free furniture

Last semester, I was headed out the door of the building when I spotted a piece of furniture that was out of place in the lobby. It had a sign that said "free", so of course I stopped to look closer. It was filthy and the paint was peeling off of it, but it had good lines and a ton of storage. So I called Ricky and asked if he and our friend Jacob could bring it upstairs. I cleaned the whole thing with bleach, pushed it into the unused portion of our front hallway(biggest waste of space, and the worst part of our weirdo floorplan), and there it sat for months.
At long last, when Winter break began, I finally got around to sanding, re-painting, and adding new hardware to the piece. I already had the paint, and the hardware cost $3. I left the piece in the hallway to dry, but when I came back a week ago, Ricky and I moved it into it's new space in the living room. It now serves as a backdrop to Henry's living room play area, and houses all of our DVDs and CDs inside it's drawers. The surface on top is perfect for displaying Henry's books and some of his favorite wooden toys, and there is room underneath for baskets to stash more toys. Re-arranging made the room feel much bigger, and I'm thrilled at all of the extra drawer-space we have now - we could do away with stacks of DVDs that were piling up around the television, and Henry's space is more organized. The piece isn't perfect, but it was free and I love it, so take a look!

Before - the chest sat in the hallway in pieces:

After - painted and moved to it's new home in the living room:

the living room gets a face lift

After living in the same apartment for three years, we finally got around to updating the living room. The walls were antique white when we moved in, the futon had a red slipcover, and the other color in the room was black. Black furniture, black rug, black curtain, bleh. I have had enough. Last week, Mom helped me paint the walls a warm brown, brought in new curtains, new rugs, new pillows in bright colors (orange, green, pink, turquoise), and - the best part - it's baby-proof!!! Henry has his own play space, and is free to roam the entire room. Unfortunately, we didn't get any exciting new furniture. We're still using all of Ricky's hand me downs from Grandpa Bill, and my few thrifted pieces from Goodwill. It may not be the most impressive display of interior design, but to me, it's amazing. Check it out:

Our Coors Cowboy has a new place of honor:

Henry's side of the room, complete with faux-fur zebra rug covered foam tiles (a kitty-obsessed toddler's dream):

The faithful futon and papasan have seen us through college:

My beautiful boy, loving on the rug he affectionately calls "kitt-y":