I Really Live Here?

I’ve been living in this apartment for only a week and already a woman is getting murdered across the street.

Or maybe she’s getting robbed, I can’t really tell. I tried to peek outside but couldn’t see anything (there are 2 streetlights on the entire street)

Should I call for help?

But what if I was imagining it? How embarrassing if the cops show up all the way here and there was nothing. I'll wait a little more and see if she screams again.

What if that was you, Grishma, what would you want someone to do? Would you want someone to wait for you to scream again?

The screaming stopped. She’s dead. She died. She might have lived had I called the police in time but now someone’s dead because I couldn’t call for help in time. I will live with this for the rest of my life. Grishma Singh, unhelpful coward.

I crawl onto to the pile of clothes I’ve been calling a mattress lately. My laptop sits on top of a cardboard box my dad used to mail me contact lenses. I open up my laptop and, for comfort (or maybe a night time routine at this point) watch one of the vlogs waiting on queue.

The blogger is staying at a treehouse for the first time, and I hear the same scream. She grew up in rural England, and while her boyfriend was freaking out, she calmly said, “Oh, it’s just a fox! For people who haven’t heard foxes before it can be very startling.”

Ooooh.

When I moved to San Francisco, no part of me could have guessed I’d live in a national park. My back yard is a forest and my front yard is a beach. It’s a nude beach, but we’ll get into that later. There are lots of foxes around at night, and now I know what they sound like.

They sound like screaming, terrified women.

Across the street this morning.

Building Tiny Habits: A Tidy Apartment

I'm really digging doing a resolution a month. I spent more time in nature in February than the last six months combined, and even though I'm no longer making it a goal to hike every week, I still went on a short morning hike on Saturday. This is awesome. Focusing on one thing at a time means I actually make progress.

This month, I've challenged myself to clean for 20 minutes each day.

I didn't arbitrarily choose 20 minutes, I got the idea from UFYH (a blog for messy people trying to be clean, not clean people trying to be cleaner.) They are proponents of 20/10 challenges, where you break down large, daunting tasks into 20/10s: 20 minutes of work time followed by a 10-minute break. 

I know what you're thinking--is 20 minutes really enough to clean every day?

Not at first. But I'll tell you more about that when I do the end-of-month recap. 

Today I want to talk about that pile of clutter you've tucked away in the corner. Mine happened to be on a shelf hidden behind a chair. And after 20 minutes of cleaning, here's what happened:

It doesn't look like much.

Sometimes, before-and-afters can look like those "Spot the Difference" puzzles in Sunday comics, and that's okay. Because when you walk past what used to be a cluttered mess and is no longer a second, outside junk drawer, it feels so damn good.

It takes a long time to find a place for those odds and ends you've been neglecting. 20 minutes, actually.

(Sentimental) Christmas Decorating

I don't have any Christmas traditions because my family doesn't do Christmas. I do love holidays, though. And I have a (fake, plastic) Christmas tree from last year that I wanted to use again. I've seen lots of really cool, themed trees all over the internet, but I wanted my tree to be really freakin' sentimental. 

So I called my friends and asked them to make things for my tree.

Construction paper, markers, Coby's homemade limoncello, candles, and holiday music. It was the kind of warm and fuzzy gathering Christmas is all about.

Here are some of the things they made:

Collin's "Portraits of Us"

An excerpt from Erica's favorite Brothers Grimm story.

Coby's favorite quote of all time.

 Collin's favorite quote of all time.

 Christina's beloved Robert Frost poem with some sweet doodles.

Rose gold colored ornaments that look like melting pinecones. Made by my pal, Target.

Halloween Decor

I wasn't sure if it'd be weird to show you my Halloween decorations since, well, it's November 11th. But then I remembered--

Right.

Honestly, these decorations are probably staying up until December.

I'm not a huge fan of "traditional" Halloween decorations--the fake cobwebs, spiders, etc.--because they feel like clutter when they're indoors. If and when I have a front lawn, I'm going all out (maybe even making a little haunted house for trick or treaters? who knows) but decorations indoors... I like to keep them more subtle.

I've been trying to figure out what to do with the bare side of my cabinets since I moved in:

And I found my answer in comic books. 

I got a huge stash of them two years ago with the intention of framing six of them at a time and hanging them up seasonally (I even bought them based on what would "go well" in each season), but, like my comic book magnets, I didn't follow through with the idea because I got depressed and everything went to shit.

