Soupsgiving

Yay! The holiday set up is complete and I am gonna sleep for 12 hours and hop on a flight back home for Thanksgiving and a well deserved break. It will be a little sad being this is the first holiday without my papaw but there will be plenty of love and food and relatives and friends to make up for it. As I'm sure I'll get a million questions about what the store looks like, what the Rockefeller center windows look like, and about our new apt I decided to make this a very picture heavy album that everyone can feel free to ask me about at "soupsgiving" on Friday at my house! 

This year my family decided to take it easy and have our big meal consists of all different home made soups so that friends and family can filter in an out on Friday. Mike and I are making salmon chowder that I'm sure will get some praise from guests and some thumbs down from most of my family that doesn't like sea food. But oh well, this city slicker has gotta bring some flava'! Having our meal on Friday also frees me up to spend Thanksgiving at Mike's house for the first time ever, so everything works out well. Enough jabber here are some pictures!

Rockefeller center windows first! I'll take some better photos closer to Christmas when its in all its gloy but for now this is what you got. Some of my best friends and I met up to celebrate and to look at the windows if you're wondering who those good looking people are in the last photo.

 

Now my store's windows...

Any FINALLY the interior of my store...

Elliot Withersbee

Had a busy weekend and need to get to bed so I can wake up before the sun to start the ROCKEFELLER CENTER WINDOW PREP! I know you'll forgive me for the super short blog so I can make myself fall asleep early. I'll be watching fast and furious 6 in bed to distract me from my excitement for tomorrow. Anyway, here are some preliminary photos of the window I completed at my own store. Enjoy! 

Every leaf, lemon, pear, foliage, and greenery was handmade with a big thank you going out to our staff for helping to prep them every morning during our morning meeting.

A little back story on the swan. His name is Elliot Withersbee. He rowed for Cornell. He enjoys swimming and poetry (only the classic poems, none of that slam poetry crap, as he would say). He is dating the swan from the Westport Anthro store, Penelope. He is from old money but he's trying to make it on his own. Side note - I think we've been breathing in to many chemicals in the art room.

 

Getting these wooden birds I made to fly up that high made even me scared to be on a ladder.

 Frosting the glass!

on a separate note...

Other than moving I wanted to update you on displays as well. This upcoming week is my window installation at the new store. We will also be putting up our Christmas trees, and starting our holiday store transformation. Last week I froze our wheat installation to give a little hint as to what is coming without making it overtly holiday before Halloween came.

I also had to install a new wall over our existing plaster walls so that now I can securely drill into them and attach display to the wall which is next to impossible on a plaster wall. Yay to building a wall for the first time! After I made the wall I bleached and re-dyed the fabric that was on there so that our new window will have a winter storm-like background. Get excited for next weekend's window pictures!

I also made a few new birds for our exterior display. I jigsawed them out of wood, sanded them, and made their wings out of leftover wooden petals from last springs display. Yay for re-using materials!

Moving on up....to astoria

Well we are officially out of the old apartment and into the new one! We got rid of about 25% of our belongings and it feels great. We're simplifying our lives one step at a time. We decided not to bring the king sized bed so for now we are sleeping on our wonderful air mattress that my parents gave me for christmas which is actually very comfortable. The plan is to buy a new mattress on black friday and hopefully get a great deal. I can't wait because our new place has very limited storage and I need the "under the bed" space for things like ski's, art supplies, etc. Anyway on to the exciting things like pictures!

Since we didn't take our initial first apartment sitting on the floor eating dinner picture, I made sure to get one this time.

I'm really loving the neighborhood we live in. Lots to do, very close to the train, much closer to Manhattan, and a younger vibe.  Last night we went to an Irish pub and a billiards hall that has trivia on Tuesdays, so needless to say I can't wait to get back in trivia mode.We've been exploring the food, coffee shops, and bars and so far everything is going very well. In fact, I'm at a bakery right now called Cafe Sou Sou that is pretty lovely. They have soft french music playing, and aside from the "Be yourself, everyone else is already taken" and similar quotes on the walls, I like the decor very much. The biggest perk though is that they have wifi - which we do not yet. No internet means more record listening which is great but since I do not have a smart phone I have been bumming off of Mike's more. We'll see how long he puts up with that.