#mint green wishbone chairs | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

la-appel-du-vide · 2 months ago

Text

12•25•24 - Christmas 2024

Christmas starts bright and early for us, so we can do our own family gifts before going over to mom's! We were up and stuffing stockings at 6:30, and leaving crumbs from the cookies Reef left out for Santa Paws. <3 It's always fun to go wake him up on Christmas morning. He doesn't understand exactly what it is, but he knows that there is something up, and he seems to feel the excitement just as much as we do! We went through his stocking first - he got some chicken meatballs, a rubber fetch stick, a new collar (still red and black checkered), a pretzel rope, a box of milk and cookie treats for dogs, and some little Blue Buffalo festive snacks. He tried at least one of each treat, and got right into chewing on everything that came out of it haha.

Then we did B's stocking! He got his new favorite protein bars, Reese's cups and trees, some Chomps meat sticks, Lindor mint truffles, Mentos holiday gum, Altoids, Pokemon cards, Aquaphor lip repair, Burt's Bees holiday set, Gold Bond healing lotion, Bath and Body works body wash, a Carhartt beanie, a golf club cleaning scrub brush, some golf ball towels, car cleaning gel, and a Utah State golf ball marker! Plus a Broncos bookmark and a phases of the moon bookmark that I forgot to put in there, so he got those a couple days late.

In my stocking, I got AirHead extremes, Reese's pieces, Santa shaped Twix, frosty Nerds, mini M&M's, a gold bow photo holder, a pink Nice Cube by NeeDoh, a Starbucks gift card, a scalp scrub brush, some cloud shaped box cutters, a Nintendo gift card, three Touchland hand sanitizers, a ballet themed Baggu reusable bag, a pink iPhone cord to use in the Jeep, and a Black Cherry Sparkling Ice, wrapped in a pretty green bow. Honestly, stocking stuffers are SO fun, and one of my favorite parts of Christmas.

Then we got right into opening presents. I love doing Christmas with just our little family. Reef is excited to open his gifts, and excited to play with all the wrapping from everyone else's. It's such chaos, but so much fun. We go one at a time, from Reef to B to me. Reef got a giant stuffed carrot, a new puzzle toy, a crinkly gingerbread man, a peppermint frisbee, a wishbone chew, and a tough gingerbread man toy. Later, we brought his gift from Winston home for him to open too, and he got some peanut butter rawhide type bones, another wishbone hard chew, and a fish bone hard chew. He's spoiled rotten for real, and he still liked playing with the boxes and paper just as much as any of his toys haha. Plus, we got a dusting of snow overnight, so Reef got his wish for a white Christmas!

B got a brown leather jacket with a black hood from Reef, as well as a Broncos t-shirt from Abercrombie that Reef tried to correct to be a Chiefs shirt, since he doesn't understand that B cheers for a different team than him hahah. All silliness. He also got a new golf bag with individual club slots, a new toiletry bag for travel, a Dune ornithopter Lego set, a record player Lego set, a dark brown Abercrombie hoodie, Pop Tarts (lol), and a Steam Deck! The Steam Deck was totally out of left field, just an idea I saw on TikTok. I was nervous the whole time I was thinking about doing it, but I got some input from his sister and decided to just send it. He'd never mentioned it, but I know he loves playing his Steam games on the computer, and I figured this would make it easier to do it. He ended up being really excited about it, which is exactly what I was hoping for!

Reef gave me a 2025 calendar that is just 365 photos of him haha, and it will be so cute. I also got a pink Kindle Paperwhite with three adorable cases (pink picnic blanket plaid, a Pink Pony Club inspired one, and clementines!), a 2025 Rifle Paper planner, a new oversized chaise lounge chair for reading/cozy activities (I'm so happy, it's going to be amazing), the cutest playing card pack from Rifle Paper, and Ashley Tisdale and Conan Gray vinyl records! That night, B realized he'd also forgotten two of my gifts which were ornaments he'd hidden on the tree! One was a renewed subscription for flowers of the month, and one was Lagoon season passes for us this year! I'm so excited! B did so good, I'm so blessed and happy!

