Mounting the TV

Hello Everybody! I hope you all had a good weekend! It snowed here in the DC area, not a lot but enough to keep me indoors. Don't you hate it when the cold gets in the way of plans/productivity? Well, one productive thing that happened over the weekend was that our friends John and Natasha came over to help mount the TV we got for Christmas. Actually, it was more like Justin and John mounted the TV and Natasha and I were there for moral support. Oh, and you can't forget these guys...they were there for moral support as well!

 

 

Here's a shot of Scobey and Louie doing their best sit and Derby being a creeper in the background

 

 

Anyway, I digress...so we got a mount from Amazon for about $50 and was delivered pretty quickly, definitely less than the estimated 5-7 days. The picture instructions seemed pretty straight froward. "Idiot proof" is what Justin called it.

 

Here are some shots of them either opening the box or screwing in the brackets into the back of the TV (I can't really tell)...



 

 

 

 Here's a shot of the brackets they put on the back of the TV... 

 

 

They first installed the wall mount and made sure it was anchored in properly and centered. It really helped that John brought his professional grade tools since I doubt our poor little drill could've handled drilling holes in brick/concrete.

 

 

The cool thing about this particular wall mount is that it has a swinging arm so you can angle the TV towards the kitchen. That way, if I ever want to cook while watching the Food Network  I can totally do so! ;)

 

 

Justin making the final adjustments...excuse the blurry, dream-like nature of these pics...it must've been the lighting...

 

 

And ta-da! A shot of the guys in front of finished product!

 

 

With the addition of our new TV, DirecTV is coming today to bring another receiver as well as install the Genie which allows for multiple, simultaneous recordings of our favorite programs, ready for viewing from any TV in our house. Woohoo! I'm sure that can't be good for our social life. LOL...

 

Although, I had no part in the install of the wall mount it looked pretty easy to do. Or at least the guys made it look easy. Can you believe there are install companies that charge +$100 for this type of service and for us it only cost price of the wall mount. Crazy, huh?

 

Have you ever wall mounted a TV or did you have someone do it for you? Would the size of the TV be a factor in doing it yourself?

Young House Love Book Signing in DC!

Have you ever waited in line for something for hours? The latest iPhone? Concert tickets? I've only waited in a super long line for a few things. One, HFStival tickets, a long time ago when I was in college. Two, for a Christian Louboutin shoe signing where he signed my wedding shoes that an be seen here. And the most recent time I had to wait in a super long line was for the Young House Love Book signing in Washington, DC.

 

Young House Love (YHL) is do-it-yourself/home improvement blog written by a married couple from Richmond, VA. They came to FLOR a few months back to do a book signing of their first book.

 

Here is a shot of where the signing took place. The FLOR store in Georgetown.

 

 

Here's a shot of the winding line outside of the store. Excuse the crappy cell phone shot. Unlike some of the other YHL book signings that were at conventions (i.e.: large spaces), the FLOR store is a converted row house so it obviously couldn't hold that many people--meaning most folks had to wait outside.

 

But not to worry. It wasn't too cold (30-40 degrees, unlike the chilliness we've been experiencing lately)...AND, there was a cookies and milk truck parked outside! I made quite a few trips tasting all of their wares. Their snickerdoodle and chocolate chip cookies were to die for!

 

Unfortunately, right when I made it to the entrance of the store they announced that they had run out of books. Too bad the Barnes & Noble in Georgetown had closed down or else I would have run down the street to get one. Well, since I had already waited 3.5 hours there was no turning back!

 

Here's a shot of me in line right before I got to their table. The FLOR folks were kind enough to take pictures for people that were riding solo like myself.

 

 

When I got to their table I couldn't think of anything cool to say. The girl before me in line had worked on the set of True Blood so I decided to mention my little 15 minutes of fame aka: House Hunters.

 

 

We talked about how it is somewhat staged...

And how that Yahoo article mentioned that some episodes are straight up fake! But what reality tv show is really REAL these days?

 

I look like I'm in deep explanation mode in this picture...

 

 

Anyway, here is the quintessential picture with the authors. I wasn't really star struck per se, but more happy for their success which is why I wanted to come to the event in the first place--to show my support. :)

 

And in lieu of a signed book, they signed a book plate for me to put in the book once I got it. However, I got the book for Christmas, but have yet to put the autograph in it. One of these days...

 

So what about you? Have you ever waited in a long line for anything? What was it and was it worth it?

Doing Some Dining in D.C.

To say that Justin and I have been dining around D.C. might be an understatement. I guess you could even call it pigging out. eek. But it was for a good reason! I had a bunch of daily deal coupons that were on the verge of expiring (leave it to me to wait until the last minute) so we had to use a bunch of them in a short amount of time. First up, Il Capo.

Before I go further, let me just tell you I actually had a coupon for Mi Vecindad for two drinks and two entrees. However, before my coupon expired, management decided to to change the restaurant concept. Instead of Mi Vecindad, a Mexican/Central American joint, it is now Il Capo, an Italian food eatery. Luckily, they still accepted my Mi Vecindad coupon, but we would dining of food other than what I had originally intended. Nevertheless, we decided to give it a shot.

Per the coupon, our meal started off with a margarita. Kind of odd for a new Italian place (I thought they might give us wine instead), but it was good and strong. 

We started off our meal with salad and calamari which were good, but they were nothing special...



For our entrees, I had the clam pasta and Justin had the spaghetti and meatballs. Again, nothing special. Justin and I are pretty picky when it comes to Italian food since it's something we cook ourselves quite often. I personally wish they had stuck with their Latin menu, but since this restaurant is so close to our house, I hope they are able to improve. Il Capo's old incarnation was always able to attract large crowds on their outdoor seating during the summer, so I wonder if they'll be able to get the same large crowds with their new menu.

The next place we tried was Boundary Road on H. St. Again, I had to use another coupon before its expiration and the caveat that came with this coupon was that I could only use it during lunch. On this particular day, I took a half day and picked up Justin from work.

We started off our meal with the lunch-sized portion of the quark (a type of cheese) and black pepper pirogi appetizer. It was delicious! We plowed right through the starter and were glad we opted to get the larger portion!



 Justin ordered the cheesesteak and I got the charcuterie sandwich which can be seen below. Having all of the different types of meat in one bite made it super tasty! The only gripe that I had about this sandwich was that the bread was so crunchy it kind of scraped the roof of my mouth! #firstworldproblems

The next place we dined at was Art and Soul, one of Art Smith's many restaurants. You may know him from his appearances on Top Chef Masters, Barbecue Wars, and of course he was Oprah Winfrey's personal chef for a decade.

We started off our meal with the scotch eggs which already had us reminiscing of our London trip...

Then for our main course we opted to get the fried chicken dinner for two, which came highly recommended. It was perfectly brined, seasoned, with super crunchy skin. It came with a side of collard greens and mashed potatoes. Here's  Justin eyeing the meal, wondering the best way to tackle it. We didn't manage to finish it (hooray for leftovers!) but I had to leave room for dessert!

For dessert we had these fig tarts, topped with powdered sugar with a side of vanilla ice cream. It's always a good sign when a restaurant has something different than the usual creme brulee, cheesecake, chocolate cake, etc.



So that's my review of three of the places we've eaten at. How about you? Did you do a lot of celebratory dining out during the holidays?