Four Years Of Marriage & An Upstate Adventure

Last Wednesday, Daniel and I celebrated our four year wedding anniversary. FOUR YEARS, folks. FOUR. That's a solid chunk of time. I mean, have you met a four-year-old before? Those things can talk and walk and count to ten and sing every verse of "You Are My Sunshine." Take any four-year-old child born on August 19, 2011, and that's basically the human embodiment of our marriage. We are growing up so fast!

To celebrate this huge achievement of still liking each other, we did the thing we love to do. We went north. 

To upstate New York, of course. Ah, upstate New York, why are you so beautiful? Why are your antique shops so cute and your people so nice and your mountains so majestic? And why is your real estate so tantalizingly reasonable, so much so that I allow myself to fantasize about buying a house in one of your charming little towns and opening a bed & breakfast even though I am not particularly hospitable and I don't like strangers in my home?

Needless to say, we love going upstate. Over the years, cabin trips have sort of become our thing. We do them maybe more than we should, or maybe we don't do them enough, I can't decide. When we travel upstate (usually just 2 hours north to the Catskills Mountains), I become a different person. I am Catskill Christy, if you will. Catskill Christy doesn't wear a stitch of makeup. She eats a lot of cheese and drinks a lot of red wine. She can't stop singing Dixie Chicks songs, particularly the song "Wide Open Spaces." She only briefly logs onto Instagram to post a picture of a river or something, but then after that, she turns her phone on airplane mode and is totally engaged in the world around her. Once an hour, she looks at a mountain and she sighs and says something like, "Just look at this place. God is so good," and then she eats more cheese. Catskill Christy eats so much GD cheese.

Also, ice cream.

On this particular occasion, Catskill Christy and Daniel (he's the same good-natured person wherever he goes, so he doesn't need a Catskill persona) went to a little town called Narrowsburg. Back in November, we traveled to this very same place for Thanksgiving. Since we drove up during a terrifying blizzard, we remember that trip as the time we narrowly cheated death. I'll never forget driving up a hill of ice, certain that I was about to meet Jesus. Honestly, though, our near-death experience was totally worth it because THIS is what greeted us upon our arrival:

Meet The Cutest Little House in Narrowsburg (it's actual title on Airbnb). We loved our stay at this place so much that we agreed we would have to come back and see what it was like in the summer. We'd heard there was a swimming hole nearby, and given the fact that neither of us could even picture what a swimming hole was (we assumed it was a hole filled with water, but how deep? how wide? how many snakes?), we figured we'd need to see it for ourselves. For the record, in the summer, The Cutest Little House in Narrowsburg looks like this:

I've got a hunch it's cute in any season.

While in Narrowsburg, we did some antiquing and for a moment I genuinely considered creating an Instagram store with all of my favorite vintage clothing and oddities (jk lol no but srsly would you buy things from me? I have good taste maybeeeee).

We also did some mountain-hiking, some river-splashing, some steak-cooking, some fire sitting-bying, some premixed margarita-drinking, a hefty amount of cheese-eating, and some boggle-playing (and for me, specifically, some boggle-dominating).

On our way back home, we stopped at Storm King Art Center, which is a huge -- no, I mean, HUGE -- sculpture park. Actually, scrap whatever mental image you've conjured up after hearing the words "huge sculpture park" because I promise you it's not good enough, and just feast your eyeballs on all of THIS:

Seriously, Storm King had me at hello. While we were there, I actually discovered that I had a TICK on my arm, sucking all of the life force out of me, and even so I still could not stop feeling like the luckiest kid in the world (We removed the tick. Everything is fine). I can't wait to return to take pictures that don't include my frightening tan lines. 

While I love so many things about these little getaways, the best part by far is getting to spend them with my favorite travel buddy, Daniel. Did I mention he and I have been married for four years? Well, we have, and they've been four of the coolest years I could imagine, full of adventure and friendship and laughter.

Four years ago, before we got married, I remember mentally preparing for hard times. It's what a lot of well-intentioned people warn you about as you enter into marriage. And sure, those times creep up every once in a while because life is life and life is tough. But honestly, at it's best, I think marriage can just be easy. It's something I feel like Daniel has always understood. When he proposed to me, I remember very little about what he actually said because, well, my brain was exploding, but one thing I do remember him saying was this: "I can't wait to sing in the car with you for the rest of my life." On these trips upstate, that's exactly what we do. We crank up some 90s country music, we sing, we laugh, we eat chips. Easy. 

