Article
September 4, 2013
by Stefanie Paulson

Our Summer – In Review

I know, I know. We have been way too MIA. But I promise we are alive. Busy, but alive. And I am vowing to break this blog silence and resume more regular posting now that we are FINALLY starting to settle into our new routine around here.

Since so much happened this summer, I am just going to give some brief recaps of the highlights just to catch everyone up.

June

This month was literally a blur. Between the stress of studying for my USMLE, getting used to being in Brooklyn, we were totally spent. We found ourselves so exhausted from all of the moving that each day was a struggle to get things done. This was probably felt hardest by Tyler who found himself more behind in work that he would have wanted.

July

I took my exam on the 12th and after it was over, it was so great to finally breathe. We went our to celebrate that night at the coolest restaurant ever, the Bookstore, in Bethlehem PA. I found out later that I did quite well on my exam too, which has made me ever more confident and happy about this next part of medical school. Mid July we spent in Canada exploring Quebec City and Montreal. I will write more about that and give lots of pictures in another post. When we got back, is was full-force apartment hunting which was a stressful experience all in itself that we are hoping to avoid ever doing again in NYC.

August

The majority of this month has been spent moving in. Not owning anything has made this process painfully slow. Plus we are both busy and way exhausted from life. It is finally now mostly together. We love our apartment very much and think it is perfect for us, but owning nothing was a bit of a struggle. A virtual tour and lots of pictures will come soon, once we finally finish the last touches.

I also started my first rotation of 3rd year August 20th. It has been great and scary and fast. I am lucky because I started family medicine and it has not been too intense, but there is a lot to do and we are still both getting our routine down. But, I love it. That much I am sure of.

 

We are finally starting to feel at home in the new apartment, new neighborhood and with our new schedules. Me working at the hospital and Tyler working in his new co-working space. It is a new and exciting adventure and we hope to see and do a lot. We visited a bunch of Tyler’s family over the last few weeks so it is nice to know that we will be home for a while now so we can really settle in and explore NYC.

 

BTW – this is our 100th post! Hard to believe we have had 100 interesting stories thus far.  🙂

Article
June 8, 2013
by Stefanie Paulson

A Few NY Updates

Well, we officially live  in BROOKLYN! We no longer live on a tiny postage stamp island in the middle of the Caribbean, but smack in the middle of millions of people and everything you could ever want ever. Except for whole foods which is way in Manhattan – but oh well.

We are so excited! Being here is just great! We have already found way too many awesome restaurants, got lost on the subway and trapped by track construction, found amazing margaritas and mexican food, and I found some decent coffee within walking distance of where we are living.

Getting settled was a bit of a mess. The keys that were supposed to be mailed to Tyler’s grandfather’s house didn’t show up so we had to have new ones overnighted. That of course was massively delayed in part due to Memorial day and in part of FedEx being lame. Poor Ty didn’t end up in NY much earlier than me which kinda ruined the plan where he would get some things set up for us, go grocery shopping, etc.

But, we are here now. And unpacked. And sadly I need to resume my hermit-like studying and really buckle down because I have a LOT to go through between now and July 12th. A LOT!

Pictures of our NY life to come – but don’t get your hopes too high while I am still studying.

Oh, and lets all pester Tyler to get on changing that location map. We promise it will be updated soon. Just as soon as my nagging wears him down.  😉

Article
May 26, 2013
by Stefanie Paulson

Uprooting Again

Nearly 2 years ago Tyler and I uprooted our lives – leaving behind family, friends, all things familiar – and packed it into some large suitcases and travelled 3000 miles to a tiny island. But we made this our home. Our funny, goofy, Caribbean home. And while it has been challenging and generating that same familiar community was tougher than expected, we grew to love this place. After all, it was our first real home together. We have lived here while married longer than anywhere else so far. And it will likely remain on top for a while considering how much like tumbleweeds we are.

But it has come time to do it again. The same stuff has been repacked into the same large suitcases and more planes are to be boarded. This time taking us to an entirely different coast, to different climates and environments for a whole new adventure. Uprooting our lives to replant again as East Coast dwellers. To experience our first full-blown winter, 4 distinct seasons, city living, subways and likely impossibly tiny apartments.

We are moving into a summer sublet in Brooklyn for now. Hopefully we will simply move apartments and not cities once we get my hospital placements, but anything is possible. And you know what, there is a part of me that loves that unknown. That loves the planning and dreaming that comes from being able to go anywhere. Being unattached and the world full of possibilities.

So for now we pray for smooth transitions. We pray that we will love our new home, that I will love the snow in April next year as much as I do now. We pray that this new adventure will challenge us, grow us, and make us even happier.

Yay to new beginnings and new horizons!!

 

Article
June 13, 2012
by Stefanie Paulson

The Move

So, this post is delayed but I kept being lazy about composing a photo tour. But finally, I finished it.

Old Apartment

Just look at those walls.

Tyler and I decided not to move after my first Term because the stress of trying to find a new place, move, and then make a trip home for the holidays was just too much. So after enduring another 4 months in our old place, we decided that we needed to ensure we found a really awesome new apartment to live. You do remember we lived in a lime green mailbox right? If not, there is little photo to remind you. But really, that doesn’t do it quite justice as that is a picture in its prime. Right when we moved in, before we acquired the rest of our stuff (ie. school books) and before the walls started to peel off. But anyways, that is behind us now.

So our new place is now off of the main road (and down a perilous dirt road, but more on that another time) and right on the water. We have fruit trees, and couches, and more than 2 plates, and even a door that can separate two complete rooms. It is magical. But in all seriousness, it is a beautiful place. We absolutely love it here. It has room for us to entertain guests, room for us to both be working and doing things in the apartment at the same time without getting on each others nerves or in each others way. And to make things better, we get terrific breeze, have lots of bright open windows, and a patio we can sit on. And there is even a deck and a pool on the property. That is technically part of the main house that we do not live in, but we will likely share it with whoever is here anyways. So we are excited about it all!

