My Home Office

If you've ever wondered where I am when I write my blog posts, this is it. It's been a little over two months since we moved, and my little work space is finally getting close to how I want it.

I use the term "home office" loosely, as you can see. My desk is very much out in the open! So, I've tried to make it look as nice as possible without spending a lot of money.

With two monitors, I don't have a lot of room for much else on my desk. The keyboard and mouse are wireless so they can be shoved in my desk drawer when I'm writing or clipping coupons. I keep all the papers that need to be addressed (bills, coupon inserts) in one pile that I try to go through once a week. Other than that, I only have a coaster and a magnetic sculpture on my desktop.

My brother-in-law put up this shelf for me (thanks, Tim!) that I can use for my office supplies, a few design books...and toys.

Hanging from the shelf brackets are my cork board and dry erase board. I wish I'd taken before photos of these! For the cork board, I spray painted the frame of an old bulletin board, cut fabric to size and adhered it to the cork with spray adhesive. The dry erase board was just a large picture frame that I also spray painted. It had a collage mat in it that I wrapped with matching fabric and put behind the glass.

It's may not be the fanciest home office, but it's a functional and happy office!

And unlike at my cubicle at work, I can actually see outside!

Shared at Take it on Tuesday at Romance on a Dime.

Recycled Wedding Invitation Ornament

Wondering what to do with your extra wedding invitations? Or need a Christmas gift for a newlywed? Here's one idea.

One night I was going through my DIY Ideas board on Pinterest and making a list of what I would need to actually make some of the crafts I had pinned. When I came across this invitation ornament, I realized I already had everything I needed and got started right away. I was finished in about an hour.

All you have to do is cut the invitation into strips, curl each strip, and put them inside an empty glass ornament. If you have an X-Acto knife, you can use that for the cutting and then curl the strips around the handle (after removing the blade of course).

Nathan was a little disturbed when he saw me cutting up our wedding invitation, but I assured him it was okay since we still had a bunch of them. Then he reminded me we had gotten rid of all the extras and that was the only one we had left. Oops. Good thing I still have the original files and extra paper.

I realized I never actually blogged about my wedding invitations, so here's what they looked like before I mutilated them.

I actually cut up the entire suite, but I ended up just using the strips from the invitation and a few of the more interesting ones from the other pieces. The ornament was plenty full.

It fits right in with all the other mismatched ornaments. Our tree looks mostly the same as it did last year.

I wanted to buy one new Hallmark ornament this year, and we picked out Tom and Jerry.

Another change is that we're using Bob and Larry as our tree topper this year. Maybe someday I'll buy or make a real tree topper, but it's kind of fun to decide what to put on top as we're decorating it.

Did you do anything with your wedding invitation?

The Home of My Our Dreams

Source: thriftysolutionsforanurbangal.blogspot.com via Amanda on Pinterest

I used to love watching the design shows on HGTV. I would look at all the beautiful remodels and think about how beautiful my own home would be. I've also collected a lot of images of home decor from design blogs and Pinterest.

It's fun to dream about the perfect bathroom...

Source: homestoriesatoz.com via Amanda on Pinterest

Or the ultimate kitchen...

Source: theinspiredroom.net via Amanda on Pinterest

But the thing I didn't realize before I was married? It isn't just up to me what my home looks like. It turns out some men actually have opinions about the way their homes are decorated! 

 

A man might hang up a fuzzy stocking poster in the bedroom because he made it in his college graphic design class and he's proud of it. And if his wife asks why it has to be on display in the bedroom, he may respond, "Where else should we put it?"

Or, a husband may wonder why his wife thinks a "random jar" qualifies as a decorative item - a beautiful, antique Ball jar that many women would love to have for all sorts of decorative purposes!

No, this isn't just my home. This is our home. A home where two opinions of what is and isn't beautiful clash and sometimes compromise. A home where a dog thinks tennis balls and stuffed hedgehogs belong in the kitchen. And one day, we'll have kids adding their own personalities and styles.

The year I had an apartment all to myself, I could decorate however I wanted. I could hang up my French posters and display my Ball jar without being questioned. But I'd rather come home to a husband and a dog than a lonely apartment decorated my way. While I may not love all of my husband's things, I love him enough that I can at least tolerate them. 


Home is really all about the people. It's about what you do in the home. Forget the little things you don't like about where you live and just focus on living!


 

A Simple Living Room Makeover

After a year of living together, we've come up with a lot of ideas of how we could make our space work better for us. Our big project this summer has been trying to better organize and arrange our apartment and, more importantly, get rid of anything we don't need in order to make our lives easier the next time we move. We aren't spending a lot of money or making enough changes to have dramatic before and after photos, but it's still been rewarding to see the improvements.

Before: Our bookshelves were a mess, and our floor was cluttered with hardware and tools that Nathan was using to build a test computer (for Server 2008 and Linux, for those who care).

After: With the bookshelves side by side and the TV moved out of the corner, suddenly we had tons of space! We used one of our end tables as a makeshift desk for the test computer. The TV is now directly in front of our couch.

Before

 

After: We finally hung up our wedding photo with our signed matte!

Before: I had my books on a couple small shelves on the far back wall behind the couch.

After: The larger shelf moved into the second bedroom to hold some of our less attractive books and binders, and the chair we had in the living room replaced it.

The other bookshelf replaced the end table we're now using as a computer desk.

To make more room on our bookshelves, we filled a box with books we want to sell or give away. We also boxed up some of our books that we want to keep but don't need on our shelves, most of which are kids' books.

And there you have it - a few small changes that have made our living room a much more pleasant place to live.

Fun with The Island of Misfit Ornaments

I decided to check out the Target 90% off Christmas sale today. There really wasn't much left at all. I guess if there's something I really want next year I'd better get it right after Christmas.

It was mostly "The Island of Misfit Ornaments," like this reindeer with one antler.

And...a toaster ornament?

 

But I did find these partridge and poinsettia ornaments that I really liked. I kind of stared at them for a while in the store, trying to decide what I could do with them, and then bought five of them along with some raffia that was also 90% off

Put them together, and you have a Christmas garland!

I like how it's Christmasy, but not overly so. I still don't plan to keep it up year round though. In fact, it fell down just a few minutes ago since I just had it taped to the window. I'll have to work on a better hanging method when it's time to decorate next year.

Did you find any great buys during the after Christmas sales?

Decking the Halls

We don't have a lot of Christmas decorations in our apartment, but we did add a few seasonal touches.

We bought this 4' Christmas tree for half price. It's plenty big to hold all the ornaments we currently own on the front side alone.

I had considered a few possibilities for a tree topper but didn't want to spend a lot of time or money on one. While I was getting my hair cut last week, Nathan went to buy some lights for the tree, and I got back home to see Snoopy sitting on top. I really like it. I have 11 plastic Snoopy ornaments, so this Snoopy we got on our honeymoon fits right in.

The only Christmas decoration I really wanted to buy was 

an "Our First Christmas Together" ornament.

The ornament I made Nathan for Christmas last year

This was one of my favorites on our tree growing up. 

My mom gave it to me after Christmas last year for my own tree.

Nathan's had this wolf on top of his TV since I've known him.
I decided he needed a little decorating.

Our advent calendars and Christmas cards on the refrigerator

Snowman night light

I took the normal decorations off the top of our short bookshelf and put up some Christmas candles and a snow globe. I gave the snow globe to my grandma when I was little since she hated snow, and now it's a reminder of her.

What are your favorite Christmas decorations?