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So I’m back. Yes, I disappeared from the blog world for nearly two months and left you all to stumble around in the dark, asking, “Where did she go? What is she doing? What is in and what is out?” And for that I am truly sorry. But don’t feel like I abandoned you because you are not important to me, dear reader, I basically abandoned everything – Pilates, reading, baking, crafting, all in the name of moving.

That is my excuse – we moved. And if you knew how many worldly possessions I have, you would know that that is a valid excuse for putting my blog and basically my life on hold. But now that we are all moved in and the apartment is organized and decorated to a livable standard (everything can always be improved on), I am ready for the comeback.

Although many of my hobbies were replaced with packing, floor planning, and stressing out, we do have some things to catch up on so let’s get into it!

Moving on Up

The bane of my existence – moving. I used to say, “I love moving, I get to look at all of my stuff!” Well, that was when I was in college or very recently post-grad, and “all of my stuff” could fit into a single U-haul trailer. Now that I’m a grown woman with 28 years of hoarding collecting under my belt, the process is a little more intimidating, but I do still enjoy playing the real-life version of Tetris, which is fitting everything in boxes. We hired movers because packing is fun, but moving is not, especially when you’re moving out of a third-floor apartment with no elevator.

My parents came to help with packing, moving, and unpacking, which was a huge help. Moving weekend was mostly smooth sailing – we did run into a slight issue when we realized that the loading dock for the new apartment had been double-booked, but the other person moving in was very nice and let us share the dock and the freight elevator.

We absolutely love our new place. Our apartment itself is great – the two-story apartment we were in before was pretty cool, not going to lie, but it is a lot easier to keep this place clean. The apartment community is great – Boyfriend Alex has been utilizing the gym, and we’ve gone to the pool twice already in the month that we’ve been here. The staff is nice, and maintenance is so quick to respond, and the people who live here are nice, too. It was a little jarring the first time a stranger spoke to me in the elevator, but I’m getting used to it. But the best part is the location. I have been describing the area as an apocalyptic community – like survivors built walls and put everything you could need inside the walls. We’ve got apartments, a movie theater, a park, restaurants, bars, ice cream shops, book stores, workout studios, spas, clothing stores, grocery stores, home stores… albeit this would be a pretty boujee apocalypse with our clothes from Anthropologie and our home furnishings from West Elm, but still! Oh, and my favorite part? There is a farmer’s market every Sunday right outside our door. Literally a dream.

I’ve already floated the idea of extending our lease, which is funny because just two months ago, I was having a panic attack in Shake Shack about moving here. If only Shake Shack Panic Attack version of me could see me now.

Fun Stuff Besides Moving: Warped Tour

Although moving was the main thing on my mind these last two months, we took a few breaks from the stress to have some fun. First, we went full emo and went to Warped Tour in DC on June 14 and 15. I’m not going to lie, the first day was a little rough. I don’t know what sadists schedule outdoor festivals in DC during the height of summer, but I’d like to have a word. It was SO hot. My main takeaway from day one of Warped Tour was a pretty gnarly sunburn and blisters from my Doc Martens. But day two? Magical. We popped around to the different stages to see bands like Honey Revenge, Bowling For Soup, Boys Like Girls, and Simple Plan, but my main reason for being there was Avril Lavigne. It had been raining on and off all day, but it really started coming down right before she came on, to the point that I was praying to whoever would listen that there would not be any lightning that would stop the show. God was super punk rock and put a pause on the lightning but said “more rain”. The show was great, but we were both getting tired, and I’d heard all of my favorites, so we were ready to go. We were pretty close to the stage, and as Avril Lavigne was the closer, almost everyone was at the stage. I don’t know how to estimate numbers, but there were easily hundreds, if not thousands, of people behind us, and it would have taken us forever to get back through all of them. So, we secured our belongings to our persons and crowd surfed out of there.

Crowd surfing to Avril Lavigne in the rain at Warped Tour in 2025 was not on my life bingo card and honestly sounds like a mad-lib, but it’s probably in my top 10 memories. Also, to get a little gushy and sentimental, the last time I was listening to and identifying with these songs, I was a depressed teenage girl who thought I would always be a depressed teenage girl. So, I really feel like it healed something in me to be screaming those songs, in the rain, with a bunch of other people, when I used to listen to them on my Walkman while dramatically glaring out the car window because NO ONE UNDERSTOOD ME.

Fun Stuff Besides Moving: Beyoncé Concert

One night last month, I was telling Boyfriend Alex about how the company that bought my company has some really nice perks. “For example,” I told him, “they’re doing a raffle to give away tickets to a Beyoncé concert.” I am not kidding you when I tell you that the very next day, I received an email saying that I had won the Beyoncé tickets. I am a very powerful witch. Oh, and these were not tickets to sit in the crowd… oh no. These were tickets to sit in the company suite at the Mercedes-Benz stadium with free food, drinks, and a hell of a view. Now, neither Boyfriend Alex nor I are huge Beyoncé fans, but we were not going to pass up this opportunity, so we flew to Atlanta and got all cowboy Carter-ed up. It was spectacular. I am not breaking any news here when I tell you that Beyoncé is an amazing performer, but she really surpassed my expectations. And of course, being in the suite made it that much better – I was too anxious to eat anything and famously do not drink, but I was guzzling free Diet Cokes like there was no tomorrow.