So now, if you were not sure you wanted to come visit us before, you will be now. So please, go through our photos and enjoy your virtual tour!  🙂

Patio

This is our front porch patio

Then we have our backyard – the fruit trees and flowers we see while sitting on our porch.

backyardSome of the Fruit Trees

Then we walk to the fence and see the Bay we live on. Just look at all those boats parked in our backyard.

our backyard - the baylook at these boats in our backyard

Alright, lets take a look inside. This is the kitchen.

This is our Kitchen

And here is a view of the dining room with the kitchen in the background and with the living room in the background.

dining roomdining and living room

Then we will move to the living room. Just look at all that seating. And our beautiful map of course on the wall. That white table will be my first big painting project, but more on that later.

Living RoomCouch and Map

And we must show off the lovely little shelf unit with all of our fun stuff we have collected. This part of the apartment provides all of the color and character. And yes, we are in love with that painting. This is also where the majority of our Grenada stuff is.

Our ShelfSome of our favorite things

Now lets move to the other room. This is our bedroom/office. First lets look at the desk. So excited to have such a nice dedicated work and study space.

Desk

Now here is a view of our bed and the sweet little couch and shelving unit in our room.

Bedroomsecond couch and shelf

And of course here is my personal favorite, the huge closet! I know, looks small to you. But this is about 3x the space I had before.

closet

And the last room on the tour is the bathroom. I was so excited to put up the shower curtain I got for my bridal shower – it is so much better than what was up when we moved in.

BathroomBathroom Part 2

And that concludes our tour. We love our new apartment so much. We love having extra space and we love that we were able to make it so homey. I mean the curtains are a little ugly and the couches have an interesting patterns that we just pretend isn’t there (hence the use of colorful stripped pillows anyways). We love it. And I am becoming more and more obsessed with finding little projects to help make it look a little better by adding small touches. Can’t wait to see with a whole apartment filled with all my own stuff where I can paint walls and furniture to my hearts content. One day!  🙂

 

Article
July 26, 2011
by Stefanie Paulson

Foursquare, Food Trucks, and Filling up Suitcases

Barnsdall Art Park

Tyler and I decided this past month that we needed to get in as much “LA” as possible. We figure the LA chapter of our lives is closing and we are quite undecided on if it will ever really be reopened again so we figured it was the perfect time to take in all LA had to offer. This meant getting involved with a an awesome church in Hollywood, Basileia, stalking the local LA food trucks on Twitter, and a new obsession with Foursquare that led us to going to the same indie coffee shop 3 times in one week just to unlock our “Local” badge.

We kicked it all off with an outdoor wine tasting and gourmet food truck event at the Barnsdall Art Park. The picturesque Hollywood view from up there was fantastic and the wine wasn’t so bad either. I am pretty sure our obsessive food truck stalking began here as we discovered how purely awesome they are.

For the 4th of July we decided that hiking Echo Mountain to watch the fireworks throughout the whole LA basin sounded like the perfect way to spend the night.So despite the triple digit temps that weekend, we along with some friends packed a sweet group picnic and made the journey.

As our food truck obsession grew, we found ourselves going to strange intersections in Downtown in search of our favorites or even going to the hip and trendy Santa Monica bar just to get our beloved sandwich. Our favorites quickly became the Munchie Machine, The Grilled Cheese Truck, and Lake Street Creamery.

The ice cream truck was naturally my favorite. But when Tyler found out that the ice cream truck had a special called “The Homer” and when they tweeted back to him with a “hells ya!” that it was available, he was all over that pink-frosted, sprinkle-topped, donut ice cream magic. Tyler’s personal favorite is the grilled cheese truck. The idea of anything grilled and melted between bread and cheese pretty much makes him happy. We have stalked it the most and it is hard to argue with the delicious sounding specials they make all the time. Our first encounter with this truck we got a Pepperbelly Melt that was filled with chili and fritos baked on jalapeno bread.

Our more nerdy obsession with Foursquare developed as I came to learn of its pure awesomeness. So we have spent the better part of this last month acquiring Foursquare points, which really don’t mean to much except that you are awesome and nerdy, and seeking after Foursquare badges for our explorative travels. All I can say is that we love being nerdy together and we enjoy the BFF bonuses we get for checking in together so often.

But alas, this has all really been a tribute to the fact that we are leaving in just 5 days. Pictures like this one have been flooding our friend’s Facebook feeds as we try and get rid of extra stuff we have lying around the apartment that we can’t store and can’t take. I am sure our friends think we are a little strange, but we just want our perfectly good stuff to find some good homes.

Our apartment right now is a bit of a battle ground. The battle over what stays and what goes, what to pack and what to store and what to just trash. There are piles and half-filled suitcases and storage bins everywhere. It’s difficult, but in some ways it is oddly rejuvenating to simplify and start over.

We both feel as though our biggest hope is that we will feel connected quickly. That we will find a home and find a community in Grenada. It took us a while to get settled in Pasadena and it is always a challenge to build a new life. We know that finding friends, finding community to dig into, finding a church to grow in, and finding a local hang-out or two where we can work and relax are much needed things for us. School and work cannot be our only lives on that island. Our hearts really pray that we will establish a home, that we will find meaningful relationships and community and that our relationship will stay strong in the process. That we can love and support each other and that we will be strong against the stress of it all.

I don’t think there could be anything more exciting for the both of us to undertake together. We are truly starting our lives, our family together as we step out in faith on this adventure. We ask for your prayer and your support and hope that you will be with us through the journey. We look forward to sharing all the many fun and ridiculous stories that are sure to come out of this.