Starter Stories

Last week I learned about Compass which is a new real estate service that helps people find the perfect neighborhood to call home. Their focus is identifying the best match based on interest and personality, using their super awesome platform for finding NYC apartments. Their main goal is to make real estate friendly and personable. Plus their platform is super fun! My hubby and I spent a night “perusing” NYC apartments… you know just in case we ever need a getaway in the big apple!

Thinking about new apartments brought me back to all of the places I’ve lived since I “grew up” and graduated college… Haha! Now as you all know this ENTIRE blog is pretty much about our starter home… and while I could have easily done a post all about our little three bedroom, two bath fixer upper I thought it would be way more fun to post about my very first apartment! Of course if you’d rather read about our starter home you can… our house tour,  what we’re working on, and original house pictures are a great place to start!

So if you’re new here Welcome!!!, if you’re an old friend… are you ready to see pictures? Here are a few slides of my very first apartment hunt!

Yes, this is the coolest pool ever! The little round things in the pool? They’re tables! With underwater benches so you can SIT in the pool! Do you have to wait 30 minutes to swim after a meal if you’re already in the water?

Why yes, I am highly attractive! Thank you for noticing! Haha! What kind of face am I even making here?

I moved into my very first apartment about a year after graduating college, so I was a young single girl (with a roommate) searching for her first place. We looked at a gazillion different apartments however I had a certain set of “guidelines” that were set in place by my parental units. Since I was a young single girl scarred out of my mind by the thought of being responsible for MYSELF I followed these guidelines very carefully. 🙂

My new apartment had to be on the third floor: no burglars were going to crawl through my bedroom window. My new apartment could not be sketchy: no broken ovens or holes in unpainted sheet-rock for this girl. My new apartment could not be near a busy street: Hello!! I could get RUN OVER!

I’m sure there were more “guidelines” but these were the ones I remember… mainly the first rule as my dad walked around every single apartment we looked at hanging out windows and trying to decide the likelihood of a burglar gaining entrance. Real estate agents loved us ;).

What this means is that my first apartment was gorgeous… we didn’t go for the over the top crown molding, baseboard, chandelier top tier apartment that was available (and that I absolutely wanted) but it was clean, had a washer and dryer (my one stipulation other than I would NOT share a bathroom) and had maintenance available. I was in heaven.

I loved this little apartment… it was definitely cookie cutter (nothing special about the entire apartment) the rooms were teeny tiny and tan walls were the norm. But what it did have was space to come and go as I pleased and a roommate with absolutely no interest in how the apartment was decorated! (You know the pictures above are of a model apartment! My house would never look like that! Furthermore I apologize in advance for the following pictures… I took them way before this blog was born and never imagined they would be shared on the internet! Either way I thought fuzzy was better than nothing!)

Now most people moving into their first apartment have hand-me-down couches, holly-wood beds and crates turned upside down for end tables. THIS WAS MY BIGGEST NIGHTMARE! I’m not sure why but throughout high school and college I would (literally) have dreams of over turned crates in an apartment living room… and I vowed to myself that it would never happen!

Of course everyone who knew me thought I was crazy but oh well! I started collecting furniture in high school and by the time I moved into my first apartment I had enough furniture to furnish my room, the living room, the dining nook, and my roomie’s room. The only thing I didn’t bring was the couch… don’t get me wrong I HAD a couch but my roomie’s couch was a sleeper, which we thought was a better option.

I loved this little apartment! I had so much decorative freedom here! I spent days die-cutting butterflies for the mural over the (missing) TV (where would our TV have even gone?!). My best friend came to visit from Kansas and ended up spending a day painting blinds because mine provided too much white space! (They were adorable painted though! P.S. I bought my own blinds from home depot and re-hung the apartment complex’s white blinds when we left!)

This apartment was my crash course in decorating. I learned that rugs can tie a room together… and it’s OK to put a rug over carpet if you don’t have hardwoods! It really does make a HUGE difference!

After that I learned the importance of curtains… I never thought they made a difference… until I hung my first pair in the bedroom! Even using my little tiny tension rods they made the entire room feel taller and more put together! Of course they were combating the leaning art over my dresser… because I thought leaning and not hanging my art made me cool somehow. Go figure!

I don’t have a story filled with our crazy fixer-upper antics for my first apartment. What I have is a girl learning to get her feet wet… shoving so much furniture in a bedroom that you can reach the keyboard for the computer FROM THE BED! The artwork may be crooked because I didn’t think to use a level (and I thought large drywall nails were the perfect hanging tool for EVERY SINGLE PICTURE!) but it was filled with things I loved! It was just right for me at that point in my life.

It was the apartment that I started dating my husband in… our late night get to know you talks were held right there in that living room. The first dinner I ever made him was right there at that table. The first movie we ever watched together was on that couch (on the missing TV!). So this little home has some wonderful memories for us! Our home now is amazing (three bedrooms seems like so much space!) but I wouldn’t trade those days for anything.

Of course if you’re into the whole paint falling off the walls, cabinet doors not hanging straight, stained carpet, no air conditioning, shower curtain rod hitting you in the head kind of story stick around… next week I will be sharing Starter Stories 2: The Craphole. Which is the affectionate nickname my hubby and I gave our very first apartment together!

Linking up with: Tatertots & Jello, Paper and Fox & The Mad Mommy