I got six $2 photo frames from IKEA and got to work.

I was too nervous to nail anything into my cabinets because I wasn't sure if it would split the wood, so I decided to use the least intrusive method of hanging the frames--thumbtacks. I used the tape measure to make sure the frames were centered and evenly spaced, and the leveler because, well, I've never been good at leveling things.

I wanted to keep the frames at about the same height as the plants on the other side of the wall, and here's what it looks like when I was done:

Welp, these are going to stay up until I switch them out for winter-y comics. Which comic is your favorite? 

Psst: I did carve a pumpkin this year (It's Potter Puppet Pal Snape. My friend Carmen made the Dumbledore next to it)

Medicine Cabinets for Minimalists

I'm almost done unpacking into my new apartment (almost a month later... but for a good reason! More on that soon.) But today I wanted to share what's in my medicine cabinet. 

I'm the daughter of anxious parents, so I've grown up with medicine cabinets that are stuffed full. My parents even put extras of medicine in other bags around their closet. Predictably, my own medicine cabinet was a well-equipped first-aid kit. That, and about a billion little bottles of lotion, chapstick, lip gloss, etc. etc.

I noticed that a lot of my medicine expired before I ever used it. Partly because I don't get sick very often, partly because I don't really like taking medicine. So, I began downsizing. 

I only keep pain-relievers, cold medicine, a thermometer, and some band-aids. I figure that I can buy everything else as needed. I've also dedicated the top shelf for travel-sized containers (so that they're easy to toss into a bag for quick packing.) One lotion. One lip balm. Replace as needed.

This might still look cluttered to some of you super minimalists, but here are my current essentials:

And here are some top picks:

1. Highbrow Tweezers//Sephora//$12 

I've used these for over five years and absolutely love them. The tips are angled sideways as well as inwards, so they hurt less than other tweezers I've tried. I wipe the tips with a small dab of hand sanitizer to disinfect them before use. 

2. Smith's Rosebud Salve//American Apparel//$4: 

I use them for chapped lips, dry areas, and--yes--cleaning.

3. Eucalyptus Spearmint Lotion//Bath and Body Works//$12: 

I don't use this as body lotion because it has a very strong smell, but I dab a little bit on my temples before a bath or when I'm trying to relax--it's really soothing.

4. Make Your Own Bandages//Urban Outfitters: 

Comes with 20 pastel bandaids, 3 markers, and makes wounds just a little less terrible. I wasn't able to find these online (I got these at a store in Boston a few years ago) but if you find these at a store please let me know in the comments below! 

How to Arrange Flowers

How to Paint in the Bathroom (Without Touching a Single Wall)

My latest "looking forward to being home" project led me to my bathroom. Specifically, to my shower curtain. I like art. I sunflowers. I like Van Gogh. The answer was pretty clear. But all the shower curtains I found (and there are some pretty cool ones out there) were $50-$80...

No thanks.

I'll just make my own. 

Here's what I wanted:                                      Here's what I made:

Sunflowers, by Vincent Van Gogh

And here's what I used to make it: 

• Little bottles of acrylic paint (once dry, they're waterproof.) // $0.50 each
• Opaque, PEVA shower curtain // $8
• Paint brushes

I kept the variety of paints pretty slim, knowing it'd be easier to just mix for the shades I don't have. But feel free to get different shades if that's easier for you!

Hang up the shower curtain taut against a wall (I used thumbtacks) because it makes it easier to measure the proportions of what you're trying to paint. Since you're not working on the floor, it allows you to work in small chunks at a time. Unless you're a professional artist (and I'm definitely not) your proportions might not be exact. That mountain might be steeper. That sky might be less cloudy. But that's okay, because you're making it your own.  

Don't pile on the paint! If it's too thick, it'll peel right off. What you're painting on is essentially plastic, so the paint spreads easily. You won't need nearly as much as if you were painting on canvas or paper. 

I didn't de-wrinkle the shower curtain before I began painting (I burned my first trial against a blow drier...) and found that the creases ease out over time.

There's something so therapeutic about spreading paint all over a large plastic sheet... and now the biggest thing in my bathroom makes me smile every time I look at it.

This is what home improvement is all about.

Just as I finished, I saw that this shower curtain on amazon went from $70 to $20... with free shipping... 

