Apartment Blog

Life is full of stress and headaches, especially from the world-wind excitement of buying Valentine’s Day gifts. So in honor of you, we want to post some tips to help you relax and focus on yourself for a change!!

Something that always helps me to relax is taking a bath. I love just sitting in a hot water with my eyes closed. It’s very relaxing. I feel like my mind can just take a break from all the things I worry about & for a moment, I soak up the steam and calm all my nerves.

Whatever way you take a bath will work. If you prefer some salts or turning off the lights and only using candles. Maybe you like hearing some soft music in the background? Whatever you prefer is what you should do. And no matter what other tasks you ‘could be’ doing or whoever may be knocking at your door, take as much time as you need! This is ‘me’ time!!

After your bath don’t rush to get dressed. While in your bath robe or towel sit and put some lotion on your legs and arms. Apply a good layer and just enjoy the feeling of being rejuvenated. This would also be a perfect time to do a mud mask for your face if you’d like! This is still apart of your ‘me’ time so don’t try and multi-task. You’re worth the extra time you’re putting into yourself. Otherwise, you’ll rush into doing something else and never really give yourself the amount of time it needs to unwind.

So once you’ve applied the lotion or any other type of beauty product, you can get dressed. My recommendation is to dress in comfortable clothes. If you don’t have a pair of silky pajamas, I urge you buy a pair. They feel beautiful on your skin. Other fabrics that would feel wonderful would be cotton, micro-fiber, a chenille blanket, etc.

And finally, the end to a wonderful pampering session is to actually do an activity you want to do. Maybe you want to have a cup of tea, hot chocolate, or coffee, sit and read a book. Or maybe you want to catch up on your favorite soap or do your nails. Whatever activity you enjoy (doesn’t necessarily have to be alone-although that’s usually when you take care of your needs versus someone else’s) do it! After unwinding, taking some time to do something you want to do will really make the ‘me’ time really worth it!!

It’s been a really long time since I’ve taken the time to do this, so I think I’m due for one!! I wish all of you the best pampering session as well! 

You want to host a Super Bowl party with all your friends and/or family, but have to watch what you spend? Food/drinks is obviously going to be a larger expensive, rightfully so, but how can you have a bit of décor to your themed party when you’re on a budget? Well, here’s a few tips to keep in mind:

1. Make Your Own Football! This is a really cute and neat idea. Just take some paper plates, cut them into shapes of footballs and decorate them (i.e. color them brown w/white threads or in the colors of the football teams playing that day). You could even hole punch them and string them up around the room like a banner!?!

2. Bake A Football Cake! Since you’re already going to be providing food (or maybe have a pot luck) make sure there is a football decorated cake. You can use food coloring for the icing and little sticks (or going really economical-matches) for the goal posts. It’s sure to be a crowd pleaser, decoration centerpiece and a yummy surprise!

3. Styrofoam Bricks! These are really cute ideas for people to throw on the ground when the referee makes a bad call or their team gets scored on. Guaranteed to get some use!! Just go to your local arts and craft store and pick up a bunch of blocks. Get some spray paint (preferably the reddish/brown color of bricks) and paint away! Stack them up in the middle of your room, they’re bound to be discovered!

4. Balloons Galore! Balloons are a cheap and easy way to decorate your house for this party. Get a few bunches (probably not more than a dozen, which can cost you about $6 dollars) and strategically place them where the majority of your guests will be. They will make a big impact for not a lot of $$!

5. Paper Chains! Going back to your childhood days when you use to make decoration out of paper strips, staple them together in circles and build from there. It made a cute little chain that you could decorate the classroom with. Why not mimic that for your party? Sounds goofy, but for two packages of different colored paper (very inexpensive), you can cut them into five strips each and get a pretty decent size streamer around your room! Be creative and do one of the teams colors around the food and the other team’s colors around the T.V.

6. Use Your Computer! Have you found all sorts of neat graphics online that you’d like to use? If you have a color printer, why not use it! Print out some of these images and cut them out. Tape them on various surfaces around your apartment. It actually turns out quite nice (and really good for your budget)! Place them on the bathroom mirrors, the kitchen cabinets or on the fridge. It’s just a little bit of decorations everywhere without a lot of extra money coming out of your wallet!

