ALL OF THE THINGS...

I had written a post about a month ago, detailing the beginning of our time in New York, but never published it.  Now upon rereading it, so much has changed!  So, instead, I'll play a quick catch up and move forward.

We arrived in New York City on July 31st, after a really special send off from our Berkeley buddies.  It was strange and surreal to go from northern California/ mellow life to be dropped off right into the heart of New York!  We had temporary housing in Hell's Kitchen for one month while we were exploring neighborhoods and looking at potential apartments.  Living in such a crazy and full-of-life part of New York for a month was really cool.  I walked and walked most days in the scorching heat (while Raf started his new job) and we took full advantage of our proximity to Central Park (5 blocks away!) on quite a few evenings for strolls.  I am kind of amazed that I didn't take a single picture during that time (not of our swanky temp apartment, or our night walks, or anything!) but I suppose I was just living it instead.

After a chaotic, nearly month-long search (and many, many fiascos that I will spare you-- I will just say that house hunting in New York is competitive and heart breaking at times) we finally settled into the most darling neighborhood in Brooklyn: Carroll Gardens.  Seriously.  It is so. darn. cute.  And we have discovered that Brooklyn is much more our speed than Manhattan.  We live in an old brownstone and guess what?  We have a sweet little patio and backyard all to ourselves!  The previous tenant was from California and lived here for 9 years and he planted so many beautiful (and edible!) things back there.  I'm pretty excited to see what blooms next spring and early summer.  Right now, we are enjoying the last (and abundant) harvest of figs.  Yep, figs!  Our neighbors on either side of us have huge fig trees that hang way over into our yard.  Black Mission on one side and Brown Turkey on the other.  We have full permission from one neighbor to pick as many as we want.  We haven't met the other neighbor, but have been picking the ones that hang over our patio, otherwise they fall and rot and collect ants.  Needless to say, I have been in my happy place.  Figs are high on my list of favorite things.  :)

Brown Turkey figs (with a couple of Black Mission too).  Our neighbor made jam from these and gave us a jar!

Fig harvest plus rosemary from the neighbor.

Also, I have had a couple of job interviews and one wasn't a good fit, but another one was.  In the end, the good one (an art teacher position) would have been mine had my New York license been renewed in time, (the NY state department of education is SO SLOW and wouldn't have my license ready for another 3 weeks beyond when they wanted to hire me), and the other one (a vegan kitchen job) at the very least taught me a couple of crazy-good recipes (see photos below)!

Amazing raw lasagne.

So, onward and upward and exciting adventures to come!  Raf likes his job quite a bit and I am having fun exploring opportunities and the neighborhood and cooking up a storm again, now that I have my kitchen in order.

P.S.  Pictures and details from our Italy trip (in MAY, geez.) are coming soon...