Excuses (and some progress)

I have 4 reasons (excuses) why I haven’t updated my blog this week. 

1. I’ve been sick.
2. We had a funeral on Friday.
3. I drove 450 miles yesterday. In mostly LA traffic (if you have never had the pleasure, it means I literally drove at 30mph on a freeway for 70 miles). I felt like doing nothing when I got home. So we tried out the Italian place across the street. They’re “known” for their pizza. Don’t know why, it ain’t that great- the cheese is especially lackluster. Now, I didn’t mind, as I was on my second glass of wine in 30 minutes when the food got there, so anything was just fine. But the hubs, he was not impressed. And it wasn’t particularly cheap. Or fast. Now, you can almost never have something that is great value, fast AND well made… but you can usually get 2 out of 3. This hit 0 out of 3.
4.  I don’t think apartment therapy realized just how many cabinets I’m in possession of when it suggested emptying them and cleaning them out. My kitchen is small, but it is ALL cabinets. I have 14 cabinet doors in my kitchen. 14. But I’m working on it! So far, I’ve gotten thru… 4. Ok, so I *may* need to work a little bit faster. But I’ve got myself a catch-up list (of, a-hem, 42 items totaling and estimated 16 hours and 12 minutes of work) , so hopefully later this week you will be inundated with content.

January "Cure", my @ss

Getting your shit together is HARD. I myself managed to get a massive ear infection that wiped out my energy almost completely. I did manage to clean the fridge inside and out AND do the top pantry cabinet, so that was a good accomplishment (I’ll share photos later. Probably.).

But, um…. I seem to be behind on this January Cure situation.  Mostly because I had a January Illness (hello, irony, party of 1- actually, it's January. It's not remotely ironic that I got sick. I almost ALWAYS catch something in January). I made a list of all the shit I’m behind on. 

Catch-Up Projects:

Day 3: floors

-mop kitchen

-mop bathroom

-deep clean living room rug

Day 7: invites

-create an invite and invite people over for February

Day 8: kitchen

- clean oven

-clean stove

-clean & organize drawers

- clean food storage shelves & organize (1/2 done)

-clean sink

-clean flatware/glassware shelves

Day 9: landing strip

- purchase coat hanger (or hooks & mount to back of changing table)

-purchase recycle mail bin

-mount coat hanger

-get tall side table (or move filing cabinet next to door.. or hang a shelf?)

- make a landing strip (it’s a place to put your KEYS DOWN, not the other kind of landing strip)

Day 10: work on your project

-clean the windows

-decide on a paper and/or give up and hang curtains

I think I need to extend the January Cure by 2 days to account for January Illness. Also, I really don’t want to invite people over in February. It’s a short month, and my birthday’s right in the middle of it. Which also, while we’re on it, I don’t really want to celebrate my birthday anymore. The last 2 birthdays were pretty sad and while maybe I can con my friends into throwing me a party this year (because I threw parties for 2 of them), if I have to plan my own birthday, it’s going to involve a book, a blanket, and liberal administration of vodka sodas. Oh, and a guest list of 1.

More on Creepy Windows

Day 7 of Apartment Therapy’s January Cure is kind of a blogging non-starter. I need to invite some friends over for February so they can see my apartment in all its post-Cure glory.

But the creepy windows are still vexing me. I showed the hubs all the different samples I showed you here, but it turns out…. I kind of hate the ones he likes.  He thinks we shouldn’t put up white because the walls are tar-stain white (my name for the color. It’s probably officially called “cheapest we could make off-white”) and it will underscore the problem.

 Of course, my beautiful, wonderful, adorable friend Fio offered to come over for a “painting party”, so it’s entirely possible that the wall color won’t be an issue. How do I have awesome enough friends to volunteer to come over and help paint my apartment? Honestly, luckiest girl in the world right here.

ANYWAY, the other issue is that I went and measured the windows, and they are MUCH larger than the 24x36” that most of these rolls come in. They are in fact 23.5 x 47 inches. And I know I could line up the paper, but then there would be a seam. In a window. Super obvious, and the kind of thing likely to send me to the nuthouse eventually (well, sooner than is already expected).

