Category Archives: Home

Here we are 4 months after the closing. Our TV room is pretty well furnished, with a futon/couch that we found at a moving sale, an Ikea coffee table, stools we found in Fred Meyers, Ikea book shelf, and Ikea and media console. (Yeah – we’re still heavily reliant on cheap Scandinavian furniture. I joke to my husband, that it’s his heritage.) We found a dining table that seats 6 people for under $100 at the same moving sale. (Although they were also selling a fish stand and aquarium for $200+, but unfortunately that wasn’t something we were ready to jump the gun on.

Not going to lie, most of what we’re looking at is either Ikea or Dania.

What we still are lacking in is:
hemnes-daybed-frame-with-drawers-white__0159184_PE315622_S4#1. A bed for us and a a guest bed

For us, we’re looking for a simple slatted bed. For the guest bed and other multi-purpose furniture, Ikea has a great selection of convertible day beds/single beds. I like this bed, since it’ doubles as a huge couch, single bed, or the equivalent of 2 single beds.

friheten-sofa-bed-with-chaise-beige__0188774_PE341595_S4#2 Sofabed for the TV room

We were looking at several different beds, but honestly, the look and price of this piece is right. It’s pretty comfy and we’re hoping that it helps when we have friends over. Some other beds we considered are Dania’s Oregon Sofa with Chaise.

29365#3 Seating for the living room

The living room is almost completely empty. Last week we got some Kallax bookshelves to start to fill that space, but we’re divided on what we want to do. My husband isn’t really keen to set up another sitting area, whereas, I think multiple nooks for sitting is fine.

He wants to set up a craft desk in the living room, which I don’t know how that would work… but he’s the more adventurous one out of the two of us, so we’ll see. Eventually we’re hoping to move his baby Grand Piano into this space, but currently that’s in his parents’ place.

#4 Our own TV (currently we’re borrowing a 36″ TV from my in-laws from their guestroom)

Pretty self explanatory, right? We’re hoping to acquire a good 50″ and wall mount the screen.

#5 And another coffee table

Again, pretty self explanatory. We need some more surfaces in the living room. (I haven’t thrown out the idea of a sitting nook, just yet. I mean, our fireplace is here, so … I am fully expecting to curl up with a book in that room.)

Am I missing anything? I’m planning a couple of other decorative things, but these are main pieces of furniture that we need to get.

Also … rugs. My biggest beef with rugs are that a lot of them are just so ugly. They are so patterned or with a specific color, that it freaks me out to commit to it. I found some that I like, but compared to other necessities, this one may have to wait.

So, normally I’m not one to make any New Year’s resolutions. That being said, I wanted to try to live a better life with less. I wanted to appropriate the mantra, “Quality over quantity.” this year. That being said, the first step was just getting my life in order (haha) and getting my act together to clean the apartment.

Last time we were in Oregon (in October), a friend of mine needed a place to stay and asked to stay at our apartment for a night when we weren’t there. Unfortunately the state of our bedroom was RIDICULOUS, but she was able to stay on the futon in the living room. That was embarrassing, but she’s like family, so what are you going to do, right? Either way, I was very much aware of how I need to clean my apartment.

20140201-223712.jpgThis time Ryan and I have been away from the apartment for nearly 4 week+ weeks. The aquarium was a MESS. (Although majority of the fish survived without anyone feeding it or doing water changes.) The living room was cluttered and it was everything we could do to just get rid of the filth and do all the dishes before we left. (We may not be doing this adult thing like we’re suppose to.)

So the first thing I did when we came back (ok – so this happened the second weekend back) was to clean the apartment. To facilitate this, I invited Jay and his GF over. I had to clean the living room, at least. I felt motivated. That’s saying a lot, since normally I would need to force myself to watch Hoarders to get the horrific inspiration to clean. I cleaned the kitchen (dishes, stovetop, and scrubbed the sink clean), bathroom, living area/TV… everything except my bedroom. Uhg.