After our little Christmas morning, we changed pajamas into my family's and then went to mom's house! We had Christmas breakfast - German pancakes (my favorite part), sausage, eggs, Jimmy Dean breakfast sandwiches, toaster strudel, hot chocolate.... it's a fantastic spread.

Then we started opening presents with those who were there - Aub and Ty came a bit late, but made it in time to catch at least half. We worked together to bring mom and dad stockings this year, since for some reason, they've never had stockings of their own! I filled them with their favorite treats, some fuzzy socks, Swig/Fiiz gift cards, a Kohls gift card for mom, golf club grips for dad, Raiders balls/frustrated golfer socks/ball towels for dad, Tree Hut body scrub for mom, touchland sanitizer for mom, hair clips and lotion for mom... that was fun. I'm glad we did it. They deserve it!

I gave Mom tickets to Wicked when it comes to the Eccles Center in SLC this Spring and Othello, which is a game I always used to play with Grandma. I gave Dad a towel warmer - which is another one I was nervous about. I figured he'd either be excited about using it because he's cold all the time, or think it was dumb and not even open it. So far, he's seeming to enjoy it! I'll call that a win. I gave Isaac a jigsaw for his home projects, and Allyssa a Beis dopp kit for a trip they're planning next year. I gave Aub a Baggu black bag, a Tree Hut body scrub, and some Hot Girls Read bookmarks. I gave Whit some stickers from our three Eras shows together, with all the outfits Taylor wore for each show on each night! She was excited about those, so that was cute. I also gave her tickets to Kelsea Ballerini for her tour in March. Allyssa gave me some black and white checkered earrings. Whit gave me (later) a Taylor Swift book themed Kindle case (so cute! a book for each era!). Mom and Dad gave me a sherpa from Urban Outfitters that I picked out that I'm so excited to wear along with a Paris skyline candle holder and some money to use for an activity between now and next Christmas. Aub gave me a pink VS blanket with red bows on it, some Drunk Elephant glow drops, a VS lip gloss, and a White Fox sweat set that I already wore and love! In my stocking, I also got Target and Barnes and Noble gift cards, chocolate pretzels, and a bag of Sprees. And of course, the boys were spoiled with a million gifts, including a golf club chew stick from Reef, a raccoon and a snowman (soft toys from me that didn't last long), and rawhide bones from Quinn! They're also so good about opening their own presents. Adorable.

B helped Mom pick out everything that Dad would need for an at-home golf simulator, so the boys definitely golfed on that out in the garage a lot of the day. It ended up being a big hit, and I think all the other boys are jealous of the set-up!

And of course, we spent the day learning and playing all of our new games, while snacking on candy, chips, relish trays, fruit, and charcuterie board goodies. We got Concept (not my favorite), Secret Hitler (like werewolf, and so fun), Flip 7 (a great one), Poetry for Neanderthals (hilarious), Shenanigrams (like Scrabble, but you sabotage each other), Everything Ever, Glitch Squad (I like this one), and Dixit! I love that this is how our Christmas days are spent. Cozy, comfy togetherness. Midway through, we brought Reef over for a playdate in the backyard with the other boys too.

We got home late, and cleaned up some of the mess, and then I got my Kindle set-up while B worked on his Steam Deck. It was such a cozy girl Christmas for me, and I couldn't be happier. It's going to be hard to pick which hobbies to spend time on during this break, because there are so many to choose from!

We had Brayden's family Christmas the following Saturday, and we got a new vinyl storage system from his parents, I got a pink Christmas blanket and a Christmas Carol book from Brianna, I got the The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo from his parents, a pink mouse and a Kindle page turner from Ashley, and some Ohuhu markers, Unpacking (a switch game), and some TicTacs from his Grandma.

We did a Secret Santa exchange at work a couple weeks ago, for just the women, and they brought in all kinds of treats and snacks from Gourmandise for the occasion. I love how the whole month of December is filled with fun, and how there is something to look forward to even on normal work days. I got some Pilates socks embroidered with pink bows and gold bow earrings!

