Making it Home

        One of the first things we did with the house was make it habitable again (with the exception of Mom's room). We cleaned everything we could reach. I vacuumed at least twice in every room, I washed the walls, I washed the windows, I swept every hard surface, I lysol'd, I febreezed, I poured baking soda (to deodorize, it was very effective), I did everything but steam clean the carpet. Before we could make it our home, we had to wipe the slate clean of how it had been before. My dad had filled the space with so much stuff that by the time the house was ready, we had thrown out more trash than stuff we had to bring in.

        As soon as we cleared the space we began to rearrange. We didn't add much furniture to the living room that wasn't intended as temporary because there already was: Two leather couches, two coffee tables, four bookshelves (assembled, two unassembled), two leather sitting chairs, one very large and very old pantry(?), one floor lamp, one ceiling lamp, one rocking chair, one incredibly old dictionary (on it's own stand), a side table, all around a fireplace. The living room is only 16' x 24'. It was… cozy… way too many pieces of furniture, so we got rid as much as practical. Rearranging has helped a huge amount with how the room works as a midway between our bedrooms and the kitchen. There are five entryways into the living room and only a few were readily accessible they way it had been rearranged, so we moved more furniture against the walls, changed the direction of the couches, and tossed things about.

        The most significant change was what I did in the closet/office. The bedroom is small, so is the other bedroom we've taken over. They are both too small to hold all of our bedroom furniture, and as a separate issue are both too small to contain all of our clothing. I knew early on I'd need to devise a way to create closet space where there was none, but before I could do that I had to know how much space I had to work with. We tossed around a few sketches of furniture layouts and decided to make the east facing room the bedroom, in hopes of inviting early morning wake ups with natural light (trees are too tall for that unfortunately), and that the west facing room would be the "other" room. I knew the "other" room would be the closet room, but I had to get tony on board.
        Once I convinced him that the way I drew up to arrange the room would allow for the best space usage, and most efficiency for all involved. we put in the dressers and bookshelves, and then I built an exposed closet! I needed more room than the built in closet provided, and this way I could really get creative with the height, width, and style of the set up. We went down to orchard supply and grabbed an extendable metal closet rod and three wall brackets. My friend Athena came over and helped us locate some of the studs, and most of them ended up being weird nonexisting ones, but we found two that worked and screwed it all in! Now I've got an awesome exposed closet to hang all of my work clothes and dresses. I still get really excited about it, because this is the first time I've ever lived anywhere that wasn't rented, and while we are still renting per se, I'm on great terms with the landlady and she lets me do damn near whatever I want!


Also in the closet room, I took advantage of Tony's aversion to the closet nook by moving his desk next to one of the windows, and I moved in my own table and things! Luckily, we had lots of notice that this would be the situation and I took advantage before the big furniture move. So what is the first thing a person who has rented their whole life wants to do? PAINT! So I filled in drywall holes with spackle, I sanded.... some of them down, I primed, and I painted! I even taped off the outlets and edges! It needed a full two coats of paint but it's totally worth it.




ok so I may have gotten really excited and started painting before taping.. but I stopped early enough to tape everywhere necessary. I will fully admit to doing a passable but bad job of really taping it off. After two coats of paint, it looks so good.



Now I've got the mirror hung, my makeup organized, and my jewelry displayed and it is awesome! I've still got my hair tools hanging out on the floor, but until I can build something for just under the table to holster there, they've got no where else to be that isn't totally in the way so whatever!




        So far, I haven't had much in the way of "down time" since it's still been a real battle to clear up everything and anything, and there are still boxes of stuff that we've been neglecting. I feel like we'll end up like that scene from the incredibles were Bob gets a call from his wife informing him that they are "officially" moved in because the boxes are all finally unpacked, even though they moved in months ago. I only finally found my 3DS today, and I was genuinely starting to get concerned that I had lost it. I think 90% of the stuff that hasn't been unpacked is the rest of the living room stuff that were wanted to keep, but now that we've got it here in the house, we don't know what to do with it.
TO give us a break from all of that, Tony and I went on a nice sunday drive through 236 and it was quite an adventure, very cool. Here is the only picture I took from the last third of our drive, there was so much more to see, but this wasn't a hassle to pull over and photograph.




        We also had our first guests sunday night! One of our friends was desperate to catch the premier for Game of Thrones and knew that I always wanted to host a viewing party, so we had a teeny little GoT party and it was a lot of fun, we had wine & beer, and meat and cheese (actually we had meat and cheese and potatoes because Steve brought over leftovers from a portuguese club meeting, and they were delicious) and we watched some incredible tv! Of course the first episode is never enough, what happened to Aria? where are Sansa and Little Finger going? Of course I don't want to know these things. I like to wait and see how the plot develops, kind of like my own life, actually. Now please excuse me, I've got some serious catching up to do on Animal Crossing.