7. Use The Dollar Store! I swear by this place to everyone! Seriously it’s amazing. Go here for your other items that you have to buy (i.e. paper plates, napkins, cups, utensils, table cloth, etc.). It’ll really save you money in the end and still be sufficient enough for your party! Other stores that are economical that might be in your area are: Dollar Tree, 39 cent store, Party City, etc.

Do you have anymore cheap ideas for decorations? Let us know! The more ideas you share, the more money in everyone’s pockets this Super Bowl Sunday (especially for any of you who have wagered on the game and might loose!!)

So you want to throw a little party this Sunday, huh? Celebrating the Patriots and Giants going to the Super Bowl? Well, here are a few tips for the host of this year’s Super Bowl party:

Tip 1: Prepare

You’re going to have rowdy activity take place in your home. So make sure you remove any fragile or breakable items out of the rooms where guests will be. Also start assembling a list of whom all you would like to invite and verbally invite them. A Super Bowl party isn’t something that’s formal so written invitations or RSVP’s wouldn’t be necessary.

Tip 2: Decorations

If you’re cheering for a specific team, make sure you incorporate their colors into the decorations for the party. You might also want to bring out all your memorabilia of that specific team. If you’re hosting the party and not for any specific team, then just incorporate football themed decorations like napkins, plates, banners, balloons, etc. I wouldn’t go too overboard with the decorations as the main purpose for this event is to watch the T.V. and not the area surrounding it! (p.s. make sure none of your decoration hinders the ability to watch the game for anyone!)

Tip 3: Entertainment

Yes, your guests are there to watch the football game! The T.V. is the most important piece of entertainment, but be sure to have activities for those not interested in watching the game. Have a separate room for those who would rather chat and make sure that room won’t interfere with those watching the game & vice versa. Also try and have fun activities for half time, like maybe a football shaped piñata!

Tip 4: Food/Drinks

This is a BIG tip, as most of your guests will be snacking on quite a bit of food. So buffet style is really your only option. You can have finger foods such as chips & dip, pizza rolls, veggies & dip, wings-‘easy food’. And make sure you have plenty of napkins in the areas where the food is and where the guests will be seated!! Usually the drink of choice for this manly custom is beer, but you don’t have to serve it if you would rather not. Just be sure whatever type of drink you are serving is enough for your guests to have more than a few glasses of since they will be there for several hours.

Tip 5: Clean Up

You’ve just had a successful party! YAY!! Hopefully your team won! But regardless, you’ve just hosted a party that you have to now clean up after! Don’t worry! If you bought plastic/paper plates, going through should be easy! Just take your trash can and dump everything! You need to vacuum up the little crumbs that are everywhere and wipe down any surfaces that are messy. If you have a few friends that’ll stay a little while after the game, enlist their help too!

Hope everyone has a wonderful Super Bowl Sunday!!

Okay, so I was searching on the web and I found this cool article on MSN.com. (I copy and pasted the text for you below.) As you all know, my boyfriend and mine’s favorite Christmas movie is the Grinch. Read what the article says about Grinch lovers like us and figure out what your favorite Christmas movie says about you!!

Article:

By Margot Carmichael Lester

Your new guy says he can’t get through the holidays without watching A Christmas Story at least three times (he even has the leg lamp). Or it’s your new lady friend who sings all the tunes from Santa Claus Is Coming to Town in the shower. We asked pop culture mavens Alexis Bondoc, columnist for IntrepidMedia.com, and Ian Williams, an author/director/filmmaker, how a person’s all-time fave Christmas show reveals his or her dating M.O. Read on for some intriguing insights!

A Charlie Brown Christmas
Alexis: The fella who never misses this show is probably a classic guy who already knows how to dress and laugh. Slip him a CD by Vince Guaraldi (who did the jazzy numbers on the show) as a gift.
Ian: If your girl loves this show, deep down, she may want to don a black turtleneck and get existential—this show has a message. But she always has time to dance (who can resist that music!) and maybe she can make clouds of dirt like Pigpen.

