A Tour of Our Not-So New Home: Living Room & Kitchen

Our entryway. This is where we take off shoes. Note the litter box, makeshift cat bed, and cat toys.

A while back, I made a big announcement all about our new home in Brooklyn. It's been four months since we signed all of the papers, and I still can't get over the fact that Daniel and I actually OWN a piece of New York City. Like, who does that?! Apparently we do.

I'll just never forget walking out of that conference room after hours and hours of signing contracts and mortgage agreements. I had the biggest cheek pimple of my life, rivaling any blemish I ever sported in my adolescence, and yet when they handed us those keys, I was an adult.

And guys, let me tell you: I am so in love with this place. I mean, I should be humble, but I am just way too excited to care. Our new apartment is sexy. It's bright and spacious with a gorgeous view and SECOND BEDROOM. We live downstairs from a family with toddlers who sound like elephants in an aerobics class, and we don't even mind. It's that good.

Yet, for as much as I love it, I've done a pretty crappy job of keeping YOU (as in The Avoiding Atrophy readership) apprised of the happenings of our new digs. I think I've been waiting to get everything just so, and it's still not, but whatever. We've made some progress, and I'm psyched to show you where we are in our renovations. Today I'll be showing you around our living room and kitchen, but be on the lookout for future posts featuring the rest of our pad. For now, though, come on in!

The Living Room

If you were to have walked into our living room at Christmastime, this is what you would have seen. We purchased the couch and the rug from IKEA in what was perhaps the most stressful IKEA visit of my life. Our plan was only to buy the couch that day, but we left with the couch, a rug, a dresser, a duvet, and a new frickin bed. My heart could barely take the spontaneity of it all. I have such anxiety about spending money, it's ridiculous. Like, I should be studied. But whatever. Now that some time has passed, I'm able to look at all of my new furniture without a sense of crushing guilt.

I would also like for you to note this zig-zaggy blob sitting in front of the couch. Some time in the beginning of November, I got pouf fever. By "pouf fever", I mean that all of my waking moments were spent googling inexpensive poufs/ottomans. I just became fixated. I mean, you've seen poufs all over Pinterest, I'm sure, but did you know that they cost about as much as a full college tuition to a private university? Not really, but they are more expensive than you'd think. I got lucky and snagged this little guy up for $35 at Kohl's on Cyber Monday.

The newest addition to our living room is our coffee table. We've been needing one, but the space is kind of narrow, so we have been a bit puzzled as to what kind of table might work. One day, however, while walking through a museum called West Elm, we happened upon the perfect one. I realize, by the way, that you may think of West Elm as a furniture store, but I maintain that it is a museum since, for the most part, nothing in there is actually available for me to own, but rather for me to admire. As we were wandering around this museum, we stumbled upon a lovely coffee table with a modest price tag to boot. Here she is:

I know, I know. She's kind of weird. She looks like three flying saucers coming in for a landing, but we don't care. To us, she is perfect. We just set her up last night, and we can't stop talking about her. We are so very proud.

Oh also, please note that we are the kind of people who color coordinate our books now.

Also located in our living room is our dining area. I scored this set of chairs on Craiglist for $10. They need some work (you can see the loose strings and stains all over them), but I'm just jazzed to have chairs that don't fold. Not to mention, we finally have a place to legitimately put a kitchen table. By New York twenty-something standards, that basically makes us Rockefellers. 

Things I still want to do in the living room:

-Hang pictures

-Get a chair that actually faces the TV

-Install some kind of jaw-droppingly gorgeous light fixture

-Buy some new throw pillows

-Curtains

-Take down the paper chain that I made for Christmas...though I weirdly like it because I'm five-years-old

The Kitchen

Daniel and I have decided to turn the next few months into our big renovation season. I mean, we don't really want to be outside anyway, so why not get shit done indoors where there are heaters and a warm kitty to cuddle with? This weekend, we completed our first major renovation: painting our kitchen cabinets. Here's what they looked like before:

Don't tell me you love those cherry cabinets. I don't want to hear it. With all of that dark tile (which we plan on removing) and the white appliances (why?), the cabinets were just not working in that space. Here's what they look like now:

LOOK AT ALL DAT LIGHT! That's what I've been exclaiming all day today while walking around my apartment. As Daniel has mansplained to me many times, all of the light is now being reflected as opposed to absorbed, making our kitchen appear much brighter. It's like heaven.

And by the way, if you'll allow me to complain for a moment, this whole thing took FOREVER. I had never painted cabinets before, but naturally, I assumed that we could probably do it in the span of a single episode of Friends. I assumed wrong. It took us all weekend as well as this morning. I've lived the entire past three days with paint in my hair, but whatever, so worth it. I'll just develop some renovator's amnesia, and keep on trucking on.