This morning, while agonizing over this, I remembered that the amazing Daniel over at Manhattan Nest had a similar problem with creepy glass doors in his last apartment and covered his glass with sheer white fabric. Which is totally cheaper. And he made a tutorial. Because he is a damn DIY superhero. 

So now I need to

1. Find a good, cheap white fabric and 
2. Figure out what color to paint that room so that I can
3. Convince the hubs that this is, in fact, an excellent idea. Once I convince myself of that.
   Also we need new curtains. 
   

I think the January Cure might be more expensive than just about any other cure out there.

The War Wages On....

It's Day 6 of Apartment Therapy's January Cure, and the task is deceptively simple: to frame some artwork you’ve been meaning to hang. So I’ll be picking up a couple of frames on my way home from Target (they’ve got some decent ones on sale… or they did on Monday). 

 As I mentioned, ahem, a year and a half ago (I am so special), my dining room/ kitchen is going for a WWII-theme. I was going to do 2 vintage repro propaganda posters but…I kind of bought a WWII-themed Doctor Who poster. Because I had to.  But I still need one more poster. I have an awesome  retro clock, one poster, and a strong need for a second. But which one? I have it narrowed down to 4.

See, Poster I have, Clock I have, Posters to choose from.

Also, I don’t know if they’ll need mats. I’m thinking yes. Then the question is, do I cut the mats myself, or have them cut for me? I do actually have beveled mat-cutter and some experience cutting mats from going to art school for 2 years when I found out that NONE of the community college’s design classes transferred to 4 year school but ALL of the fine arts classes did. So I matted a lot. But that was long ago… and frankly, I was never any good at it. Actually, it got worse when we had to start mounting things onto board for design school. In summation, I think the fact that I have the focus of a goldfish with a head injury works against me. 

Oh, yeah, the point! Anyway, GETTING things matted is expensive but buying mats and cutting them yourself is pretty reasonable. And you know I’m cheap. So…. I’ll probably see if I can pay attention for the 5 minutes it takes to cut a mat. 10 for 2…. It’s adding up quick and I’m already losing interest- not a good sign.

Anyway, do you have a favorite from the above posters?

Curing Creepy Windows (Day 5 of the January Cure)

The task for day 5 was to pick one project off the list and start doing stuff related to that project. I picked 2 (because I ‘m a rebel). 1 is to clean off the damn fridge. Which I did nothing about. At all. I actually put MORE shit on top of the fridge (because I’m a rebel?). The other thing was to start researching window films to cover our den/office/2^nd bedroom’s window.

We have what must be the most awkward window in the city.  It looks out onto our neighbor’s gated porch. We are the ONLY apartment in the complex that has this feature. And it’s just creepy. It’s creepy to have the neighbors looking in, it’s creepy to be looking out at them on their porch. There is no party that comes out without a creep factor with this window. 

There are blinds up, but we have cats, so they don’t stay closed. And there WERE curtains up but the guest we had in there for a while accidentally broke the incredibly cheap curtain rod and I haven’t replaced it. Because, I am special. Anyway, this window needs to be semi- permanently obscured, because no one in the history of ever needs this view.

Did you know that window film can get really fucking expensive? I mean, I know that ANYTHING can get marked up into oblivion, but seriously, $80 to cover ONE window? This is like that whole $300 wallpaper situation. It makes me want to scream I KNOW WHAT IT COSTS TO DESIGN AND PRINT THIS SHIT, WHAT ARE YOU TRYING TO PULL? And then I remember that the reason I know this is because I’m a designer, so stop being so lazy and design and print it yourself. (That was directed at me, not you. I like you. Probably.) 

But anyway, I found some pre-printed/patterned window films that don’t make me angry and now I just have to choose one (the hubs is being consulted). I kind of want to go for a stained-glass look… except… I know me and I know I’ll get tired of it in like, a nano-second, and then I’ll just leave it there and hate it OR tear it down and not replace it and we’ll be right back here in the “what to do about the window” situation.

