New Design

Well, Irene has come and gone (for Virginia anyway) and she didn't do nearly the damage we thought she would.  We were expecting Isabel-scale damage, but fortunately for Hampton Roads we were pretty lucky.

Spending all weekend cooped up in an apartment with my boyfriend, little brother, roommate, and three pets means that a) I'm very grateful the sun is finally out, b) I'm sick of Cheez-Its and Spaghetti-O's, and c) I had time to do some visual tweaking to my blog.

I had a blog back in my high school days (when LiveJournal was all the rage) and would spend countless hours in Photoshop making all kinds of design elements, and playing around with CSS.

Needless to say, I haven't done any of that in six years.  So I haven't really brushed off my CSS and image-creating skills so much as I have chiseled the grime off of them.  Add in the fact I no longer have Photoshop and did everything in MS Paint and Splashup, and you can imagine that there was a fair amount of consternation involved, especially with my header.

My blog isn't where I want it to be quite yet, but it's getting there.  And I feel like a proud parent every time I look at it.

So, what do you think?  Do you like the new look?  Ever tried to tackle blog design on your own?  Cause I would love to hear your stories!

Battening Down the Hatches & a Giveaway

We're stocking up on canned tuna and bottled water over here at Semi-Grownup Life, and hoping Irene doesn't take the power out for three weeks like Isabel did.

To tide you over, Kim over at Third Floor Design Studio is giving away a mood board to one lucky winner!  Her blog is stupid awesome and full of all kinds of "Aha!" moment design advice.  Plus she's super sweet, so skip on over and enter!

See you Monday!

I Can't Wait

I can't wait for this...

Frames

I'm thinking of doing an empty frame collage over my dreaded "thermostat wall".  You know what wall I'm talking about.  That one wall that's BAM IN YO' FACE the minute you walk in the front door, and smack dab in the middle of it, right at eye-level, is a stupid, ugly thermostat.

I've had a canvas hanging over it but it's kind of a pain in the ass inconvenient to take it off every time you need to change the temperature.  It's also scuffing the crap out of my walls. (Who uses flat white paint in an apartment complex!? That stuff is impossible!)

So, here is a little bit of what has been floating around my brain lately (all images from Pinterest).

My Bedroom: A Bucket List

So before I started this blog, I read somewhere that to be successful, you have to blog every day.  And I totally did for three days.  And then something happened.

That something was Band Camp.

Yes, you heard that right.  I am a total dork.  So much so that now I'm a semi-grownup dork, I'm teaching younger dorks how to be better at their dorkishness.

AKA, I'm getting paid to teach high school kids how to march and play drums at the same time.  Because I do that (play drums).  Being a drummer totally reduces my dork factor, right?  Right?

Anyway, here's a peek into my bedroom.  By no means am I any kind of fancy pants designer, and there are still a lot of projects to be completed, but here we go!  Disclosure: My room is actually filled with lots of wonderful natural light.  I just suck at taking pictures.

A Day in D.C.

Growing up in Virginia, I've always taken for granted how close I live to our nation's capital.

I have family in that area, so the Washington Monument has always been a familiar sight, and I was a little surprised when Ryan said he'd never been.

So on Saturday morning when he suggested we go, I jumped at the chance!

Well, what was supposed to only be a two-and-a-half hour drive took nearly five hours!

I don't even want to talk about Virginia drivers.

So, after much swearing and braking and talking about turning around, we finally made it to D.C. right around 5 PM, which turned out to be pretty lucky, because we got there right after a nasty rain storm cleared up.

I'd Die

So I definitely have a legitimate post about a fun trip Ryan and I took yesterday.

But then I got distracted by the Online Room Design Giveaway happening over at Danielle Oakey Interiors.

My couch pretty much just serves as a kitty playstation/bed/scratching post.

I don't even own a coffee table.

So I'd probably have a stroke or something if I got it.

Hop on over and enter to win!

Because this girl is all kinds of amazing and talented.

Come On In!

Hello, blog world!

So I've been hemming and hawing over this blog stuff for quite some time.  You see, I didn't even know there was a blog world until a year and a half ago.  And then I found Kate and my life came to a grounding halt, then immediately started back up again.  But life was now different.  For reals.

Because you see, I'm just a twenty-four year old bartender/musician/procrastinator/giant child with an ugly apartment and a dog and cat that get hair all over it.  Then I realized I could totally make my living space suck a whole lot less for not a whole lot of money.  But I also needed to shave my pets vacuum every day.

Thank you, Kate.  You really are my hero.  Someday I will paint the ugly faux-bamboo dresser in my bedroom (there's an entire set of this stuff dispersed amongst my family!) and it will not chip, or peel, or look all kinds of crazy.  Because I've been reading about (but not actually doing) furniture painting for a year, and that makes me a professional, right? Right.

So, here I am, bloggity-blogging away, jacking my boyfriend's interwebs because my irresponsible little brother former roommate didn't pay our cable bill.  See? Balancing bills and throw pillows - it's a tough job.

BTW, the boyfriend is Ryan.  He's way more opinionated about interior design than any man should be, but I love him anyway.

Thanks for hanging out and welcome to my semi-grownup life!