Blog Posts

Best Burger Joints in Tacoma

Welcome back to the Nantucket Gate Blog and welcome to the month of May! This month, we are celebrating National Hamburger Month by sharing some of the best burger joints around Tacoma, WA with residents of our apartment community. Read on to find out a little about each restaurant, including how far away they are from Nantucket Gate. Frugals (1.5 miles away) This local burger chain’s mission is to offer the highest quality products at the lowest possible price while offering the best customer service in the industry. Frugal’s is a grab-and-go style double drive thru burger joint to provide a quick and convenient experience. Burger Broiler (6 miles away) This hopping local burger chain first opened in 2012 and has since become a popular spot for people of all ages to enjoy great burgers in an inviting atmosphere. Stop in for a freshly made burger, hand-cut fries, and a delicious fresh fruit shake! Delong’s Deluxe (6.3 miles away) This order-and-go style burger joint is located in Lakewood, WA and offers American classics like burgers, hot dogs, french fries, hand-spun shakes and more. Enjoy your meal at their outdoor picnic tables or take it home to enjoy! Shake Shake Shake (9.2 miles away) Shake Shake Shake is the culmination of an 8 year dream of brothers Gordon and Steven Naccarato. The Naccarato's partnered with Tacoma gallery owner / artist Robert Stocker to form Shake Shake Shake, LLC., and together built their retro modern 1940's inspired burger cafe. Try one of their signature burgers for the ultimate experience! Frisko Freeze (11 miles away) For more than 50 years, Frisko Freeze remains a staple for Tacomans in search of burgers, fries and shakes, with no seating beyond a few benches, but a roomy lot for parking and grubbing. Along with burgers and fries, you can also find hot dogs, fish and chips, and family-sized prawn baskets on the menu. Do you have a favorite burger joint in the area? Let us know by leaving a comment on this post. Have fun celebrating National Hamburger Month here in Tacoma!

DIY Mother's Day Cards

Mother’s Day (Sunday, May 13th) is less than a week away and here on the Nantucket Gate Blog, we want to help you celebrate! Remember when you were little and you would draw your mom a picture and she kept it on the refrigerator in your apartment for years? It’s no secret that handmade things are more meaningful and are a great way to show your love. We are sharing a few ideas for homemade Mother’s Day cards so you can show your mom just how much she means to you. Pop-Up Flowers Mother’s Day Card from Martha Stewart Living Make your mom a card for Mother’s Day that is as lovely as her! This card will blossom before her eyes as she opens it and features beautiful paper flowers that will never die. Gather up all the supplies you will need and follow the tutorial to learn how to make it. Mums The Word Card from Luv Scrapping Together This adorable homemade card is made to look like a pitcher filled with flowers with the word “MUM” printed on it. Gather up all the materials you will need and get to work making this card that your mom will love to show off to all her friends. “I Whaley Love You” Card from Crafty Morning If your mom is a fan of puns, this super cute card is a great choice! This card is also super simple and easy to make. All you will need is white printer paper, light blue paper, deep blue paper, scissors, glue, and a pen or Sharpie. You could also glue on googly eyes to give the whale eyes. Fancy Mother’s Day Card from Crafty Sahm I Am This impressive handcrafted card looks like a high-quality card you would find in the store. Your mom will be amazed when you tell her that you made it yourself. Head to your local craft store to get everything you will need to make this over-the-top card. Share your own homemade Mother’s Day card ideas with us in the comments. Thanks for reading our post and have a great Mother’s Day here in Tacoma, WA!

Unique Recipes for Pretzel Day!

If you are a fan of pretzels, you won’t want to miss out on Pretzel Day on April 26th! Celebrate your love for pretzels on this day by baking some in your Nantucket Gate apartment! Invite some friends over and enjoy them together with your favorite dipping sauce. We’ve got a few unique pretzel recipes for you to try out. Cheddar Bacon Stuffed Pretzel Buns from Yammie’s Noshery Filled with ooey gooey cheddar cheese and pieces of bacon, these pretzel buns are sensational and make the perfect anytime snack. To make them, you will need milk, active dry yeast, brown sugar, butter, all-purpose flour, fine salt, crumbled bacon, grated cheddar cheese, minced garlic, smoked paprika, chopped fresh herbs, baking soda, warm water, and coarse salt. Ham & Swiss Stuffed Honey Pretzels from Drool-Worthy Is your mouth watering yet? This recipe is like the classic ham and cheese sandwich meets a soft pretzel, and we couldn’t be happier! You will need warm water, sugar, dry active yeast, salt, honey, all-purpose flour, butter, egg, shredded swiss cheese, chopped black forest ham, baking soda, poppy seeds, sesame seeds, and mustard for serving. Pizza Stuffed Pretzel Rolls from Domestic Fits All the cheesy goodness of pepperoni pizza is packed inside these soft and delicious pretzel rolls. To make them, you will need the following ingredients: pizza dough, marinara sauce, chopped pepperoni, cheddar or mozzarella cheese, baking soda, butter, coarse salt, and sugar. Pretzel Honey Peanut Butter from The View from Great Island This thick peanut butter spread is the perfect balance of salty and sweet. Enjoy it spread on some toast or on some fresh fruit! To make this spread, you will need broken pretzel pieces, raw peanuts, honey, sea salt, and vegetable oil. The result is an incredible pretzel-based peanut butter spread that goes well with almost anything! What’s your favorite pretzel recipe? Share it with us in the comments so we can try it out! Thanks for reading our post about National Pretzel Day.