Things I still want to do in the kitchen:

-Add a back splash. I'm thinking hex tile or subway tile. Not sure yet.

-Remove and replace that nasty black tile. What were the previous owners thinking there? I'm not a fan.

-Maybe try some open shelving by just removing a couple of the doors from the cabinets. We'll see though.

-Replace the countertop with a butcher block

-Install a prettier light fixture over the island

-Actually get a real kitchen island, or at least a larger cart

Anyway, so that's our living room and kitchen. Please affirm me in all of my home decor abilities. I still lack the confidence to actually believe that I can make this place look like grownups live here. 

Do you have any home projects you are working on?

Home Decor as Procrastination

Today is one of those days where, in an impressive attempt to avoid several far more pressing responsibilities, I've decided to do some home decorating!

It mostly involves actually getting art up on the walls. We've been nearly-hoarding a pile of artwork in our living room for the past few weeks. I'm not sure why it always feels like such an arduous decision when it comes time to hang a picture, but it does, and that's why we usually just watch Orange is the New Black instead.

Some art we finally decided to toss on our wall

So we put some art on our walls. Fine. No big deal, right?

Right.

Well, that's not all folks. Today, I am doing something that I would rarely ever think to do. Actually, Daniel and I are doing it together, but I suspect he will do most of it. 

Whatever. 

We are painting a dresser!

This dresser, in particular:

A neighborhood friend of ours is moving (sad!), so she needed to get rid of this little guy. We've been looking for a new dresser, so she gave us this one for free! Daniel and I tried to fit it in our car and couldn't, so we ended up walking it home, causing a fantastic scene in our neighborhood. A kind stranger saw us struggling and leant us a dolly. It was a Christmas miracle. 

I usually prefer having love-worn, vintage pieces in my home to having new things. It's sappy, but I just love imagining where my furniture lived before it came into my life. This dresser, in particular, came with a little hint to the life it had before my friend owned it:

"Sara Silver, May 8, 1992"

Seriously, how cute is this? I found this in the bottom drawer, and while it definitely makes me feel like Sara Silver is haunting our new dresser, I hope we make her proud with the new paint job.

Daniel is deglossing it now, so I'll post pictures when it's done, and I will be honest about what percentage of the work I actually did.

Have a happy weekend! What are you up to? 
Are you doing anything as productive as painting a dresser?

A Pursuit of an Evil Season

In the Lammert House, we didn't celebrate Halloween. It was kind of seen as taboo. I'm not going to point any fingers, but some towering male figure in my childhood was just not a huge fan of it. I remember several times where instead of going trick-or-treating, my family went to church to celebrate Reformation Day, a day which commemorates Martin Luther nailing his 95 Theses. That's great and all, but there wasn't even candy.


I remember one Halloween where we didn't go to church (in fact, I think they canceled it that year and threw some kind of a "Fall Fest" instead) and I dressed up in a poodle skirt and roller skates all alone in my room. There wasn't candy there either.


Above all things, on October 31st of every year, I wanted Halloween. I wanted to dress up and go door-to-door and eat candy until I threw up all over my Posh Spice costume. That's all I wanted.


I'm sure if I'd confessed this desire to that towering male figure in my life, he probably would have conceded. In fact, I think one year he did because I have the faintest memory of a trick-or-treating experience. But the point is, in my mind at least, Halloween was FORBIDDEN and for that reason I now have an unhealthy fixation on celebrating it in my adult life no matter what the cost.


And that's why...I'VE BEEN DECORATING!


Now, I haven't actually gotten the guts to buy any real Halloween decorations (it feels much too sinful so early in the month), but I have been using all of my Hobby Lobby and Marshall's trips to buy Fall items: the gateway decor.


Here are some Fall hints that exist in our home right now:

Our mantle. Note the owl, gnome, and orange fabric picture. These were actually all gifts. The gnome is from my beautiful friend Lara as a wedding shower present, the picture is from my sister, and the owl is from Daniel after I begged him in a Hobby Lobby to let me have yet another owl figurine.  

This intensely amazing cookie jar is yet another gift from Lara (she's really good, right?). The leafy thing is from Marshall's and I made that beautiful fabric pumpkin (and by "made", I mean I made it happen in my apartment by purchasing it from Ross. Do you love it?)

These flowers aren't exactly fall themed, but Daniel bought them for me, so they deserve mention in this entry. Notice that the flowers are surrounded by a sparkly pumpkin and mushrooms.