20140201-223703.jpgEventually, on Sunday, I hauled my ass to clean the bedroom. It’s not perfect, but it’s SO much better. The floor is completely clear of stray clothes. I cleaned my closet for the first time in YEARS. I found this iced tea in one of those tote bags above. I also may have found a Duane Reade receipt dated 2011. Yeah. It has never been opened, so it’s probably fine. (If there is ever a nuclear disaster, it may have been a good idea to just go foraging for food and water in my closet. Thankfully there wasn’t too much more perishables in there. It was a little ridiculous how I found extra packets of hot cocoa mix in one of my bags still filled with sordid random items from my last job. (Mind you, I’ve been at my current job over 2 years now.) There were mountains of tote bags. I found random sweaters eaten apart by moths. Sweaters I used to like. :( (This resulted in a small shopping spree at Old Navy for 2 new sweaters – but that’s another story.)

20140201-223720.jpgIt’s always the case in these situations that you find things you COMPLETELY forgot about. Clothes that you never wore and bags you never saw again. I bought a tote bag the last time I was at a Tori Amos concert, and I found it. I don’t think I ever used it. :P (This also leads to the question, WHY ON EARTH DO I HAVE SO MANY FABRIC TOTES NOW? I never used to have fabric totes a decade ago. These are bags I collected in the last… 10 years? Where did all these bags come from? I’ve organized them into, bags I like and want to keep – aka. bags I bought – and bags I am going to set aside to give to friends whenever they need a bag to put shit in – aka. random tote bags I managed to accumulate via free stuff.)

It’s like a weird unintentional time capsule, don’t you think? I also found 3 random Magic the Gathering cards, H&M gift cards, scarves, hats and gloves I forgot I had (I suspect these were gifts from a friend who works at an accessories company), etc.

Also, WHAT IS THAT BLACK PIG with wire around it’s neck? I think it was given to me by someone at my last job, but why on earth would I take it and keep it? I just hold on to way too much stuff. Also, what is that unidentified clear bottle of liquid, which was clearly some free item without a label saying what it is, just the damn healthcare brand on it. WTH?

I still also found tons of shutterfly branded chapstick that I drunkenly took at a vendor event at shutterfly.

I want to adopt the idea of a capsule wardrobe. I just want to have a regular rotation of high quality items I can wear that will last. I want to get rid of all of my “crap” in my bedroom. (Hence the recent cleaning spree, which I will discuss later.) I want to stop being such a hoarder. I need to purge. (33 is an arbitrary number. I will probably settle on 40-50 depending on the season, but it’s definitely a start.)


(image courtesy of samishome, which illustrates the idea of capsule wardrobes well)

I have an insane amount of hats. It’s ridiculous. I have like 20-30 hats. I DID NOT BUY ANY OF THEM. This is what happens when you know someone in the accessory field. I like a lot of them, but I’m not a hat person. Hmmm. I may sell some of them to Beacon’s Closet or on Ebay.

I plan to throw away anything I don’t want. I want to store everything else out of sight and mind. The plan is that if I don’t think about these things when I move next year… I am throwing them out. (Reasonable, right? I need to take baby steps.)

I just want to live a better life with less.

I’m home, “on-call” for work. So what did I do? I cooked a bag of dry black beans so we can have a little for breakfast and the rest for the week. I cleaned my aquarium (hopefully to fill with colorful platys), hooked up the XBox to YouTube and discovered Vice Japan Channel, and now I am watching reruns of Sex and the City. I randomly picked the episode where Aidan leaves Carrie for the second time after she cheated on him with Mr. Big. In that episode, they say goodbye in her bathroom… and that shower curtain!!!!! I NEED IT! I searched for the last 50 minutes and I cannot for the life of me find that particular screenshot.

It’s long and sparkly.

So this is what it has come to. Season 4 has pretty good outfits, I must admit.

At least I have some Rose wine.

I’m looking forward to getting my freedom back next week.

Edit: Pebbles Silver shower curtain from Bed Bath and Beyond! Voila! Pretty close.

I’m also digging the discontinued Tender Falls Anthropologie Shower Curtain.

And a little more affordable Kate Spade shower curtain from Bed Bath and Beyond.