I also participated in a Swiftmas gift exchange this year, with a group of 400 Swifties! I sent my girl a Jo & Co All Too Well necklace, some friendship bracelets, and some Taylor stickers. I received a Speak Now TV music book! That was a fun thing to try out, and I'd for sure do it again!

I'm already experiencing the post-Christmas sadness, but being away from work is the upside. I'm hoping to have a productive time off, and get ready to start a fresh new year!

Luckily, we know Christmas will always come back, and that's something to hold onto. Thanks, Ghost of Christmas Present 2024. You were a lovely one. <3

0 notes

reneeacaseyfl · 6 years ago

Text

Restaurant Review: Elysian Bar | Fortune

The Elysian Bar in New Orleans’ Marigny neighborhood occupies the 150-year-old rectory of Saints Peter & Paul. Set behind a gated garden of pygmy palms, the building is an inviting confection of brick and marzipan stucco. I don’t so much walk through the arched doorway as a magnetizing presence inside summons me forth, the single gas lantern flickering above my head like biblical tongues.

A long hallway stretches down the first floor of the former clergy quarters. There’s a snug coffee bar to the right. Two adjoining parlors to the left are lit and furnished for the sequel to Interview With the Vampire: ornately mantled fireplaces, cane chairs with crimson cushions, marble tables with legs shaped like sea serpents, eruptions of ferns and blood-purple flowers, body-length gold mirrors, bustled and billowing mustard drapes framing a burgundy gingham sofa like a theater stage. The dreamy space feels less like a restaurant than an exclusive house party you were invited to by mistake or as a cruel joke.

I pause by the entrance near a stack of menus, waiting for a host. There’s one on staff (management confirms later) but none appears, so I walk down the hallway. It’s difficult to tell the staff from the diners, but no one says hi or can I help you, so I keep going. The hall opens into a sunroom modeled after Monet’s dining room in Giverny, France. One door leads out to a brick courtyard, guarded by stained-glass saints watching from the 24-foot windows. Another doorway connects to the moody vermilion bar, whose cocktail menu showcases a grand tour of vermouths, including an Athenian rouge that smells like a bowl of vanilla and roses. I wait 10 minutes. Neither of the bartenders acknowledges me.

Hotel Peter and Paul’s rectory parlor. Courtesy of Hotel Peter and Paul

I backtrack to the foyer, where someone tells me to sit anywhere and “a server will be right over.” A server does not come right over. Then two do, a moment apart. The first takes my drink order and the second takes my food order, as if they were cocktail waitresses absentmindedly wandering the Harrah’s casino floor. Then Martha Wiggins materializes alongside my table, bearing a bowl of grilled okra and crispy, rice-floured-and-fried eggplant lashed with harissa, and the night starts looking up.

Rebirth

After she became a Popsicle tycoon but before she was a hotelier, People’s Pops founder Nathalie Jordi would pass the Peter & Paul compound—the schoolhouse, the rectory, the church, the convent—all closed more than a decade before she relocated to New Orleans from Brooklyn in 2009. “These buildings tower over the neighborhood,” she says. “They were dark and gloomy but still very beautiful.”

Jordi wanted to open a hotel in Marigny, but “much smaller and more modest” than the 71-key situation she wound up with: “I was aware of the [Peter & Paul buildings] but they just seemed out of my league because they were so big and required so much expensive renovation.” Partnering with design firm ASH NYC (the Dean in Providence, the Siren in Detroit) made the $20 million, four-year rehabilitation possible, and the Hotel Peter & Paul opened in October. The Elysian Bar, which is managed by the folks behind the Bywater smash Bacchanal, debuted a month later.

I wake up in a wrought-iron canopy bed, in an attractively monastic room at the foot of a dramatic wishbone-shaped cypress staircase in the old schoolhouse, thinking about that eggplant and okra. The tender vegetables were shellacked in fragrant, feisty pepper paste. Crème fraîche, fennel, and mint countered with cool touches. Black sesame seeds, whole cumin seeds, and peanuts made every bite crunch like Cracker Jacks.