Spring Cleaning Tips

Welcome back to the Nantucket Gate Blog and welcome to Spring! Technically the first day of Spring was March 20th, but if you haven’t got your apartment cleaned and ready for spring and the warmer weather yet, we’ve got some tips! Deep cleaning your Tacoma, WA apartment can be a pain, so take it one step at a time. Refrigerator Take some time to go through your refrigerator and get rid of any expired or spoiled food. When you’ve taken everything out, spray and wipe down every surface to get rid of any spilled or stuck-on food. You can make your own simple and inexpensive refrigerator cleaner with salt and soda water. Ceiling Fans Remove accumulated dust from your ceiling fans with a pillow case. Enclose the blade with a pillowcase and wipe the dust off. The pillowcase will catch all the dust and keep it from raining down onto furniture or the floor below. After you have finished, toss the dirty pillowcase(s) into the washer to be cleaned and used again in the future! Windows Wipe down your windows with a rag and soapy water and then use a clean rag to dry them. You could also use a window squeegee, if you have one, to dry them and help get rid of any streaks. Cleaning your windows every few months will help get rid of any dust or dirt stuck to them and allow more sunlight into your apartment! Faucets and Sinks Lime buildup is a common problem for sinks and faucets. A quick and easy way to get rid of lime buildup is to lay paper towels over the fixture, soak them in vinegar, and let them set for a few hours. Letting the vinegar-soaked paper towels sit on the affected surface will help soften the lime buildup and make it easier to remove with less vigorous scrubbing required. Cabinets, Walls, and Baseboards Clean off cabinets, walls, and baseboards with a wet rag or sponge and some dishwashing soap. This will help remove dust, dirt, or any other substances gently without ruining the woodwork or paint. What other spring cleaning tips would you add to our list? Share them with us in the comments so that everyone in our apartment community can benefit. Happy spring cleaning!

Word Games for Scrabble Day

Are you a lover of words? If so, you will appreciate that April 13th is National Scrabble Day! Scrabble is a classic word-building board game played with 2-4 players. However, Scrabble isn’t the only word game out there! In this Nantucket Gate Blog post, we are sharing a few different word games with the residents of our Tacoma, WA apartment community. Test your vocabulary and learn some new words this month! Bananagrams Similar to Scrabble, Bananagrams is a fast-paced word building game where the first one to run out of word tiles is the winner! There are several different ways to play; learn the basic rules and instructions on how to play from WikiHow . Words with Friends Words with friends is an online version of Scrabble that you can play with your friends on your phone or on the computer. The game keeps track of your points and all of your stats so you don’t have to! Challenge your friends and impress them with your extensive vocabulary. Boggle Boggle is a fun word scramble game where you try to find as many different word combinations in a short amount of time. Play the board game with friends or one of the several different online versions of the game. Balderdash This ridiculously fun game has players come up with fake definitions for obscure words to try to trick other players into thinking their definition is the correct one. The actual definition is mixed in as well, but none of the players know which one it is. This is a fun game to get creative with and try to trick your friends! What are your favorite word games to play at your apartment? Share your ideas and suggestions in the comments for how to best celebrate National Scrabble Day! Thanks for taking the time to read our post.

Book Recommendations from Librarians

Library Week (April 8th-14th) is just around the corner! Get back into the habit of reading by heading to your local library to check out a new book. The Nantucket Gate Blog is sharing a few recommendations from librarians that you might want to consider. Or you could ask a librarian at your local Tacoma, WA library. Librarian Recommendations The Rules of Magic by Alice Hoffman “For the Owens family, love is a curse that began in 1620, when Maria Owens was charged with witchery for loving the wrong man. Hundreds of years later, in New York City at the cusp of the sixties, when the whole world is about to change, Susanna Owens knows that her three children are dangerously unique. Difficult Franny, with skin as pale as milk and blood red hair, shy and beautiful Jet, who can read other people’s thoughts, and charismatic Vincent, who began looking for trouble on the day he could walk.” Genuine Fraud by E. Lockhart “From the author of the unforgettable New York Times bestseller We Were Liars comes a masterful new psychological suspense novel--the story of a young woman whose diabolical smarts are her ticket into a charmed life. But how many times can someone reinvent themselves? You be the judge.” Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng “Enter Mia Warren – an enigmatic artist and single mother – who arrives in this idyllic bubble with her teenage daughter Pearl, and rents a house from the Richardsons. Soon Mia and Pearl become more than just tenants: all four Richardson children are drawn to the alluring mother-daughter pair. But Mia carries with her a mysterious past, and a disregard for the rules that threatens to upend this carefully ordered community.” The Librarian of Auschwitz by Antonio Iturbe “Based on the experience of real-life Auschwitz prisoner Dita Kraus, this is the incredible story of a girl who risked her life to keep the magic of books alive during the Holocaust. Fourteen-year-old Dita is one of the many imprisoned by the Nazis at Auschwitz. Taken, along with her mother and father, from the Terezín ghetto in Prague, Dita is adjusting to the constant terror that is life in the camp. When Jewish leader Freddy Hirsch asks Dita to take charge of the eight precious volumes the prisoners have managed to sneak past the guards, she agrees. And so Dita becomes the librarian of Auschwitz.” Do you have any book recommendations to share with us? We hope you enjoy reading one of these books from the comfort of your apartment!