Wow, has it been a week since I posted last?? The days have flown by. I've felt as though I haven't been doing that much but, looking back, I've been keeping pretty busy, splitting my time between being a housewife and trying to get my portfolio in order. Props to all the housewives out there: I never realized how easily it can get out of hand and turn into a full-time job.


(our new fave after-dinner drink -- mint "tea")

And speaking of the house, yes, a trip to Ikea was all it took for us to turn a house into a home (scroll down for a photo of the new and improved apartment). We bought all those things that seem to get left till last, probably because you can ultimately live without them but which make life so much more comfortable. So no more "storage" on the floor, no more chopping with a tiny steak knife, no more taking pinches of salt straight from the bag.

I have to say I'd forgotten how much of an "experience" Ikea is. Although as a kid I went a lot with my parents (loved the ball-filled playroom, hated the weird food), this was only the second time I've been to Ikea as an adult. Both times I expected to breeze in and out, but we were there for hours. I'm glad our furniture choices worked out as well as we had planned, although it took all of Tuesday to assemble the furniture (I did it solo, since Ben was at work) and get the apartment back in order.

And did I mention, we had our furniture delivered?!? We got to Ikea's warehouse without remembering that Keren's little Renault barely held the four of us and our computer bags. It certainly wouldn't accommodate all those boxes. Fortunately, delivery was cheap and painless -- the driver arrived first thing the next morning and brought the boxes right up to our door -- but the concept of door-to-door delivery seems like a wild luxury to us suburbanite Americans.

*



Wednesday night our first language class was held. It was 2.5 hours of immersive language training. In class, our instructor spoke no English (not that she couldn't: she's fluent in English, but insisted everyone speak only Hebrew), so by the end my head felt as though it was going to explode from trying so hard to grasp what was going on and trying to keep up with everyone else. It's the beginner class, designed for idiots like me who know nothing about the language, but it seemed as though half of the class already knew quite a lot of Hebrew. It sort of annoyed us that we are already at the bottom third of the class since we don't have the experience everyone else does.

However, far as I can tell, Ben and I are the only Americans in the class -- there is a really diverse set of nationalities represented: French, British, German, Russian, Belarussian, Latvian, Venezuelan, Argentinian, Swiss, Japanese, Filipino -- there were practically no two students from the same country. So, knowing the class isn't designed exclusively for dumb Americans salved our pride a little bit.

And as I said in an earlier post, it's fun to be back in "school." The other night I ran over to a bookstore and bought back-to-school supplies: notebooks, pens, flash cards and a couple of folders (I should mention that I spent almost an hour browsing leisurely through all the many notebooks and pens -- i love office supplies!). They also sold a small selection of workbooks, so I also bought a penmanship book (ahem, designed for kindergartners -- you trace lines to practice writing your ABCs). Class meets again tomorrow, so tonight we do homework and I'll work through the penmanship book. Photos of my bad handwriting will be posted soon...

*



One thing Ikea didn't yield was fabric; for whatever reason, the selection was poor. So yesterday, since it was rainy and gross, I dragged Ben back down to the HaCarmel shuk (the one in Tel Aviv) to check out the fabric shops (one whole street of the shuk is devoted to them). Not surprisingly, like the antique shops in Jaffa, these stores were tiny and packed deep with bolts of fabric. They were mostly so small that I would have had to poke a camera in the shop owner's face to get a shot. This is a more spacious, comparatively well organized shop. I found a few materials that will be excellent for pouch-making -- we'll see how they turn out!



And of course we just had to cut through the produce part of the shuk to get back home. We reluctantly bought ourselves what I call a "yenta cart" -- a plaid-covered wheeled cart, about the size of a large piece of carry-on luggage. Many of the old ladies here have them. They're super-dorky but without one it's impossible to do grocery shopping solo. Anyhow, because we had the cart with us we felt free enough to actually buy a few groceries at the produce part of HaCarmel. We got some good stuff: dried, marienated olives ($5 for a lb!); some really tasty, cheap cold cuts and sausages; and the best part -- two big handfuls of still-warm pita, half plain, half intensely seasoned and oiled (again just a few bucks for the lot).

*

Today the weather is beautiful. The heat feels like it has finally broken -- it's golden instead of red-hot -- so we plan to spend the rest of the day at the beach. (Maybe I'll get the rest of my postcards written. Has anyone received theirs yet?)

We jogged in the park this morning (along with, it seemed, half the population of the city) so it should be really pleasant to just sit and relax. Here at the cafe it feels great to just sit back and enjoy our cappuccinos -- it's about 75F, a breeze is blowing, it's beautiful. If the stolen wireless connection at home is cooperative (which it hasn't been, but you get what you pay for), I'll probably post more photos later today. xo!