My apartment bedroom

After I moved out of my house I moved into an apartment, and I'm currently using the master bedroom as a bedroom/closet/office hybrid. My bed is pushed up against the wall, and the headboard serves as a divider between the bedroom and the office, with felt daisy garland strands hanging from the ceiling to add a little extra separation between the two spaces.





The bedding and wall tapestry are both from my society6 shop. The tapestry felt like a great way to separate this section as its own little room since the rest of the space is just painted plain pink. 





In my old bedroom in my house all of the artwork was sleep-themed, and I kept a few of my favorites on display here as well! The "literally nothing" poster print is from The Motivated Type, the "Less drama" print is from Hollie Startup, the "Worries can't reach me" print is from A Soft Wrongness, and the "Tired all the time" poster print is from Exquisite Paradox.

The giant poster of the sleeping woman is actually a vintage ad for bed sheets that I bought on ebay and scanned so I could blow it up to 30" x 40"! I'm SO thrilled with how it came out. The ad already had a bit of a halftone pattern, so it upscaled beautifully and it just looks so perfect hanging above my bed. I uploaded the file to my google drive, if you want you can download it here.

I don't have room for a nightstand, so I decided to hang a floating shelf and use that instead! It actually works great - I was a little worried at first that I was going to constantly bump my head on it, but I don't actually end up sleeping anywhere near the edge of it - so far so good! I also have a discreet ipad holder on the underside of the shelf. I love reading on my kindle app in bed and using one of those remote page turners so I can be extra cozy laying on my side, all bundled up in my blankets!

The bedroom in my house (which I'll be sharing soon!) was an all-time vintage inspired kitschy dream room and I'll never be able to compete with that, but I am pretty darn pleased with how my little bedroom nook looks in my new apartment. And it's so, so comfy! I'm not exaggerating when I say that my favorite part of every day is getting into this bed and cuddling with Arrietty before I go to sleep. It's a perfect cozy oasis!

my home cinema!

For a little while, I lived the dream! As an obsessive cinephile there was nothing I wanted more in my house than my own little home theater. Not just to watch movies (duh!) but also to finally have a home for my massive collection of movie posters that I had been hoarding and collecting for decades. This will sound so silly but there were times when I didn't even watch a movie, I just stood in the theater and looked around at it. I was just so happy to have it, so grateful that life led me to a place where I could devote a room in my home to my love of the movies. Even if this only lasted a little over a year, I will look back fondly on this room, the memories I made in here, and the warm fuzzy celluloid feelings it gave me.

Now, first let's take a look at the before photo, from when I first got the keys!



Me and my brother built the arched entryway from plywood (not the most perfect way to do it, but it did the trick!) and I made my Cinema sign using my laser printer. 



I don't know how many people would want to recreate this, but if you're looking for authentic home theater carpeting I highly recommend the one I got, here. It came rolled up and I hired a local flooring company to install it for me as wall-to-wall carpeting. This was one of the first things I did when I moved in (the rug was literally sitting in the POD in my parents' driveway before it was even delivered to the house on move-in day lol!) and it immediately made the house feel like it was mine!



The chairs were all from Wayfair (I just searched for "black recliner" and then sorted the results from cheapest to highest price and picked the cheapest ones lol) I put the back row chairs on furniture risers so that they'd have a little more clearance to see the screen. Each chair had a blue quilt (from the kid's section at Target!) so we could all be extra cozy during the movies!





I used the wall behind the roll-down screen to store my DVD collection and also to highlight three of my all-time favorite films. Above the shelving I had printed out pictures of my favorite movie stars and put them in Dollar Store frames. 









My house didn't have a ton of closet space, so at the back of the theater I had two utility cabinets filled with pantry items and household essentials (toilet paper, my vacuum and broom, paper towels, etc.) and then I used the side of one of the cabinets to build a mini concession stand for candy and popcorn!



I've mostly come to terms with having to give up this house, especially since I was able to move a lot of my furniture and knick-knacks and artwork into my apartment. But I just don't have the room anymore for most of these posters and they're back in storage. I can't imagine I'll ever own a house again (I don't even know if I would want to after this ordeal) but I really miss having my own little theater. 

long time no see!

Hey! Long time, no see. I mean on this blog at least - I've still been posting things on social media so maybe it's not long time no see, maybe you literally just saw my instagram stories earlier tonight!

Anyway, a lot has happened since my last post when I was giddy with excitement over my cup holder bags and mere months away from getting the keys to an actual real life house. I spent most of the last two years knee-deep in decorating projects and making my house the most fun, colorful, retro, happy PINK house that I possibly could! I made the den into a home theater complete with a 90s inspired patterned carpet, I turned my guest room into a time-travel room that was a replica of my childhood bedroom! I had cat doors for Arrietty everywhere and pink carpeting upstairs. I covered the kitchen in a fun retro pink flower power wallpaper and made an arcade in my basement. It was so fun! 

I had to put the house up for sale this past summer (long story, you can read more here) and it officially closed on Friday. I just realized that most of the photos of my house that have been circulating around the internet for the last 6 months all came from the Realtor listing so I wanted to post them here and give them a real home 💖 

I'll break this up into a few posts so it's not like a hundred photos at once! Let's start with the kitchen! This might be the room that changed the most over the ~2 years I lived there. I had a hard time getting it perfect, but by the time these photos were taken I was finally completely, totally happy with how it looked. I loved the color scheme, the fun wallpaper, the mismatched color chairs, and my checkered rug. It was just SUCH a happy room!

I made a thing

Hey, long time no see! Since this was, once upon a time, a fashion blog, I felt like I should post a little update for anyone out there who might still be checking in to let you know that I designed a purse! And it's got a heart emblem and scallops because my taste in clothing and accessories has not changed one iota in the last 10 years lol!

I'm selling these on Kickstarter and I already passed my goal - by A LOT, actually - and if you'd like one you can pre-order right here. They're designed to hold a water bottle, they're available in 12 colors (including a Halloween themed version!!) and they're available through August 12th.

Also if anyone misses me (??) I'm still posting regularly on twitter and I joined tiktok!

 

undeniable determination

This is a close approximation of what I was wearing on February 7, 2011, exactly ten years ago! You can see my original outfit post right here. I don't have that dress anymore, which is a shame since it was one of my first adventures in sewing. But even with my alterations I still didn't wear it very often, mostly because the bodice was too long for me (you can see it bunching a bit in the pictures) and I didn't know at the time that it was only like a $10 fix at the tailor. Also I hardly ever smiled in my photos back then. I wasn't sad, I just didn't think I looked nice when I smiled, and that in turn makes me a little sad. I'm glad I finally got over that at some point and let my happiness show in my photos now :)

This dress was a recent find on Thredup (not sponsored) which is where I've been getting a lot of my new-to-me clothes recently. I love color and fun patterns and bold designs just as much as I always have, but most stores seem to only be selling clothes in various shades of grey and beige these days. So I've been getting my shopping fix buying slightly used clothing instead! I especially love that they have a "fit and flare" filter on their dress page! All I have to do is scan the listings for pops of color and shopping is a breeze lol!

Also, this bow tie is actually a hair tie with a duck bill clip in the back. I attached it by putting a bobby pin on the neckline of my dress and then attaching the bow to the bobby pin. The bow mostly hides the pin, so you don't even see it! It's my new favorite clothing hack! I got a few of these hair bows in different colors and can't wait to start adding a little vintage bow flair to some of my dresses!

dress - J Crew (via thredup) | shoes - bait footwear | bow - amazon