A Christmas Story
Alexis: Aww… He’s got a wistful, nostalgic sense of humor and can probably remember every Christmas morning growing up. But, more importantly, there’s more than a slight chance that he didn’t get that one certain gift that every other kid on his block got — the Radio Flyer wagon or the super-cool robot set — and can still remember that deprivation NOW. Will you be the one to indulge him now?
Ian: Your romantic partner is something of a happy medium: corny, yet cool. Not cool in a desperately hip way, but subversive enough to keep things interesting. She hasn’t forgotten what the wonders of childhood were like—and doesn’t want to.

Bad Santa
Alexis: If this is your guy’s favorite seasonal show, then hold your horses. This guy is the Anti-Santa who would probably be happy to make a bunch of gift deliveries with a bottle of Jack Daniels. His ideal vision of Christmas probably involves telling little kids they don’t need Barbies or that Mickey isn’t a real Mouse and that he lives next to a 7-Eleven instead of the North Pole. Run, run, run. Unless you’re happy spending your time with the embodiment of Life’s Little Destruction Book…
Ian: Most likely, your lady was waiting for a movie like this long before it came out. Finally, someone told a Christmas story without much of a moral… and with lots of cringing along the way. Not one for nostalgia, your girl probably wants to order Chinese food rather than prepare a feast. If you are equally dark in your outlook, well, merry, merry!

How the Grinch Stole Christmas
Alexis: You don’t have to worry about this guy at all. He’s offbeat, sure, but he’s got a good heart. He probably loves celebrating Christmas with a delightfully creative and witty sense of humor instead of tradition. He’ll probably surprise you with completely novel ways of marking the holiday season.
Ian: The girl who loves this one is a sucker for ritual, and why not? We all know what happens to the Grinch, but the magic is in the retelling. The Whoville song is treacly and boring, but the Grinch’s theme, with jazz glissandos and rich baritone, make it a yearly must-see. But you must ask this woman: Does she identify with the Grinch… or the Grinch’s poor dog? That will give you some important clues!

It’s A Wonderful Life
Alexis: If your guy likes Frank Capra’s all-time classic, you can put good money on the fact that he’s as classically appealing as Jimmy Stewart—and probably as thoughtful, too. Thoughts count a lot with this kind of guy; make sure yours are up to snuff.
Ian: Like Crowded House sang, “Wherever there is comfort, there is pain,” and don’t your baby know it! She gets It’s a Wonderful Life as it was meant to be: not a sing-songy holiday card, but a deeply sad reflection on dreams deferred. She’s a deep-thinker… and probably a keeper.

Rudolph, The Red-Nosed Reindeer
Alexis: Any guy who picks this stop-animation classic is probably as unique as little Rudolph is. He probably celebrates Christmas — and lives his life — with a playful and creative streak. I mean, this is a guy who lives for the island of misfit toys and the Bumble! He’s probably quite a character.
Ian: Yikes. Easily the most anesthetized and goofy of the Xmas specials, Rudolph has the subtlety of a “Hang in There!” cat poster. Repetitious and cloying, it goes down like a bowl of red frosting. Your girl might be cute, but she’ll put antlers on your dog and giggle like she was the first to think of it. Consider yourself warned!

Santa Claus is Coming to Town
Alexis: The guy who loves this one is manly enough to really get down with Christmas and the classics, especially if he’s a Fred Astaire fan. This guy truly loves the holiday. You will celebrate every possible tree-lighting, sidewalk chorus group, eggnog-pouring moment, and you will do it with a smile on your face.
Ian: If your baby’s favorite is this one, she’s probably a Goth chick. No other Santa origin myth is quite so dark. Sure, Fred Astaire narrates, but St. Nick as an unwanted orphan? Hunted like a criminal? We knew Santa’s psyche was complicated, but we didn’t know he needed therapy.

Now, we’re not saying you should take any of these interpretations as the gospel truth. There are, of course, exceptions to every rule. But you should learn a little about yourself. What’s more, adding these insights to other information could help you figure out if you and your sweetie have a future full of holly-jolly Christmases together—or if your holiday honey will leave you feeling like your heart got run over by a reindeer. Ho ho ho!