The Elysian Bar inside Hotel Peter and Paul. Courtesy of Hotel Peter and Paul

Martha Wiggins, deliverer of the dish, is the chef de cuisine to Alex Harrell’s executive chef, and the two go way back. They cooked together at Sylvain and Angeline and have resumed their easy two-step at Elysian Bar, banging out an all-day menu featuring Southern produce and proteins on an international vacation. Huge, sweet, head-on prawns were plucked from the gulf, roasted, and bathed in fruity-hot Calabrian chile butter. Lacto-fermented corn blew up a mild-mannered cucumber salad with mini explosions of sugar, salt, and funk.

The grits were best I’ve eaten, a strain of red corn grown and dried by the Alabama coast, milled at Bellegarde Bakery in New Orleans, and finally simmered with milk and cream into a porridge as silky and beige as cappuccino foam. They came topped with a perfect poached egg, frizzled shallots, and mushrooms suspended in a barbecue-y tomato sauce, all delicious but ultimately unnecessary. These grits stand alone.

Laissez-faire

Elysian Bar’s eerie evening glamour abates in the sunlight. At 8:30 in the morning, when I shuffle across the hotel courtyard into the restaurant, the place feels like a mansion museum before the docents have arrived. There are no customers and no breakfast besides baked goods at the twee coffee bar—strange for a hotel restaurant. “The menu starts at 10:30,” says a dour barista, passing a cup of Congregation Coffee across the counter. She looks like she needs it more than I do.

I take the coffee for a walk around Marigny, where the houses are taffy-colored and the sidewalks cracked like Kit Kats. Trees turn whole blocks into canopied tunnels of greenery, and the air is thick with humidity and magnolias. There are worse places to wait for a restaurant to open.

I head back into Elysian Bar at 11 a.m. and, just like at dinner, there’s no staff to direct me. I wander into the sunroom, by daylight a country kaleidoscope of lemons and sapphires, and sit down. A server appears to inform me I have to order at the bar, and while I can order now, the kitchen won’t start serving food until 11:30. So I get up from my table, walk into the bar, place (and pay for) my order with the bartender. Nearly an hour later, the server then delivers that order to my table. Confused? Me too.

Inside the cafe at Hotel Peter and Paul. Courtesy of Hotel Peter and Paul

Harrell and Wiggins hold up their end of the deal again. The tannish-gray puck of sunchoke custard looks like something you’d use to grout bathroom tile, but it tastes purely of the creamy, nutty Jerusalem artichokes. A tangle of shaved asparagus, arugula, and radishes tossed in acidic, mustardy vinaigrette surrounds the custard like a green halo. Bourbon creates a subtle undercurrent of sweetness in the exquisite chicken liver pâté. Grilled sliced of wheat-y Bellegarde sourdough and tangy strawberry-beet mostarda accompany, and the three components eaten together harmonize like a choir.

The duck egg omelet is perfect. Made with Mississippi eggs and served with a well-dressed pile of arugula, it’s as yellow as a buttercup, pregnant with rich, runny triple-crème cheese, and not too wet or too dry. Chives and bowfin caviar bead the omelet’s sloping surface, adding balancing pops of salinity and allium heat to each luxurious forkful. I would eat this every day for breakfast and never get bored.

It’s afternoon—literally, after noon—when my “breakfast” is done. I see my server/not-server once during the meal. Because I’ve already paid, I can leave quickly, without saying goodbye.

Many people think the best thing a hotel restaurant can be is not a hotel restaurant. It’s much more valuable to be a place activated by locals, somewhere authentic, with genuinely good food and noncorporate ambiance. Elysian Bar has clearly achieved that. The smart cooking and evocative atmosphere make it a spectacular place to be, but for the guest who wants to belong to another city for one night, to feel welcomed and cared for, it’s only spectacular in how short it falls.