apartment decorating UPDATE

So we have been doing a lot of work with the apartment and I love love it! Here are some pics:

his and her comfy chair corner in master bedroom-those pillows were a housewarming present from my husband when we were engaged for our first apartment

our gallery wall- more to come!

wall decorating for rentals

I love walls- they feel like a huge canvas waiting to be filled. I like filling a room with color by painting and using accent walls. My last apartment, we got it before we actually moved in so we had time to paint. And literally every day I was there (about a year a half), I would exclaim "I just love these walls, they look so good against the flowers, the picture frames, the tablecloth, etc".

In this new apartment, all the walls are a cream white. This is really not my usual thing, because I love color but I am seeing the pluses to it. The light is really bounced off the walls well, and I see how it is possible to inject color into a room without necessarily painting it- like pictures, furniture, and fun accents. That being said, I still really want to decorate my walls. There are so many solutions for renters now- I will round them up for you. 

1. Fabric as wallpaper with using starch as glue

howaboutorange.blogspot.com

I'm back...and decorating :)

So the past couple of weeks have been crazy with making my apartment liveable and finishing up a paper for school. I have also been procrastinating getting back into blogging because it is intimidating for me to keep up relevant and exciting posts. I get a little nervous sometimes. But I know I want to do this, and that its good for me, so I'm just gonna push through the discomfort.

I am so happy to be in this new apartment. It feels so spacious and has very bright lighting, even being a basement. All the white walls feel like an exciting canvas that is begging to be filled up.
Originally there are two small boxy rooms that are meant to be bedrooms, and a large random shaped room for the living area. But I don't like such small bedrooms, so we switched it- one of the small rooms will be our dining room, and the large room will be for us. We are not doing that much entertaining at this point in our lives that it makes sense to crowd ourselves into a tiny room. This apartment is for us to feel comfortable and relaxed in. Hosting is fun, but its really not the main point here.

Below are pictures of what I would call stage 1 of decorating- it is liveable, most of the boxes are gone, and the main furniture is there. Next up will be the start of injecting some style and color into the place. I have already started putting up a gallery wall, and I have so many ideas for everything. so fun!

Our boxy dining room- we are currently using folding chairs, but I want to get proper wood ones, and a red comfy chair for a corner. I put up display shelves for the random bottles and vases I have- I love collecting them!

MOVING

I am so happy to be finally moving. Our new place is a lot bigger than our old one. Its a basement though, so I will have to be creative in making it cheery and bright. The ceilings are super low, but the current lighting is pretty good. Right now its all white, which is so not my thing, so I can't wait to make it colorful. I love house decorating! The only real piece of furniture we have now is a table and mattresses, with a couple of dressers, so we have a lot to do. Here are some current pics (before all our boxes came in).

decorating with glass bottles

So I did another collage on a bottle.

 I actually really like collecting interesting and unique bottles and vases. They can be used to decorate tables, display shelves, holding flowers, and even made into a lamp!

decorating with scarves

I'm getting a home decor bug because I am looking forward to moving. I realized that my scarves can be used for a lot of temporary decor ideas.

print wallpaper vs bright-colored shelves

As another artistic outlet, I love house decorating. Its such a fun challenge to figure out how to work with the space you have AND make it pretty. I have *some* experience with this, as our last apartment was a studio, as in there was no doors (except for the bathroom!), and I had to figure out to use every inch wisely. Just to add to the fun, it was me, my husband, and my baby (until he was 6 months). Don't worry, we have since gotten out of there. But it was a wonderful lesson on living clutter-free and creating a homey and inviting space. We even had plenty of guests for dinners, no joke.
Back to the topic, I really enjoy looking at house decorating blogs and getting ideas. In case you haven't noticed, I love bright colors. One idea for shelves I really like is white with the inside painted a fun color like this teal.

younghouselove.com