Pretty colors... but a good idea?

Which leads us to the translucent varieties. Which are probably better. But I don’t know…. Having a serious Pisces moment. I’ll probably let the hubs tie-break this one. So, once we pick a style, then I just have to measure the windows, buy the film, clean the windows, measure the windows again (measure twice, cut once), cut the film and apply it.

Frankly, if Anthropologie made a painfully expensive version of this stuff, I'd probably buy it.

Maybe I’d better just go clean off the fridge…

Day 4 of the January Cure

First off, I would like to note that I have done 3 of my 20 list items! And the January Cure didn't mention most of them yet. So that's fairly brilliant, really.

Day 4 (really 6, but the weekends count as one day, I guess) of the January Cure was to sit somewhere in your apartment that you generally don't sit and look around. For 10 minutes. I felt like I was on time-out, and the hubs asked me what in the world I was doing, but I did notice a few things. Like the fact that our walls are seriously bare. And that I have GOT to sort out the shelf situation.

See, I like this shelf. I like all the red and black and this and that. Except for the candle in the frosted glass, I would keep every item on this shelf. I might move the smaller frame elsewhere, but the rest is great. The shelf, however, is not. And see the screws above the shelf? There was supposed to be another shelf. But it fell off the wall. A lot, actually. So I got rid of the kamikaze shelf long ago, but the screws remain. And this shelf still looks lonely all by itself (itshelf? no?).

Also, I need to get some curtains up. Honestly, you'd think some college kids with better than average taste lived here.Except I'm a grown up. Technically. So........................... guess I'd better sort this out.

This post was kind of depressing. Know what wasn't? This great bit of street art/graffiti that I managed to capture before they painted it over.

Day 3 of the January Cure: Floors & Flowers

Continuing on in this January Cure, this weekend was dedicated to cleaning the floors and buying flowers. Buying cut flowers is apparently important. They bought several bunches. In true “perfect” fashion, I bought the cheapest fresh-looking ones available and supplemented with a stolen palm branch (thanks, apartment!).  But my vase matches my cake stand, so I get points for that, right? Right. 

I was also supposed to buy green cleaners but I HAVE baking soda and a gallon jug of vinegar, and I didn’t make it to the green grocer and this girl does NOT pay 60 cents for a lemon unless it’s an emergency. Especially if I need several. No way, jose. So I got some carpet cleaner (not on their list), toilet cleaner with bleach (not on their list), some dawn dish soap (not the biodegradable soap on their list), and some sponges (hey! That one’s actually on the list!). 

Natural cleaners are great in the kitchen. Natural cleaners are great in general. I myself use a damp cloth to dust with. Natural cleaners do not fly in the bathroom with me.  You know what’s natural? Germs. You know what germs occur naturally in? Bathroom things. So I bring bleach, and nature can suck it. Yeah, you heard me.

Oreo liked the tree. He was not pleased when it went away.

Anyway, it was a rough weekend, so real cleaning didn’t happen until Sunday when we took down the Christmas tree.

So…. the floors maybe aren’t mopped yet?  And I maybe just did a basic vacuuming of the living room? But the hallway, den, and bedroom floors are CLEAN. Like, roll on the floor clean. 

Plus, I reorganized the kitchen (finally) to reclaim some counter space. When the brother-in-law lived with us, he reorganized the kitchen so that my KitchenAid mixer wouldn’t have to be pulled forward every time we used it. Which is good. But it meant that the microwave moved from its happy little microwave hutch onto the counter and ate all the counter space.

And then there was extra space on the hutch, and you know how random crap is attracted to empty space. 

So, the (red) toaster oven moved over next to the (red) KitchenAid mixer and the microwave moseyed into the unused corner at an angle, and it’s making me fairly happy right now. 

Except I don’t know where to put my adorable Anthro-like measuring cups now, but maybe some hook installation is in order. We’ll see. Now if I could just repaint the cabinets and install my red knobs and maybe put in a backsplash, I’d be one rapturous camper. (Happy +40)

Actually from Pier1