So here's to vacations, A+ husbands, and easy, easy love!

Four more years! Four more years!

How to Use Airbnb Like A Pro

If you frequent this blog, you may know that I have a well-documented love for Airbnb. Through this wondrous network of home-away-from-homes, I've been able to snuggle up in cabins in upstate New York, attend Alt Summit without having to share a room with five other women, and even find affordable accommodations for my recent trip to Europe. I've also regularly used Airbnb for when I have visitors here in NYC because, for some reason, my parents don't want to sleep on my IKEA sectional couch (I mean, seriously, what's that about?).

If you ask me, Airbnb is the best way to go when it comes to finding the right place to stay. It's cheaper, it's homier, the hosts are wonderful, and it's just a convenient, solid system for making travel easier. I use it so regularly that I actually can't remember the last time I stayed in a hotel.

That being said, since I've been around the Airbnb block a few times, I thought I'd share with you today some of my tips and tricks for booking the best possible experience. Let's do this.

Know what you want

Do you want the whole place to yourself? Is it important for you to have a washer/dryer? Would you like to stay in a treehouse or a riverboat? If you have specific requests, Airbnb does a good job of helping you sort out the listings that just aren't going to work for you. After entering in your dates and location, you can always choose the More Filters option. From there, you can click through a series of checkboxes or even plug in a keyword (e.g. king size bed, beachfront, movie theater on site). Pro tip: If you are traveling somewhere woodsy, wifi is not a given, so filter your search to make sure that you don't end up in a cabin somewhere without any access to Orange Is The New Black.

Don't dismiss private rooms

In terms of room type, you probably know that you have three options to choose from: Entire Place (you get the whole kit-n-kaboodle to yourself), Private Room (you stay in a room where your host will be on site), and Shared Room (you share a room with another human being). As a certified introvert, I always swore that I would never choose any option besides Entire Place. I just didn't like the idea of someone else being around while I hung out in their digs. But while booking a trip to Salt Lake City, I noticed that there were a lot of private rooms available for crazy cheap (like $30 a night) that looked really great. I booked one, and man oh man, it was fabulous. My host was a dream. She didn't ask overly personal questions, walk in on me in the bathroom, or hover over my bed a la The Exorcist. She just chilled and answered my questions whenever I had them. I had a private entrance, so it was basically like staying in a hotel room, only super cheap and actually much nicer. All of that to say: even if you're a total loner, a private room might still be a good deal for you.

Read the fine print

Some hosts go to great lengths to describe their listing. Some don't. I often steer clear of the ones that don't because I like to be well-informed of what I'm getting into. But I also look for certain red flags, too. For instance, when a host says, "We LOVE making new friends and we hope you will take some time during your visit to sit down with us, have a scone, and tell us your story" -- that's a big ole NOPE for me. If you're into that sort of thing, go for it, but for me, that's just not my bag. Instead, I look for a host that says, "We enjoy hosting our guests, and while we are always available to answer questions, our aim is to respect your privacy." Sign me up for that. Also, be aware of their cancelation policy or if they have weird house rules (A curfew? Am I 17?).

If your dates are flexible, be flexible

Just like a hotel, Airbnb listings often have a high and a low season, so rates are subject to change depending on the month or even the day of the week. Take a look at the calendar on listings to see the availability and cost of each day. You know, be smart.

Read reviews

Reviews are at the heart of what makes Airbnb great. For one, they hold hosts and guests accountable. Knowing that you are subject to a review process makes you far more likely to be on your best behavior. But for another, they give great insight into what's really going on. A host description could be like, "I have the best house in the world. Two bedrooms. Two bathrooms. Close to shops. No ghosts or ghouls of any kind, I swear" but then you read the reviews and they are like, "The toilet was broken the entire time I was there, and dude, there were SO. MANY. GHOSTS. If that's an issue for you, don't stay here." (For the record, this is just an example, but man, I kind of wish it were real). Take interest in what a host says about their place, but put your trust in reviews.

