making halloween.

living in southern california, i'm blessed with beautiful weather ninety percent of the time. the sad thing about this, though, is that it's not unusual for the weather to stay in the seventies and eighties through halloween.

this means it never 'feels' like halloween unless we make it feel that way. in 'the nightmare before christmas' the characters sing a song about creating christmas in halloween-town. i feel like i should sing 'making autumn' every year. i think this year, we made it pretty darn good.

my 'jack skellington' and hubby's 'zerg'. yes, he is that nerdy ;)

halloween dinner. stuffed 'jack-o-lantern' bell peppers. yum!

happy halloween!

off to get cupcakes and watch our final viewing of 'nightmare before christmas' for the year!

nesting.

lately, well ever since my decision to embrace my life and the place i'm at, i've had an overwhelming desire to redecorate our apartment. before, it had been functional, but not really 'home.' hubs and i always talk about 'when we buy a house, our room will look like.....' etc.

but this apartment is where we live now. our lives are happening here. and so, it should feel like our home.

first up was the living room. i can't find any before pictures, but suffice to say, it was boring. couch against one wall, tv against another, computers in the corner. no pictures, no rugs, no throw pillows, no nothing.

now, we've added lots of color, rearranged the furniture, and upgraded the desk area. no, this isn't like an hgtv makeover, but it shows how much of a change about 60 bucks worth of ikea knick-knacks can do. and it makes me much happier to call this place home.

then came the bedroom. again, it was clean and organized but it was boring. always had sheets and bedding that i had gotten on sale, never anything i loved. and i had a bunch of design ideas that i hadn't wanted to 'waste' on an apartment. but when my mom came to visit for my birthday, she inspired me to use those ideas up.

before (or halfway through the process when i thought to take a 'before' picture)

hubby is sooo good at helping me stage my pictures

and after- the whole thing cost about 50 bucks (excluding the bedding) which i think was well worth it.

the first time we've had curtains, a night-stand, or a wedding picture hung in 3 years

my desk alcove (love the ties my mom used)

these are right along the side of the bed. i'm still adding pictures but i thought it was a sweet, earthquake safe way of displaying pics

my mom has called this process of mine 'nesting' which weirded me out 'cause that term is usually reserved for those expecting a baby. but i guess in a way, i am preparing to welcome a new life- mine.

anyone else feeling a little like 'nesting' lately?

mel.

hello, blogosphere. welcome to my little blog. i've tried this blogging thing a couple of times before, but i feel like i kept making the same mistake. i tried to make a blog JUST about school. and a blog JUST about married life. and a blog JUST about me and my life. the problem, of course, being that life does not segment so easily. everything overlaps. so THIS blog is about anything and everything that happens to me, that i do, that is done to or for me, that i want to do someday, or that i've decided never to do. it's just about ME. being twenty-something, married to the greatest man on earth, and embracing the 'poor newlywed, starving student, stressed out, apartment living' phase of my life.

the main reason i started this blog was because i was having some bad times. i was feeling very down about where i am in my life and felt a big rush to move on to the next chapter. i started reading a few blogs of other people about my age who were in my situation (married, students, not ready for babies) and were really enjoying their lives. they inspired me to challenge myself to do the same. hopefully with this blog, i might be able to help someone with the same rain cloud over their head to start embracing life, too. 

my challenge to myself, and to anyone who stumbles upon this section of the inter-web, is to find one thing every day (or every other day cause some days are just CRAZY) that you love about your life that you wouldn't have if you were in a different stage of life or had different circumstances. 

today, i'm going to be grateful that my car makes that annoying, embarrassing squeally sound and we can't afford to fix it. because it encouraged me to take a walk to the store today, which was a chance to see flowers, and birds, and trees, and a warm sunny day i otherwise would have missed.