Our apartment is finally a
home!! We've put a lot of work into turning it from a dumpy little apartment into the perfect little first-home for us newlyweds. Here are a few pictures:
First, the dining room (notice all the "thank you" cards sitting on the table... we've been hard at work on those). And, I BUILT that cabinet all by myself, with power tools & all. Super wife.
My favorite part of the dining nook is probably the blue wall. It perfectly matches the upholstery on our dining chairs (which I reupholstered all by myself, also with power tools).
I love this room/nook.
Next, and quite possibly my favorite room *aside from the bedroom* is our adorable little living room! we bought that big 37" flat screen HDTV and a BlueRay player that streams NetFlix. It was a great purchase, and we've already gotten tons of use out of it.
Though I don't love decorating with the color red, our two red couches are very comfy and actually make the room feel cozy and homey. I'm very pleased with this room, and it has a great view into our little balcony garden. =)
Next up, Nathan's office. This room used to be my bedroom when I lived here with sweet Caroline last year. Now we are using this extra bedroom as office space, since Nathan will have lots of reading & writing to do in these next two years of his Masters program at Vanderbilt.
One of my favorite things about this room is the chair in the corner (it's kind of hard to see in this picture). It used to be a very outdated chair, blue with pink polka-dots, complete with ruffles around the bottom. Well, we cut off the ruffles and found a perfect stretchy slipcover to put over it, and it seriously looks like a completely different piece of furniture. It's hard to believe that it used to be an eyesore... now it's one of the best assets in that room!
Another highlight of the office is the dart board hanging on the back wall. I got it for Nathan for Christmas this year, and he's finally able to start using it. It really makes the office a cool, classy, intellectual space... perfect for Nathan. Now he can take breaks from writing philosophical and theological papers to shoot a few darts while sipping on bourbon and smoking a cigar (the last two are probably false, but I like the imagery).
And the last photo I have of the apartment is our wonderful kitchen. Seriously, I love our kitchen. Now, it's definitely not a "dream kitchen" (that would be the kitchen at Nathan's parents'-- ahem, MY in-laws-- house. Amish-built cabinets? yes please), but its the best kitchen I've seen in any apartment of this size. The only thing it's lacking in is countertop space, but we've found ways to make-do.
My favorite thing about the kitchen is this little shelf. Nathan used to have it next to his desk at his old apartment, and then he had the brilliant idea to use it to hang pots! It currently serves as our pot rack, fruit basket hanger, cat-food storage, cookbook shelf, recycling center, and miscellaneous storage. I love it.
It is so amazing to finally be settled in with my husband. There are, of course, still a few last things to do (like finish writing those thank-you notes!), but the bulk of the work is done!
Our next projects are to hang shelves to decorate the blue wall in the dining nook and, my personal favorite, our hallway of family photos. On the main hallway, we're going to start a family ancestry wall. We've got a lot of great old photos framed and ready to be hung, and I'm excited to get it started! This is my favorite of Nathan's photo contributions. It's an old photo of 4 generations of Dryden men (he's the youngest one in the photo, obviously). It's such a great photo, and I'm excited to have it hanging in our home.
That's all for now. I'll be posting again soon with some of my recent cooking adventures!
