Apartment Life

I have never lived in an apartment. I have lived in houses, cabins, and dorms, but the apartment experience is new. Broadstone Heights is an upscale, gated apartment complex with a dozen or so three-story New Mexico-style stucco buildings with four apartments on each floor. We are on the third floor, and the staircase is outside with no elevator. The complex has an office, mailboxes, outdoor pool and spa, and a fitness center. I haven't used the pool yet, but I have been to the fitness center most mornings, and it is quite well-equipped. The apartment itself is very nice, with one bedroom including a walk-in closet, a washer and dryer, dishwasher, entry hall and coat closet, living/dining area, gas fireplace, balcony, central air, and lots of cabinet space in the kitchen and bathroom. The units are either quite well sound-proofed or I don't have any neighbors because I don't hear any voices or music. Since I've been practicing my oboe in the apartment, I hope my neighbors, if any, can't hear me either!

Here's the living room:

The dining room has been turned into my office.

The kitchen has more cabinet space and counter space than my Schuylerville kitchen.

We have ample parking and the spaces are covered, but I learned not to buy too many groceries at once, since I have to carry the bags up 4 flights of stairs.

When we moved in, we had to add a pet addendum to our lease. In order to do that, I found out that I had to bring Annabelle to the office to have her picture taken. I still can not imagine why this is necessary, but I dutifully wrestled her into her harness, stuffed her into the carrier, sustaining only 2 scratches on my calf (should have worn jeans, but it's 80 degrees out) and walked her over to the office. Thank goodness the young woman with the camera decided that she could snap the picture through the mesh on the carrier so I didn't need to let the cat out of the bag, so to speak.

Other than the weird cat-photo thing, apartment life is OK! But I'll be glad to have a little space to plant things and room for the rest of my instruments.