Apartment life...

Do any of you girls who live in apartments feel like you can never have anyone over because of the small space?

DH and I live in a 1 BR in Forest Hills and I think we have a really decent sized apartment. People compliment our place whatever they *do* come by... but that's part of my problem. I feel like no one ever ones to come out and see us!

Our family who live in the suburbs doesn't want to battle the parking situation so we always have to make the 45 mins -1 hour drive to see either DH's family in Westchester or my family in Suffolk. And they think there isn't enough room to host any kind of holidays or anything, even if the parking wasn't a pain. (It might be tight, but isn't that part of the fun? Having everyone all together, no matter what? )

And our friends always say that we're too far, and they want us to come into the city all the time. Sometimes I don't want to go into the city - sometimes I want to host people at our house and still show everyone we can have a good time!

Any thoughts on this, fellow apartment dwellers?

Re: Apartment life...

YES! I feel your pain 10X over! My parents only live 10-15 minutes away and don't come over because my mom is HIGHLY allergic to the cat. BUT my IL's NEVER come over because they don't want to deal with traffic/parking. We tell them all the time if they want to come over we can leave our garage open for them but they still don't come.

When I get tired of it, I just stay home and tell them that I'm not coming to LI anymore until people start coming to us. BIL always tells us that he doesn't like coming to Queens because he works in Queens (NYPD) which I think is BS! I tell him all the time 'so if you worked in Nassau, you wouldn't go to LI?' He tells me it's different.

I say, do what we do. If people don't want to come to you, just tell them that you're not coming out until they come visit. They will eventually come by. It usually works for us. The only time people come to us is if we are going to the Mets game (since we're so close).

And we're the same as you. We have a decent size apartment with plenty of sitting room, people just think Queens is evil for some reason. Just wait until we have a house on the island and people want us to go to their house, I'm making people come to us for a year before I go to their houses!

Re: Apartment life...

my situation EXACTLY. and we moved to a twice as big 2BR apt as we were living before
we had my cousin and her DH over, once DH's mom and her bf came over for 10 mins and thats that.
all of my family live in BK and SI and they all say how far we are. I guess going to them is closer and shorter of a trip than them coming to us
I make myself feel better by saying that who wants to 1st cook for 15 million hours and then clean for 30?
my mom suggested to keep inviting and making ppl used to more and more coming over, still havent gotten around to trying her method

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You absoutely just summed up our situation...except through NEW JERSEY into the mix! We are both native NYers (Me - Nassau and Kieran - Westchester). Our family treats Jersey City like the plague. Yes, traffic is a major issue.

Thing is, we aren't really happy here. We love our apartment and July will mark 2 years here. We've had a blast exploring a new area that was brand new for both of us. It was the perfect experience in terms of moving in together because it wasn't like I was moving into his world or he was moving into mine - we made a new start together!

THE BIG BUT....But, the traffic KILLS us! Most (if not all) of our close friends in addition to our family are somewhere in NY.

Anyways, my response is turning into a ramble. I'm gonna tighten it up and just say that I TOTALLY HEAR YOU!

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We moved into our apartment and 4 days later a huge fire broke out in the unit next door.

It set us back in getting things set up since we had serious smoke damage and couldnt live there for a couple days.

Then I had my shower - so more stuff to put away and planning the wedding. We just havent had time to really ask people to come over for a big get-together.

However - since we live in Suffolk now, my friends think I moved to the other end of the earth since they are all in Nassau and about 15-20 min away from each other. Meanwhile, we are only 30 minutes (even in Suffolk) away from where they are.

Even in my old place - which was only 15 min away from them, it was rare that anyone came to visit. Maybe it was a space issue?? maybe they thought my place s*cked?!?! lol im not sure.

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We do have people over sometimes but its tight. Right now we're living upstairs from my grandma so its pretty much a 1br. I can't wait until we have a house! Not even just for hosting but the room for EVERYTHING will be great. I have stuffed so much stuff into closets that just dont fit anywhere!

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I have to say, I agree with so much of your post!

We live in such a tiny apartment- when we have people over, we are crammed into a tiny space and its actually pretty hard to move around. When we have stay over, they're either on the couch or we have to move around tables and chairs to be able to blow up the air matress.

parking is obnoxious around us too... and we're far from where we grew up so its really a treck for people to visit us.

It's incredibly annoying- that being said, now that it's beach season, people all of a sudden want to stay with us!

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I'm glad Ito know I'm not the only one Misery loves company I guess lol...

I just can't help but when people give all of their excuses for not coming when it's like we're always the ones juggling, compromising and otherwise trying to make ourselves available to people.

Come on people, get with the program!

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yep.

we've only ever had mor and craig over... or one person at a time.

we have a 1 bedroom and intend to eventually have a baby in there with us while we save for a house.

sucks but... that's living on long island.

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I've tried having people over, not only is it cramped, but the neighbors get all bent out of shape - yet, they do the same thing.

I just wish I had a bigger kitchen, seems to be the place where people tend to stand around lol.

Re: Apartment life...

have a party! people will come.

Re: Apartment life...

I know the feeling. Parking in RVC stinks! Luckily there are 5 spots right in front and for some reason people get very lucky when they come over. We are in a 1 BR apt. and can comfortably fit 6 people in our living room. Counting the comp. chair and 2 chairs from the kitchen we can fit 9 people w/seats. We've never had that many people and I wouldn't even want to because it would get cramped.