Introduce yourself

When you've found a place you love, reach out to the host to say "hello" and make sure they have availability. Be nice, complementary, say what your travels plans are, use proper grammar -- just be a decent human being. Many hosts run their Airbnb listing as a business, but at the same time, they are also welcoming perfect strangers into their home which can be a vulnerable position to be in. Put their mind at ease by showing them you are a considerate person, and you will be far more likely to be approved.

Be a superstar guest

Hosts aren't the only ones who receive a review on Airbnb. Guests do too. Think about that before you clog someone's toilet or crank Metallica at 3 AM. In my most recent experience, my hosts only approved people with one or more reviews, and they said they were most impressed with the ones I had received. Not to brag, but I'm kind of the perfect guest. I tidy up, I say please and thank you, I don't scream in my sleep. I basically just act like a decent human being and all seems to go fairly well. Do the same thing and hosts will be far more likely to trust you to take care of their homes.

Now that you know how to be the best Airbnb user possible, it might be time to finally give it a try! Here's $20 from me to you to use on your first Airbnb adventure!

Have you used Airbnb? What are some of your tips for having the best possible experience?

Adventures in London and Paris

This week, I'm back from a beautiful, lengthy, and probably totally undeserved European vacation. Did you miss me? It's cool if you didn't. You had a lot going on, I'm sure.

But in case you happen to care even a little bit, just know that my hubs and I had a crazy good time. It truly was the best trip of my life, unforgettable in so many ways, and yet now that we are back, it feels like it was all a dream. Did we really just spend eleven days drinking wine, eating cheese, and putting our eyeballs on some of the most beautiful architecture and art this world has ever known? Did we really walk over 100 miles across Europe in shoes from Payless? Did we really eat pig's feet and LOVE it?

We really did, folks.

Going into this trip, we really had no expectations because -- and don't be mad at us for this -- we didn't exactly make any plans. Besides booking the sites of our AirBnb residences in London and Paris, we really didn't come in with any sense of what we were going to see. We didn't learn French. We didn't buy a guidebook. We just sort of...winged it.

Wait, sorry, that's not entirely true. We had a lot of helpful suggestions from our friends. Like, A LOT actually. Shout out to Jess, Jo, and Aaron (who made us an interactive MAP! I mean, are you kidding me, bro? Talk about generosity). We basically would have mistakenly wandered into brothels had it not been for you three. Instead, we knowingly wandered into places like this:

But apart from our friend's suggestions, we wanted a sense of spontaneity to our trip. Here's how things went down: we flew into London (Gatwick Airport, to be specific), stayed there for about three days, took a train to Paris, stuck around there for about four days (plus a quick jaunt to Versailles), and then traveled back to London where we stayed for another three days. We lived in AirBnbs, sometimes with hosts, sometimes without. We did some touristy things. We did some less touristy things. We consumed a hearty English breakfast, various cheeses, onion soup, crepes, croissants, baguettes, wine (SO. MUCH. WINE.), beer, tea, fish, chips, curry, crumpets, finger sandwiches -- every expected Parisian/English dish imaginable (along with several unexpected ones). We went to museums, parks, cathedrals, and gardens. We saw famous paintings, landmarks, and places where famous dead people are buried.

Anyway, you get the idea, folks -- we did the damn thing.

And now that it's all over, I'm left with the daunting task of detailing the wild tales of our European adventure. In fact, the first thing one of my friends asked me upon our return was, "Did anything crazy happen to you?"

And the honest answer, and potentially disappointing depending on what you're expecting, is that nothing all that crazy happened to us. Things went smoothly (save for one tense moment upon our arrival at the London Bridge station when we couldn't figure out which train to take and the wind was whipping us around and I wondered if the weather in London was always like this Mars hellscape nightmare and if we would ever make it out alive). Really, we just enjoyed ourselves. And each other. And all of the locals. And ALL of their food.

But while I can't offer you a thrilling account of us scaling the side of the Eiffel Tower with our bare hands or meeting Mr. Bean at a nightclub, what I can provide is categorical observations of things we loved throughout our trip. Think of it as an awards ceremony for our vacation. Here goes:

Most jaw-dropping view (London): Sky Garden

Sky Garden is located at the top of 20 Fenchurch, which sorry London, but that building looks like a giant melting toaster oven. At the top, however, it's absolutely breathtaking. I mean, hello, it's a garden...in the sky. But actually, don't get too excited about the garden portion of it. It's basically filled with a bunch of nondescript plants that you could find in any mall in America. BUT the views are seriously top notch. Just magical, really. Thanks to our London-based friend, Jo, who gave us the heads up about this place (aaaand who basically planned the last half of our trip for us)!

