New Year, New Home.

They say that the New Year is a time of new beginnings. To start off the New Year, we made the decision to make a big change in our lives and put in an offer for a new apartment!

Leaving is always a bit bittersweet. I will miss the pine floors, the Victorian details, the corner windows, the quirks and the light of this place. I will miss the memories we made here and I will miss the community we formed with our neighbors. I will miss our current neighborhood to be sure.

But I won't miss Molly crawling over me each morning to get out of bed, the constant breaking of glasses and bowls from the slightest movement near little dish rack, the minuscule sink, and the barreling of big trucks down St. Marks in the early morning/late night hours to god-knows-where.

We're ready for this move, and we're much better researched than last fall, when a week after our wedding, heady and stuffed with wedding money, we rashly moved to a neighborhood where we hadn't even spent a day in prior!

We are moving to a new world for sure. Ditmas feels almost like suburbia, with its rows of freestanding early 1900s homes (with driveways, even!) and old-growth trees. While it doesn't have the amenities of Park Slope/Prospect Heights, and adds anywhere from 10-13 minutes to our commutes west, the neighborhood is cheerful and passes muster (some nice restaurants and bars, and more opening), our money goes so much further, and we are so excited for our 875 sq ft space in a 1935 Art Deco mid-rise!

I will post more about the new apartment soon, but it has amazing southern light, a tasteful kitchen with a full-sized refrigerator and stove (egads!) and a lovely eating nook (for Ms. Molly), a bigger tub (6 inches longer and 4 inches deeper but who's counting?),  a huge living room original parquet with a border inlay, a bedroom so big I don't know what we'll do with it, and best of all, a series of quasi-Moorish 1930s arches framing all the rooms. We're both a bit worried about the increased monthlies, but hoping that we can rise to the challenge. Cheers!

The living room, looking into the hallway and kitchen. Arches galore!