Margot Carmichael Lester’s work also appears in Go magazine.

How do you and your family celebrate for the holidays? Are there any traditions that you’ve always done or are you starting new ones? I’m still new to this whole ‘holiday on my own’ type thing, so here are some traditions that I’ve found (plus some that my family have always done).

When you think of Christmas, what is one thing you know you’ve got to have? Well, the Christmas tree of course. Traditions start around this significant symbol in many ways, from picking out the Christmas tree, having special memories of ornaments, to sitting around the tree opening gifts. So that’s where my traditions start. Usually, my family and I would go to one lot and pick out a tree. Each year we’d take turns as to who got to pick it out. However, the last two years (the start of my ‘on your own holiday’) I have put up my fake tree. My old traditions with my family have been replaced by new traditions. And as far as time frames, I always put the tree up after Thanksgiving!! I say, let one holiday pass before you start celebrating another! And another tradition that surrounds the Christmas tree for me is ornaments. Every year my boyfriend and I pick out a Grinch ornament for our tree, since ‘How the Grinch Stole Christmas´ is our favorite Christmas movie. So we get at least one Grinch ornament every year. (Pretty soon our whole tree will be all Grinch ornaments!)

Other decorative Christmas things that I’ve found (and do) are advent calendars. At my parents place, the advent calendar was a blank Christmas tree and each day we’d open up the calendar door that contained a surprise ornament. The 24th of December was always the star of the tree. Another decorative element that can be a tradition in your home is the dinning room table; whether it’s holiday dishware, a centerpiece or table cloth. I’ve never had holiday dishware but centerpieces we’ve had. It was always a large candle with a berry & holly wreath wrapped around it.

An extraordinary holiday tradition that I want to get into the habit of is giving to the less fortunate. When I was in high school I did the Angel tree with our National Honor Society and since then I’ve only done it once. I’d like to get back into the habit of doing that and maybe even doing some volunteer work too. Christmas is after all about giving not receiving!

What other holiday traditions do you and your families do? Are there any you’d like to incorporate in the future? We’d love to hear your ideas!

No matter where you are, you have neighbors. At work, it’s the person in the next office, at school it’s the student sitting near you and at home it’s the person renting the apartment next to yours. The awkward first encounters between you and your neighbors are always hard to get over, but eventually will help you in the future. Who else will check your mail when you’re on vacation or jot notes down when you skip class?

Everyone has heard the horror stories about neighbors. So to avoid any of those potential problems, here are a few tips for getting to know your neighbors:

Tip 1: Introduce yourself
The first day you move in will obviously be a busy one, but maybe the second or third day you should go an introduce yourself. Nothing elaborate is needed, just a simple ‘Hello, how are you? I just moved in next door’ type thing will work. Breaking the initial barrier will help prevent any awkwardness in the future when you see him/her.

Tip 2: Wave
Doing such a simple gesture will go a long way in maintaining a relationship with your neighbor. Think about it, wouldn’t a nice wave in the morning to say ‘how are you?’ be a pleasant way for you to start your day?

Tip 3: Pick up your pet’s messes
If you happen to live in a pet friendly apartment, please pick up their messes. This not only will help your neighbors out-so they don’t have to watch exactly where they are stepping-but will also improve the look of your apartment community!

Tip 4: Set up play dates
During the initial introduction, you made one of the first few days you moved in, you should have been able to find out if your neighbor has any children. If they are roughly the same age as your children, make a play date for the kids to get together. Or if they don’t have any children, maybe you both could visit a local dog park with your animals? Doing this will help you get to know your neighbor better as well as allow your children (or pets) interact with others.

Tip 5: Visit the area and all its amenities
You didn’t search for an apartment that has access to a tennis court, pool or fitness center not to use it, did you? Utilize the amenities your apartment neighborhood offers. If you go to the fitness center often, you’re bound to run into some regulars or visit the pool during the summer and chit chat with other sun bathers. You will start to create relationships with others and this will give you an overall comfortable feel in your new apartment home!