Most jaw-dropping view (Paris): Pompidou Center

Of course, the Sacré Coeur, which is clearly visible in this photo taken from Centre Pompidou, also has some insane views. Basically, there are plenty of places to get high in Paris.

Tastiest dish (London): Okra Fries at Dishoom

I haven't been able to get these out of my head, and I WILL have them again.

Tastiest dish (Paris): Quiche at L'Eté en Pente Douce

I didn't take a picture of this because I ate it. Quickly. After walking the steps up to the Sacré-Coeur on our first night in Paris, I was famished, hangry, and ready to eat my own thumb. Then I was served this quiche, and who even knows if it was actually any good, but at the time it was the best thing I'd ever eaten.

Favorite area (London): Shoreditch

When we told our AirBnb host that we were going to spend the day in Shoreditch, she laughed. She said that she typically has two types of guests: people who go to Piccadilly Circus and people who go to Shoreditch. For the uninitiated, Piccadilly Circus could be compared to a place like Times Square and Shoreditch could be compared to some trendy neighborhood like Williamsburg. But man, this place kicked it up a notch, hipness-wise. Every single storefront we passed was just so. damn. cute. We especially loved coming upon the above bookstore on a BOAT!

Favorite area (Paris): St. Martin Canal

This was our hood in Paris, and man, I'm so glad it was. Definitely off-the-beaten path, away from tourists and full of beauty and local flavor. Also, restaurants on boats. I'm finding that I really like when businesses are on boats.

Happiest surprise (London): The availability of prawns

First, a linguistics lesson: in England, they call shrimp "prawns." In retrospect, I have no idea what word they use for our version of prawns. Probably "wigglies" or something similarly whimsical. But anyway, you can straight up buy precooked prawns (or shrimp, AKA my favorite food) as a snack for next to nothing. It's like getting a small container of grapes or celery sticks or crackers only it's SHRIMP, and it's delicious. This was the first thing I ate at Gatwick Airport upon arrival at an establishment reminiscent of a CVS, and my brain basically exploded. I feel like Americans need to get over our unwarranted fears of expired shellfish.

Happiest surprise (Paris): The people

Whenever I've heard people accuse the French of being rude, I have always rolled my eyes. I am of the belief that shitty people and wonderful people exist EVERYWHERE (I've met both wherever I've lived) and that they are not simply relegated to certain areas. That being said, as a person of pride, I must confess that I was a bit worried that my theory wouldn't hold up. Rest assured, though, that the people of France were positively lovely to us. As I fumbled through limited French, no one ever made me feel like a jerk. I received smiles and help whenever I needed it. Lay off the French, guys.

Best overall metro system: Paris

It was hard to go back to the freaking MTA here in NYC after my experience in both Paris and London. But I've got to give it up to Paris for its ease, comfort, and lack of a rush hour.

Best overall goats: These goats just looking for some shade at Luxembourg Gardens

Sorry, London. Paris won this one too.

Best best BEST thing overall: Versailles

I mean, look at that, guys. This place was heaven. I won't even try to dignify the experience of Versailles with fruitless words. Here's more pictures instead:

City I would choose to live in: London...no wait...Paris...no...hold up...

Probably neither, honestly. I'd miss drip coffee too much. But man, it's fun to dream.

I honestly haven't even begun to scratch the surface here, and perhaps this warrants a future blog post, but you get the picture: we had fun. Copious amounts of fun. And now I'm home, and I just wish I could go to my local deli and pick up some prawns.

Are you dreaming of a big, fat vacation?
Where would you go if you could travel anywhere right now?

My New Obsessions: Cabins & Unplugging

It's possible that I have a new addiction, one for which I have no intention of ever seeking recovery. My name is Christy, and I'm addicted to cabins. Small, quaint, beautiful cabins tucked away in unassuming villages in the mountains. 

You may remember that a few months back, Daniel and I went on a spur of the moment trip to a cottage in a town called Accord in upstate New York. Last week, we got that same familiar itch to escape for a bit, so we packed up only the essentials and drove to Camp Tremper, a quiet oasis that I had discovered on AirBnb just one day before. That's her up there with the red door. Ain't she a beaut?

