museum, Allied Museum, and Berlin Wall Memorial.

Memorial to Murdered Jews of Europe.

Brandenburg gate by day and night

Checkpoint Charlie

Berlin Wall Memorial

Topography of Terror – this is where the Third Reich Headquarters stood. It was bombed and obliterated by the allied forces. There is now a museum there about the atrocities of the Nazis. In the picture below, you can see the Berlin Wall Memorial in the background.

Berlin Cathedral

Now, let’s talk about the important stuff – FOOD. Berlin is supposedly on its way to becoming a foodie destination and also happens to be the vegetarian capital of the world. I was not very impressed with the food. Now, caveat, alot of the restaurants were closed for the Christmas Holidays while we were there. We ate traditional German food, Turkish food, Italian food, American style hamburgers, French breakfast at the cafes, American style steakhouse, and Christmas Market food.

I am having a hard time finding food photos, let alone any good photos from the Berlin part of the trip and I think it is because of all of the issues we had, it just put a damper on things. I kind of want to go back to Berlin under different circumstances and maybe I will like it more, IDK.

Adam trying Turkish beer and liquor with a water chaser.

Fried feta rolls and really delicious bread

Adam’s entree at the Turkish restaurant. It is ground meat with a tomato spread, meh.

Turkish tea to round out the meal.

We went to a traditional German restaurant and I got the flatbread I tried at the Christmas Market. What you can’t see in the photo are the MILLIONS UPON MILLIONS of white onions. Hey, I like onions but this was insane.

Adam trying Currywurst (a popular German dish) – pork sausage, with curry ketchup and curry powder. He said it was the wurst, lol. The dish is so unique it even has its own museum.

American style burgers at Burgers Berlin. It seemed like the bun had two tops instead of a top and bottom but it was good.

Kartoffelpuffer – traditional German potato pancakes with apple compote. We had these at a department store called KaDeWa, short for Kaufhaus des Westens. This department store is the second largest in Europe comprising 7 floors with every designer brand you can think of but the highlight is the fifth floor. It is like a luxury food court with different mini restaurants serving everything. They even have a Moet & Chandon (fine french champagne for those not in the know) counter.

Odds and Ends

Berlin had some really cool metro/train stops, each decorated differently. This was my favorite. It looks like black and white flowers but if you look close it is just a white stencil on glass. This wasn’t even my stop but I had to get off and take pictures.

I also like this train stop. It is classic french looking with white and green subway tile.

The lighting is bad in these but this stop had really cool murals, very french looking.

I found some cool street art.

In the states, you have red and green circles at crosswalks but in Berlin you have little red and green men, so cute.

So that is a quick and dirty rundown of our trip to Berlin. My next post will summarize our time in Stockholm, my new favorite city! Now that place has some good food!!!

I will end with this. I think the United States of America is the greatest country in the world. It is so diverse and you can truly come here and live the American Dream but there is one thing Americans could learn from Europeans and that is the art of relaxing and enjoying a coffee at a cafe. Europeans don’t do drive-thru. They stop, sit, relax, talk, and enjoy themselves. Cafes are absolutely everywhere on every corner in Europe. I don’t even drink coffee but I love spending time in the cafes.

Two posts so close to each other…what has gotten into me??? It’s not the eggnog. I’m back to share some gifts Adam and I bought each other and a sampling of things we bought for family.

I get the Vintage Travel Calendar by Cavallini & Co. every year for Christmas. I love this calendar with vintage travel advertisements. I could probably recycle the photos and frame them they’re so pretty. Actually, this company makes fancy wrapping paper I have framed and hung in my house.

Most of the pictures I post on the blog come from my cellphone but I hate going on vacation and using my phone for pictures. I just don’t think the quality is as good as a camera when you print the pictures. Now, if you are fine just having pictures online, a cellphone is fine.

Ugh, is it possible to buy a nice camera for less than $300? Our current camera is a Nikon Cool Pix but it was definitely time for an upgrade. I like having a small camera, I cannot see us traveling with those super nice Nikon with the super zoom attachment. So, we ended up buying a Canon Power Shot. I feel so old, I’m trying to figure out how to use it.

Adam likes fancy cocktails with bitters, syrups,  and exotic liqueurs so he asked for a barware set. I ordered him this set on Amazon at 8:30 p.m. on Wednesday night and it arrived on Thursday, the very next night with free shipping. That is so crazy to me!

I really like the mid century modern look of this set. It complements some gold patterned glasses we bought at an antique store a couple years ago.

Adam also got a pair of SoundPEATS bluetooth ear buds. I asked him what is so great about them and he said he doesn’t have to have a cord attached to his phone and I said, “oh, that is pretty cool.”

I forgot to share these super cute flats I bought at J.Crew on clearance for $20. I live in black flats, they are my favorite shoe to wear. These are so cute with their little tassels.

My mom’s birthday falls right around Christmas so we sent her some wine from Early Mountain Winery in Virginia. The name may ring a bell, I shared photos from our pickup party a few posts ago. We are members of their wine club and go there every chance we get. They always have tasty small plates and make a mean cheese plate.

For Christmas my mom wanted a garden cart. She’s a master gardener and unfortunately lives in Florida so I can’t take advantage of her “services”. My sister on the other hand does live in Florida and received a landscaped yard for a Christmas gift one year. I thought I was just going to have to get my mom a gift card but I found a cart on Google Express with free shipping and literally bought with two clicks.

My mother-in-law also has a birthday close to Christmas. We sent her a box of chocolates from John & Kira’s, a chocolate shop based in Philadelphia, PA.

My sister-in-law and family just closed on a new house. I can’t imagine how stressful that is to move right around the holidays. We sent them a succulent garden as a housewarming gift and HP Sprocket Photo Printer for Christmas. A Sprocket printer can be plugged into your phone and print pictures directly from it. I thought that was pretty neat.

For some family members, they will receive gifts from our trip to Germany and Sweden. I’m hoping we can find some really unique things.

Switching gears for a moment, Adam and I just finished watching the first season of Jack Ryan on Amazon Prime. I thought it was really good; however, I feel like the character “Jack Ryan” was mis-cast. John Krasinski, plays the title role and most of you will recognize him from his role on The Office as Jim Halpert. I mean, I’m not going to stop watching the series because it is really good just wondering if anyone else feels the same way.

And finally, an update on the lot we put an offer on. The seller at first was not going to entertain our offer, she wanted a full price offer. So we told our realtor, that’s fine, if she changes her mind let us know. A few days later she came back with a counter offer and then we came back with a counter offer to her offer and we haven’t heard back from her since. Stay tuned.