A closer look at the mushroom salt shakers (an old Anthropologie purchase) and the presumably magical pumpkin (Ross). 

Now, I've had these mystical balls for some time. I never really understood their utility, but they are Fall-themed, I guess. I believe they hail from Wal-Mart. Also, fun fact, I won that candle the other day by selling the most of the item of the week at Anthropologie. Daniel does not like the smell of it, but tough... It's a winner's candle.  

Another owl reference. 

Yet another owl reference. Oh dear. Believe it or not, I JUST now realized that I have an owl thing. I'll have to monitor that from now on. 

Along with decorating, I've also been doing some fall-themed baking. 

Eat 'em and weep. These are pumpkin scones made from SCRATCH, and I made them (actually Daniel helped out...like, a lot). This is a big deal for me. I've been wanting to get in the baking game for a while, but couldn't find a solid entry-level dish. These things were too good. Like, as in, we ate an entire dozen in a day and didn't share with anyone. Check out the recipe, IF YOU DARE.

So why did I show you all of these things? Why did I subject you to an autumn harvest of photos that you may or may not have wanted to see? 

Well, here's the thing that I'm realizing lately. Being domestic is suddenly something I am craving. Never before was I trying to beautify my living space by decorating for the season. There has never been a real burning in my loins for scones (ew). For me, these tendencies just never came naturally. 

However, lately, these are exactly the sorts of things I want. Maybe it's because I work at Anthropologie which is practically the epicenter of all things beautiful, but I think it's more than that. Somewhere in my being or maybe in my upbringing, I recognize this desire as an act of service in my marriage. I truly want to make our home beautiful, and I see it as my charge.

Now, Daniel never once sat me down and told me that he needs to live in autumnal bliss through the months of October and November (though that would be a hilarious conversation), but somehow I feel like he would be happier in a home full of pumpkins. In the same way, I never sat Daniel down and told him he needed to get a job STAT so that he could provide for my every need, but he will be the first to tell you that when he was looking for a job, he was propelled by that desire. He sent his resume to every single place in town and was genuinely unable to rest well until he found a job (he did, by the way, at the YMCA!). 

I am not saying these inclinations are great. The truth is I sometimes freak myself out with my inability to do domestic things and Daniel definitely had his own minimized version of a freak-out when he was looking for work. Biblically, this is the curse described in Genesis 3 where God tells the woman, "your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you" and he tells the man, "cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life." For Daniel, working is a greater part of his identity. Without it, he feels lacking. For me, when I truly examine myself, I know that the real reason I seek to do these homemaker things is for Daniel (I mean, the way to a man's heart is through interior decorating, right?). It's silly. It's stupid. It makes no sense, but in my wiring, it's what I innately believe. 

So anyway, that's my confession (and Daniel's subsequently). I don't even really know how I got here especially considering how I started this entry talking about the deprivation of Halloween in my childhood. 

Anyway, HAPPY FALL! 

UPDATE:

Here is my FIRST actual Halloween purchase of the season.

Hope you're seeing this, Towering Male Figure in my life (especially since you're one of my four followers).

I have 10 Minutes to tell you

I have ten minutes to write and a great desire to do so. I'm a slow writer, so let's cut right to the chase.

I got this in my e-mail the other day.

Good question, David's Bridal. I've been wondering that myself. So much of my last year has been propelling me towards my wedding, but now what? Deciding on a centerpiece was hard enough, but now I have a whole life to plan.

The good news is I'm not alone. I've got a partner in my confusion. His name is Daniel and he looks like this.

I married him. We live in an apartment with a sun-dried tomato accent wall in the living room. Our wireless network is called "Hootenanny" and we have a corner behind our kitchen table with nostalgic stuff we can't bear to part with (plus a few wedding gifts we still need to return). 

We have been applying to jobs like crazy, but in our free time, we've been hanging out with some new friends.

They really hit it off.

We've also been spending some time with family. 

On a scale of 1 - 10, how related do we look?

My mom's birthday. Note the ShamWow and the Alumawallet. Obviously she has never seen such technology.

It's been happy, great, beautiful, fun, BUT I still feel like I'm waiting to get started. I don't know, David's Bridal, I guess I just thought I would have an answer to your question by now. IS this real life? If it is, I'm happy to embrace it because it is like a party every single day, but if there's more (and David's Bridal, feel free to tell me), I think I'd like to know.

ON A FRIVOLOUS NOTE: 

This is a wall in the bedroom of our apartment that is a real puzzler. I just can't figure out what to do with it. Any ideas? I would love your thoughts in the comment section of this post.

Okay, times up. It was longer than 10 minutes. On my way to Reagan's. Sorry to keep you waiting, girl.