Kelley and the Blog: Kelley and the Crib

I never realized how far away Bismarck really was compared to all my family and friends. It's a 2 1/2 hour drive to Fargo where Tony and Heidi and a big handful of my friends live. It's a solid 4 1/2 hour drive back to Hallock, which after 24 years, I finally realized it's the most peaceful place in all of Minnesota, and a mind-numbing 6 hours to the Cities where my very pregnant sister, Maureen, and her black bearded husband, Brian, live. Oh! Which by the way, Keith's parents are only a 5 minute drive from Maureen's and Brian's house, and a 40 minute drive from his sister's. And then there's Keith.....well he's just a 5 hour plane ride away, but in car hours it converts to 17 hours. He wins the prize for "Person Who Lives the Farthest from Kelley!"

I figured it would be awhile before I would be able to host you all out in Bismarck, so I thought it would be nice to give a virtual tour of my bachelorette pad! AKA the one bedroom apartment. But before I turn into Tour Guide Barbie, I feel a story coming on.....

When I took the job out in Bismarck, my current boss said he wanted me to start two weeks after I signed all the work papers. I said to him with confidence, "Sure thing! I'll be there in two weeks!" But in reality, I was thinking, "Ohhhhhh darn." Two weeks really wasn't very long to pack everything up and move into a new place 200 miles away. Even though I was pretty pumped to be starting a new job, I was NOT pumped about the actual moving part. I have a notorious history of becoming a LITTLE crabby when moving day comes along. But there was hope! Bobcat was VERY good to me and gave me a moving company to haul everything I owned out to Bismarck. That was a huge check off my list and a huge relief. Next was to find a place to move all my things into.

I decided to recruit my mom to come out to Bismarck with me to hunt for an apartment. I never had to look at apartments by myself before, so my mom was the perfect person to have for the hunt. She asked all the important questions like "How is security here? Have their been any previous problems with the appliances? Where do you need to drop off the rent check?" And I asked, "How big is the closet?" Which I felt was an equally important question :) The whole apartment hunting process was a lot like "Goldie Locks and the Three Bears." I made appointments to just three apartments and wanted to sign a lease before the end of the day. The first apartment we saw was super close to my work, but it just didn't seem homey enough (This porridge is too hot!). The second apartment was pretty old and smelled pretty funky (This porridge is too cold!) Then the third apartment was awesome (This porridge is just RIGHT!). It was in the newer part of town in a quiet neighborhood, very homey and it didn't smell funky. We have a winner!

So that's the story of the hunt for an apartment....shall we begin the tour now? I just cleaned right before I took the pictures. I wanted to have that HGTV feel to it...