Our Home Is Now A Mid-Century Modern Greenhouse

Sam and I moved into a highrise condo a while back, the nicest place we've lived in to date! It's caused me to go on an obsessive decorating spree in an attempt to recreate the West Elm catalogs that keep showing up in my mailbox. I also learned that Overstock and Amazon are a godsend when you live downtown; nearly all of the items pictured below were bought online and shipped to our door. Details and product links are listed at the bottom!

Midcentury Modern Interior Design with Houseplants

My goal was to create a minimalist zen aesthetic, believing it'd be the easy thing to do. (It's not.) Sam, being the practical one, seized the opportunity to push for a massive Spring Cleaning before our big move. In an effort to simplify our lives, we donated/tossed two-thirds of our possessions accrued over the past 2 years! I was really happy to finally kick my compulsive hoarding habit. Adulthood status attained! I still misplace things constantly and forget that the glasses I'm searching for are on my face, but that won't never change.

This also marks the first time ever that I've made an effort to buy non-IKEA furniture — the kind that won't fall apart after two more moves. The live edge walnut coffee table was my biggest splurge; it was custom built by a talented woodworker from Kansas and I intend to treasure it for a very long time.

Bloom Sofa (Dania Furniture) and Walnut Live Edge Slab Table

The open kitchen is my favorite area; it's been totally utilitarian and brightly sunlit for all of summer. I feel somewhat pressured to keep it spotless, but I am lazy by nature. So I sweep food crumbs under the rugs.

Safavieh Shag Scrollwork Rug, to tie the room together!

In the midst of all this decorating, I've acquired something of a green thumb. I am convincing enough that people ask me for recommendations, despite the fact that I selected every plant in our home based solely on hardiness. (Also, that orange orchid arrangement is fake.) I am pretty happy with how the driftwood terrarium turned out, though! That one was fussy as hell and took three tries to get right.

Living Room

Kitchen

Small Plants

  • Mini Succulents (terrarium)

  • Mini Cacti

  • Jade Plant

  • Aloe Park Avenue

  • Tillandsia Air Plants

Large Plants

  • Heart Leaf Philodendron

  • Silk Orchids (I cheated a bit)

  • Xerographica Air Plant

  • Green Hydrangeas (table vase)

  • Prayer Plant (keyboard)

An Introduction: Why I Write Badly & Intermittently

When I was in school, I remember vividly how I would spend hours crafting my websites and blog posts: a staple of my youth. I kept a Livejournal throughout most of high school and college, back when the site was a bustling online community for maudlin teens to twenty-somethings with an abundance of feelings and a lack of spellcheck. These days, reading my old journal elicits both warm nostalgia and second-hand embarrassment in equal measure. Yet there's a small part of me that wishes I could return to a simpler time in my life. I will never be able to write in that overly sentimental, foolhardy style of days long past. But perhaps I can connect with you all the same, kind reader.

I look back fondly on my "LJ Days," as it were — full of silly memes, surveys, fandom blogs, and RP chatrooms. When you are a lifelong introvert, you tend to express yourself far better through written words than face-to-face interaction. The older you get, the more you learn to appreciate those little time capsule remains of your younger self — decidedly less subtle and self-aware, yet brimming with hope and optimism. Nowadays I'm older, wiser (LOL), and slightly less prone to spelling errors and snap judgments, so maybe this time capsule will be less embarrassing for future me to revisit.

So that's the gist of why I started blogging again. Please feel free to lurk, comment, or subscribe to this blog if you find something that interests you. Thank you for your time, kind reader!

Tools of the trade.

Tools of the trade.