(but I like mine better.)

Monogrammed Coir Doormat

I was digging around the internet trying to find a doormat I liked, and eventually narrowed it down to the following: 

// 1. Constellation Bias // 2. Izola // 3. Wellfleet // 4. Piano Cocoa //

But then I realized that I don't want to spend $40 on a doormat. Instead, I spent $8 and used Lia Griffith's monogrammed door mat tutorial to make my own. Here it is:

I fell in love with the design and didn't want to change a thing. Literally. (She uses a G, too.)

I used: 

• Coir doormat // $5, Ikea
• Black spray paint // $3 from a local hardware store
• Griffith's stencil // print here

The hardest part in making this doormat was making sure that the stencil was a) in the middle, and b) not lopsided. I've never been good at eyeing straight lines (I think it's because I always kinda tilt my head to my left), which is terribly inconvenient for someone who's into geometric designs.

Heads up--unless you mount the mat to the wall, you can't use a leveler to align anything. Unless you're okay with the risk of getting paint on walls, you can't push the mat against one outside to make sure it's straight.

I used tape measure to make the stencil's placement as straight and centric as possible. It was a lot of guess and check, but I made sure the edges of the antlers were equidistant from the edge of the mat, and that the top and bottom of the "G" were equidistant from the mat. 

I'm actually still not sure if it's straight (I can never tell, remember?)

Oh well.

Choosing a Color Scheme

When I was "auditioning" for schools as a kindergartener, there was a school I didn't get into because I couldn't name my colors. (If you ask my parents, it was because I didn't say a word during the entire interview-quiz. Maybe the nuns scared me.) I did, eventually, learn my colors and became very confident in my ability to name them.

Until now.

In trying to create a color scheme for my space, I've learned that the hardest part isn't figuring out what colors I should add, it's figuring out what colors are already there. Take, for example, my couch. What color is it? I don't know. I mean, it's brown. But I can't point it out on a color wheel. And if I don't know where it is on the color wheel, how can I know what's directly across from it? Or the two colors equidistant from it?

I want to figure this out because I'm not starting from scratch. I'm not going to buy a new sofa. I'm not going to buy a new dining table. I could buy new sheets, but I probably won't. I have to consciously think about color moving forward, and I want to be precise.

If you can eyeball your stuff and estimate the right color, more power to you. But if you're a perfectionist and need a precise palette, here's a way to do it:

Step 1: Take a photo of the largest "thing" in your room. I'm going to make a color scheme for my living room, and everything is going to be centered around my sofa.

Step 2: Upload the photo here. This website will tell you the specific RGB/hex # of any image you upload. (There're apps on your phone that can do this, too, but I haven't found one that'll give you the hex #) Here's my couch-swatch:

Step 3: Copy the Hex # and paste it here. It'll give you all the popular color schemes--and if you hover over the other colors, you can find their info as well.

For my living room, I came up with this palette:

And now, the actually difficult part. Finding things in these colors...

The Color Wheel

I'm determined to make my space a place I enjoy, so I decided to learn about interior design. When I decide to learn about something, I go 100%. I looked up textbooks from various interior design courses, found some free online courses, and started taking notes.

Literally.

Every book suggested I have a solid understanding of colors before moving forward, so I spent about four hours reading everything I could find about color theory. I've never taken an art class before (save for "elementary school paper mache madness" a.k.a. 5th grade) so I was at a "Colors for Dummies" starting point. But I feel much more confident making decisions about color for my apartment now. 

TigerColor is a great resource for learning about color schemes, because it not only explains how to group colors together, but also how to keep them from looking ugly. Apartment Therapy also explains color schemes really well! 

Choosing colors off a palette is more than knowing how far apart they are on the color wheel--you've gotta figure out how dark, how light, what undertones, where to use them, etc. etc. Look at photos of rooms you like and see what patterns you notice! (I'm drawn to analogous schemes, but I'm going to see if I can pull off the triad instead.)

Some other tips on using colors:

• If you don't know where to start, use the 60-30-10 rule: 60% of your room should include a dominant color (in low saturation), 30% of a secondary color, and 10% of an accent (in high saturation, if you want)
• Include black pieces like picture frames, throw pillows, or lampshades to make the other colors in your room more vibrant.
• Go dark-to-light vertically--the darkest pieces should be closest to the floor, and the lightest closest to the ceiling. 

