Sometimes I am Cheap part 2

I went to Target last week in search of a toothbrush holder. Much to my chagrin I realized they were wildly expensive. Why would I spend $6.99 on a toothbrush holder? First of all, I am going to die of E.coli anyway because toilet water soars through bathrooms contaminating everything in a 100 mile radius. Second, if I can make it myself, for essentially free, than I will. My materials included a can of Bush black beans, a rubber band, some paint and sealer.

Total cost $1.50. The paint and sealer we already had, can of beans was $0.50 and $1.00 for the broccoli. Where else would I get a heavy duty rubber band? My craftiness has proven fruitful once again!

I finally have my first love back

We bought a piano! It is the most beautiful piano in the whole wide world. You know when you are at the store and you find a semi-cute dress and then you look at the price tag and it only costs $4.00? All the sudden that dress is the most beautiful thing on this green earth! The same thing happened with this piano. I found it on craigslist for $300.00, a woman moving into a smaller house couldn't take her piano and was desperate to sell it. Michael and I drove to her house a few weeks ago to see if the piano would be a good purchase for us. I sat down, played all the keys, checked the petals and to my surprise the piano was in great condition. I played a little part of one of my favorite songs Claire de Lune. The woman selling the piano was so happy that I could play. She told me that she would sell it to us for $200 because she just wanted the piano to go to a good home. Michael told me after that we had everything we needed for our house now because, keep in mind we don't own any furniture for our living room, we had a piano and a bed. What more do you need?

Sometimes I am Cheap

I want a cute house. I want people to walk into our very "chic" one bedroom, zero furniture, partially painted, hoarder neighbor, "whats that scratching sound?" apartment and think, "wow, this is gorgeous!" But I am poor, we are poor. What is a girl to do? Solution: buy cheap crap and paint it! So thats exactly what we did. Allow me to introduce this cheap Ikea lamp.

Nothing to write home about. But give me thirty minutes, three do-overs and everything I learn during girls camp craft time and voila!

The first one was easy and I already liked the colors so I inversely painted the second lamp.

These lamps are my ticket to a gorgeous house! I just know that when we have guests over they will completely over look the fact that we have weird neighbors, ugly paint, and no furniture because we have stellar lamps!

Condensation

I have a problem. It is by far the most plaguing, bothersome thing in my life. It haunts me at least five times a week and anyone that has made toast with me before knows what this monster is: Condensation. Toast, when it comes out of the toaster all hot and crisp, is a beautiful thing. But all that deliciousness is for nothing when uninformed people put that toast on the counter. The cool counter condenses the steam from the hot toast and creates water on the counter that by proximity gets water on the toast. Might as well call it toast tears cause that water on the bread is... horrifying. My very talented brother made me a shirt for Christmas depicting this sad event.

Sad, so sad. My husband, being the genius he is thought of a very thoughtful and practical gift for me, an early birthday present, but it was much more than that. He gave me my toast back. He went to the store last night to buy me gift for my upcoming birthday and when he returned he had a big smile on his face. He told me that he had a present for me. I opened it and this is what I saw:

A napkin holder? He promptly explained that my assumption, while logical, was quite mistaken. In fact it was something far greater than a napkin holder it was, ladies and gentlemen, The Toast Pal. (he named it himself) He then when into a info-merical type dialogue explaining how "are you tired of your toast always getting soggy on the counter? well not anymore with your handy dandy Toast Pal." As silly as it was the toast pal one of the most thoughtful gifts I have ever received. He also bought me a rose, just in case the toast pal wasn't a hit, but it was!

Life in California

Michael and I have been stationed in southern California and after a lot of apartment searching, packing, short Christmas vacation, and unpacking we are finally settled. We live in northern San Diego, specifically Oceanside. I know warm days and cool nights year round sounds hard to handle but I think we will manage. We live in a one bedroom apartment close to Camp Pendleton. Our apartment is nice but needs a little revamping. We have a dining room but why use it as a dining room when you can use it for something more fun? We have decided to put my piano and Michael's drawing things in one space and call it our imagination room. We painted that room blue and Michael, being the talented artist that he is, painted a really cool design on the wall. That has sparked our imagination and spring boarded our design ideas for the rest of the house. The next big project is finish painting the living room and buy furniture for it. It has been fun living in an apartment that allows a little creative freedom, I just wish we didn't have to paint the walls back to their original brown pink gross color when we move out.

This was the color we decided on although the above picture is a more accurate representation of the actual color.