Following Rabbits Blog — at home

I've been living in my apartment for almost five months now, and I'm still trying to get my act together. An issue I've been grappling with are my empty walls. I have high ceilings and huge expanses of plain white walls-- my hallway alone is over 20 feet long and 10 feet high. I have several pieces of artwork and framed photographs from my last apartment that at least make the place look lived in, but I'm dying for something that'll give my apartment some personality and pops of color. I've been seeing vinyl wall decals everywhere, I especially love these from Etsy:

set of 6 vinyl vintage photo frames from SimpleShapes $38.99

vinyl branch and bird with frames by willowcreeksigns $59.95

vinyl wall decals by artwallproject

plum flowers by walldecors $35.75

vinyl New York City skyline by WallStarGraphics $60

I have a friend who owns a vinyl cutting machine and loads of vinyl in great colors. I sent him a few ideas for my apartment, and he agreed to make me some decals! I'm pretty amped-- I definitely want some mod looking frames for my living room, and some Alice in Wonderland inspired designs for my bedroom. I'll share some photos when I get them and put 'em up!

I have a really weird kitchen set-up. My refrigerator stands alone in the middle of a raised tile floor. It's kind of an eyesore... I found this how-to on Martha Stewart Crafts and decided my fridge could use a little accessorizing. I bought different sized flat glass marbles at the dollar store, hit up Michael's Crafts on the UWS for Sobo glue and craft magnets, and sat in front of the TV tonight watching Lost and cutting little circles from my stack of magazines.

I alternated between cutting out numbers, zodiac signs, and mini Lady Gaga's and cursing the artist-formerly-known-as-John-Locke traipsing across my TV screen. (What a life I lead, huh?) They came out pretty cute!

I moved to Astoria February 1, and I still have things in boxes! For shame. I moved from a studio in Brooklyn where less was more: for two years my clothes were in makeshift file-box drawers in the closet for lack of a dresser. My new apartment is a very big 1-bedroom that I had picked out in January with my boyfriend. I figured when we mashed together all of our furniture we'd have more than enough, so no biggie, right? There was no mashing, and I have since become the sole occupier of the space- trying desperately to spread out! My bedroom remains completely empty save for my clothes (in boxes in the middle of the floor, natch). I'm not devastated by sleeping studio-style in the living room- I've got a killer walk-in closet and dressing room to make up for it. I was, however, itching to get my workspace set up again. My sewing machine, fabrics, ribbons, patterns, and screenprinting table have been stashed in a corner since I moved.

Anyone who reads my twitter feed knows that I've been planning a June trip to Paris. This weekend I got an unexpected Cherry Sunshine special request order that is going to fund my tickets! Ah, good karma pays off again. This bit of serendipitous news prompted a victory dance and the speedy set up of my new craft space.

I have an odd cubby-hole cut out of my long hallway. On one side is a closet door, and the rest is open space with an outlet. My sewing table fit perfectly! There's an overhead light, and I've installed a shelf in the closet to make a nice dark space for burning screens for my screenprinting table (Loyalty II Royalty hoodies coming soon!). Everything is stored in plastic tubs because Lily loooves to play with ribbons and zippers. I have a collage that I made my 1st week in NYC in an effort to spruce up my first apartment, and a cork board for random bits of memories and inspiration. I'm already halfway done with my magically lucky order, and am excited to start working on creative projects again! (Having all this space to myself isn't so bad after all.)

Like seemingly everything in my new-to-me apartment, my closets were a bit shabby looking when I moved in. Hence my clothes, shoes, and household things are still in boxes all over the place rather than tucked away in the 3 closets that I have. The shelves all had peeling contact paper, there were rogue hooks and nails all over the place, and the floors were splattered with paint. I went to Home Depot (my regular after-work haunt these days) and bought 2 rolls of contact paper- red and white for my living room and hallway closets, and blue and silver for my bathroom and bedroom. I started in the living room closet, wielding my hammer to pull out a dozen bent, painted nails. I swept the floor and pulled the shelves out, peeling as much of the old contact paper off as I could. I've never used contact paper, but I have a foggy memory of my mum using it back in the day. It's tacky enough to hold well, but not so sticky that you can't reposition it if you mess up. I wrapped the shelves like presents, putting the seams on the top of the shelves since I can only see the bottoms when they're in the closet.

I wedged the shelves back into position, and pulled out my trusty paintbrush and the white paint that I used for the bathroom ceiling. I painted the closet walls and then decided to paint the floor as well (security deposit be damned). It was already splattered with paint pretty badly, and I wanted it to look clean in there. I think it looks pretty good! I've already moved in my coats and board games, and tomorrow I'll toss my guitar amp in on that freshly painted floor. I'll clean up the other two closets before the weekend and once everything is stored inside, I'll finally be able to walk freely around my apartment! Small thrills, folks.

My bathroom was hurtin' when I moved in last week. The shower curtain rod looked like it was used to joust with 10 years ago then hung back up, all busted and rusty. The walls weren't painted between the last tenant moving out and me moving in, and the ceiling was yellowed and had mold spots... not good. We recently painted our offices at work, so lucky for me there was a bit of white paint left over that I used to paint the ceiling. Then I headed to Home Depot. My bathroom has tiles that go up most of the wall, so that saved me on having to buy a lot of paint for the walls. I picked a tropical green color from the color samples, and got a quart with a semi-gloss finish. I bought a kit for $9.95 that included a paint tray, rollers, a paint can opener, and a 2-inch brush and picked up a sandpaper block for a few bucks. I also bought a pair of yellow rubber gloves to scrub the bejeezes out of the tub, toilet and tiles. Finally, I got a new shower curtain rod, since the last one obviously gave me the willies. Grand total: $43.68. Time to get to work!

I started with the ceiling, cutting in around the edge with the brush then rolling the middle. I let it dry overnight, then taped the perimeter and around the window with painter's tape to paint the walls. The green I chose was pretty intense... I feel like I always realize paint is going to be darker than you think  once it's on your walls. It's probably a good rule to always go one shade lighter on your color chip than the shade you're choosing... that's been my experience anyway. I painted the green in 2 coats, while standing on a swivel stool (not a good idea) talking to my mum on the phone the entire time (really not a good idea). But it came out pretty good, if I do say so myself. And looks MUCH better than it did a week ago, thank goodness.