Rug Search

We've been holding out on getting a rug—partially due to the cost and partially due to lack of interest on our part. However, given all the holiday sales, we started our search this weekend. I had seen a graphic woven rug at Calypso Home, so we set out today to see what else is out there. The debate ended up being, do we want a flat woven, graphic rug? A large scale graphic could be fun! But over-powering! On the other hand, we could get a textured rug. Really, who doesn't like walking on a nice, plush rug? In the end, we found a great looped rug at Room and Board (and of course, it's not on sale).

New Shops, Old Shops

Recently several nearby stores that we've come to love here in SoHo have closed. The most upsetting of which, has been the disappearance of Valley Shepherd Creamery. A local New Jersey farm, they had a tiny storefront on Sullivan street where we bought fresh cheese as well as olive oil imported from Greece. Although we still have Murray's Cheese, we are sad to see such a small producer leave the neighborhood.

However, just down Bleeker Street from Murray's, a new tea shop has moved in. David's Tea isn't exactly local (it's a Canadian chain), but we're happy to have something other than Starbucks and Nespresso for our caffeine fix. We even bought a glass teapot there for the flowering tea that B + R brought us back from China.

Also new to the neighborhood, and much anticipated, is the arrival of REI SoHo. Finally.

Studio Ghibli

The IFC (Independent Film Center) which is 4 blocks away from our apartment is showing 4 weeks of films by Studio Ghibli. If you dont immediately recogonize Studio Ghibli's work their most popular work includes Spirited Away and Ponyo. Tonight Lara and I watched My Neighbor Totoro which is about a family that moves to a new house in the country side and the two young sisters become friends with a big fluffy tree spirit. Lara wants the little white spirit as a pet, surprise, surprise. Can't wait to see the other fun animated movies in the next couple weeks.

Texas Slow Cookin'

Just before Thanksgiving we finally did what we've been talking about—we bought a slow cooker. We were in Sur La Table to get some extra pie dishes (since we were bring FOUR pies to the Thanksgiving feast), and saw the Cuisinart slow cooker there. Inspired, but not sure if that was the best bet, we did some quick research and bought the Breville 7qt slow cooker from Williams Sonoma. This particular slow cooker was well rated, and the insert can be put directly on the stovetop to brown any ingredients—thereby saving an extra pan to do so. Also, since I'm such a sucker for recipe books, we bought a slower cooker recipe book to go with the slow cooker. Of course.

After going through the recipe book and marking all the ones that appealed to us, we finally tried out the first recipe—Texas Chili. We also made Mark Bittman's cornbread muffins to go with them. Now we have chili for lunch to look forward to—or maybe sloppy joes for dinner one night...