Fun Stuff Besides Moving: Floridaaaa

As Taylor Swift says, Florida… It’s one hell of a drug. And this trip to Florida was sponsored by the drug of caffeine. We woke up at 3:00AM on Saturday, drove to Baltimore, flew to Tampa, attended a wedding, drove to Orlando, drove back to Tampa, flew to Fort Lauderdale, flew to Baltimore, drove to DC, then drove home to Fairfax, returning around 12:30PM on Sunday. With a few moments of sleep here and there wherever possible – in the car, on the plane, on the floor of the Fort Lauderdale airport… But with the help of plenty of energy drinks, we made it, and it was fun!

Entertainment Weekly

Movie(s): Bring Her Back, 28 Year Later, Jurassic World Rebirth, Superman, The Fantastic Four: First Steps

Okay, if I go into my deep thoughts on each movie, we’ll be here for much too long, so I’m going to try to keep this quick:

Bring Her Back: Weird, a little predictable, honestly forgot we saw this one.

28 Years Later: My second favorite from the franchise, barely getting beaten out by 28 Weeks Later. Interesting. Funny at times. Everything could have been avoided if the parents were honest with their kid.

Jurassic World Rebirth: Loved it. Cried over the beauty of dinosaurs. Perfect cast – love Scarlet Johansson and of course, Jonathan Bailey, but was distracted by his accent coming out – why could he not have been British in the movie?

Superman: Amazing, incredible, my favorite movie of the year, and I suspect it will stay that way until Wicked 2. I laughed, I cried, I bought a ticket for a whole seat but only needed the edge, yada yada yada. Favorite line: “why don’t I have a seat?!”

The Fantastic Four: First Steps: My second favorite Marvel/superhero movie of the year. I’ve never seen a Fantastic Four movie but I got really attached to the characters and sobbed like a little tiny baby.

Book(s): Rules of Civility, Crescent City: House of Earth and Blood

Rules of Civility was the last book I read before I, the dumbest girl in school, packed up all of my books. It was fine. Honestly, I finished reading that on June 12 and I don’t remember much from it.

Last week, I, along with many BookTok girlies, woke up to the news that we’ve been waiting for – Sarah J. Maas has finished the first draft of ACOTAR 6. My feeling of excitement and thoughts of possibly rereading ACOTAR slipped from my mind as I realized I have yet to read Crescent City. For those of you who are mentally stable, let me explain. A Court of Thorns and Roses (ACOTAR) is a five-book series by Sarah J. Maas. She is also the author of Throne of Glass (TOG), an eight-book series that features different characters and storylines than ACOTAR but is still in the same world. The same is true for Crescent City (CC), a three-book series. I have read ACOTAR and TOG, but was procrastinating CC. But, from what I’ve heard from the BookTok girlies, CC ties in to ACOTAR much closer than TOG and is a necessary read before ACOTAR 6.

Long story short, I ran to Barnes and Noble and bought all three and am diving headfirst into it. How long does a first draft take to be ready for publishing? ChatGPT (which I have lovingly started to call “Chet”) estimates the publishing date of late 2026, early 2027, but I will try to finish all three in August just to be safe.

Hobby Lobby

Welcome to a new section that I have decided to call “Hobby Lobby”. Although Hobs Lobs is not my craft store of choice (I am a Michaels loyalist and a Joann’s mourner), I think it’s a fun and hilarious name for a section on my hobbies (if I do say so myself).

Most of my hobby time has been taken up with crocheting baby blankets, as seemingly everyone I know is pregnant and also having a boy. (Okay, three people, but that’s a lot). In my rush to finish the first one, I didn’t even take a picture of it. I promise to do better for the next ones. In addition to two crocheted baby blankets, I’ve also decided to hyperfixate on cross-stitching again. My idea is to cross-stitch things from my favorite books and hang them in our bookshelves, and I’m currently working on this one from Fourth Wing.

Baking and “apartment steading” are back in the rotation as well. My favorite white bread recipe has disappeared from Pinterest, so I’m working on finding a new staple. I made this one this week, and it turned out great. I have found a homemade granola recipe that is delicious and has saved me so much money. I double the batch and it lasts me a few weeks.

I am attempting, once again, to get a sourdough starter going and have gone back to my roots of making it in a mason jar. I got a fancy starter jar and was never able to get my starter to grow in there, so I am blaming the jar. I currently have a rosemary and roasted garlic artisan loaf fermenting on the counter that I’m very excited about, as both the rosemary and the garlic are from the farmer’s market. I have big baking plans for the rest of this week for a friend’s birthday party on Sunday, so I’ll come back next week and share those recipes.

In’s and Out’s

In:

Forgiving your favorite blogger for disappearing for two months

Baking bread

ADHD medication

Out:

Revving your engine in residential neighborhoods

Daily loads of laundry

Not blogging

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Until next week, ILYSM,