Fun fact: Artists decided on blue, yellow, and red as primary colors because you can mix them to make all the other colors, but modern color theorists argue that magenta, cyan, and yellow are actually better primary colors because they give you the widest range of colors. (That's why we use them for printer ink.)

Cyan + Magenta = Blue

Magenta + Yellow = Red

(Nothing combines to make yellow.)

Comic Strip Magnets

Nobody loves out-of-context comic panels as much as me. Sunday comics are my jam.

Last year, I decided to make fridge magnets out of comic strips. Today, I actually made some.

Here's what you need:

• Sunday Paper
• Magnet Strip ($2)
• Scissors and/or Exacto Knife
• Glue (I used wood glue, but anything stronger than Elmo should work just fine)
• Clear PVC sheet ($1)
• Sheet of balsa wood ($2) I used balsa because I'm familiar with it, and because it's easy to cut without needing a saw or a sander. It's a really light wood though, so the final product doesn't feel as sturdy. If you want something a little harder but still easy to work with, I'd recommend birch.

(aren't these scissors the cutest?)

Cut out the panels you want to use, and glue them onto the wood. To prevent wrinkling the paper, use a very little amount of glue (this part doesn't need fool-proof gluing). 

Then, cut the shapes out with scissors or an exacto knife (you can use scissors on balsa without a problem.) Place the PVC sheet over the paper, and carefully trace and cut it so that it'll cover the entire square. Then, glue around the edges, and attach smaller pieces of the magnet strips onto the back. I messed up quite a few times... newspaper is difficult to work with, so you might consider printing out the images on thicker paper/with better ink.

If you're patient and want something that looks more professional, you can get glass covers instead of the PVC sheets. The only caveat is that you can't choose the size since the glass is pre-cut.

Lazy Tips for Cleaner Floors

I don't ever want to vacuum more than once a week. People apparently vacuum every other day (some vacuum daily?) and just the thought of that makes me want to

(photo via)

But I have concrete floors, and it seems like they get dusty anytime I open the door. You'd think that means I have to vacuum more frequently, right?

Wrong.

I want to introduce you to Smith's rosebud salve.

No, no, I don't go around rubbing rosy vaseline on my floors.

After I take a shower, I put some of this on my feet (because they get ashy, especially in the summer.) Then, I put on old athletic socks inside-out (with the fuzzy side now facing out), and go about my life normally for about an hour before taking the socks off, wiggling my thoroughly-moisturized toes, and tossing the socks in the hamper. High-traffic areas are usually the dirtiest ones, and walking around with what is essentially a duster on the bottom of your feet keeps them cleaner during the week! 

The Importance of Space

I've never been good at "working at home."

In college, I couldn't get anything done in my room because everything made me sleepy and distracted. I literally would sit outside in the hallway and get more done there than in my own space, even though it was almost always noisier. I'd go to libraries, cafes, parks, lounges, weird nooks behind staircases... anywhere but my room.

Post-college life is the same. Teaching requires some preparation outside the regular workday (cough) so that meant I couldn't just clock out at the end of the workday and be done. Here's how it played out:

Yikes. I've talked about how anxiety made the last year much harder for me, as well as how it knocked my entire life out of balance (if looking at how I spent my time isn't enough of an indicator, I don't know what is) but there's another factor sending my mind into a frenzy that I need to address.

My space.

My apartment.

Why can't I work in my apartment?

One way I lowered my anxiety over the past few months was by keeping work at work. I wouldn't leave until I was done planning for the next day, hoping that I'd stop thinking about work when I got home (at 7pm, most nights.) And it worked, sort of... 

I still didn't make dinner. I still didn't go on walks. I still didn't relax. My space didn't calm me down, it didn't help me unwind. Part of that, I'm sure, is because when I wasn't worrying about work, I was worrying about a thousand other, very important things. I didn't make everything outside of work as low-stress as possible. Everything felt like a burden. So I continued in my routine of guilt-sleep-repeat.

I'm sick of coming home just to sleep. I want my space to welcome me. To energize me. To make me happy. Actively happy. 

Step 1: Make it beautiful. (i.e. decorate it with things that make me happy, and keep it clean)

I'm going to go knock out some challenges from UFYH while I listen to This American Life. When I feel frustrated, I'll use smallrooms to pump me up. 

(One thing at a time.)