Our reasons for this trip were many, but let's get to those in a bit. First take a look at our digs (apologies for the grainy picture quality):

Crates used as side tables, shelves equipped with camping essentials, a simple decorative rug, and that was basically it. I loved the sparse nature of this cabin, providing only what was needed. Minimalism is a design element that I rarely incorporate into my own home decor. My design aesthetic usually involves shelves stacked high with too many books, walls covered in trinkets from too many trips to flea markets, cat pictures, dinosaurs, unplayed guitars, paintings I started and never finished, and awkward furniture to bump my knees on.

That's the usual chaos I welcome into my home, so this empty cabin kind of felt like being pulled from the rubble of a hoarder nightmare. It was simple and splendid, as was this sweet spot where we ate breakfast every day:

We woke up naturally each morning, no alarms or roosters or anything to rouse us. I would be up first to make some coffee in a french press (a thing I don't do at home, but I really want to start) and plate some pastries that we had gotten at a local bakery the day before. When Daniel woke up, I beamed with pride as I told him that breakfast was waiting for him on the porch, as though I had slaved away refining the flour and churning the butter to make these store-bought pastries possible. 

After breakfast, we would set about either relaxing or pursuing creative endeavors. Daniel made zucchini pizzas. I wrote a story about a man who finds himself in a far away galaxy on a planet in which nearly every convention of earth is replicated except that there are giant caterpillars living on top of mountains. 

And then after all of that, we would explore.

We went to a nearby town called "Woodstock", famous for some something that happened in the 1960s. Something to do with music, peace & love, or whatever. Who even knows anymore.

At the end of each day, we would come home to our little nature haven, cook a simple dinner, drink a great deal of wine, and play a game. The first night it was Trivial Pursuit, a version from 1980 that our AirBnb hosts had provided. We knew almost none of the answers, and it was hilarious. The next night we tried to invent a game called "Gypsies, Tramps, and Thieves" but all we could come up with was the title. Again, we'd had some wine.

So why did we take this trip? Why did we feel compelled to leave New York City suddenly, smack dab in the middle of the week, to drink wine and play Gypsies, Tramps, and Thieves? Well, for one thing, we did it because we could do it. Daniel has been on summer break, and of course, freelance life is always pretty flexible on my end. A last-minute trip to a cabin in the mountains seemed totally doable for us. But the main reason for this trip, at least for me, was a bit more personal, a bit more intentional than just wanting to take a fun vacation.

Here's the deal: lately I have just been feeling a bit anxious. It's a specific kind of anxiety, though, one that is all tied up with life in the digital world. My laptop, my phone, Twitter, Facebook, Buzzfeed, even blogging -- it's all been making me kind of sick. I'm feeling way too plugged in, too connected, too notified. 

While I know that cyber sickness is not uncommon, this has just been a surprisingly difficult season of it. Instead of being amused by my Twitter feed or my notifications, I've been finding myself rather alarmed by them. It's not just that there is bad news out there right now (though seriously, these past two weeks have been a shit storm of horrific news). It's more that I've just felt this unnerving pressure associated with all of it. Perhaps some of this can be attributed to the fact that I've been writing weekly culture pieces, and to prep, I scour Twitter for content to write about. I feel like a zombie in an obsessive search for one human brain in a sea of the undead. Twitter is a really weird place guys. 

Whatever the case, last week I just got really fed up with the Internet and my life's connection to it. We went to the mountains, I shut off my phone, and you know what, I could breathe again.

My mind is still pretty unprocessed about this whole thing. These days, I seem to only be able to think in caveman-like grunts: Social media BAD, mountains GOOD, phone NECESSARY, computer ALSO NECESSARY. While exploring mountain life with my hubs was an awesome refresher, it wasn't a totally realistic picture of my actual life. For me, in my line of work, in doing this thing that I am so very lucky to be able to do, having an online presence is just an inevitability. I need to strike a healthy balance.

Perhaps if you are reading this, you might be thinking that this is all kind of silly. I mean, who cares, right? Shut off your computer when it's making you stressed, and stop worrying so much, geez. 

And I wish it could be that simple, and maybe it is, but I am just not there yet. That's why, at the very least, I'm thankful for AirBnb, mountains, and Camp Tremper.

Do you ever get social media sickness? How do you handle it?