Better late than never: a tour of my condo! Working on this post made me clean up the condo to take the pictures. I’m not saying it’s usually messy, but I fluffed up the pillows and straightened out a few things to make it look pretty.

Just some background information: my condo is one floor and on the second floor of the building. I share a main front door with three other units (two on the bottom and two on the top), and you have to go up two short flights of stairs to get to my unit. (I have my own front door with a new doorknob and deadbolt; changing all of the locks was the first thing we did after I closed on the condo.) We have two shared common basement areas below the units and each unit has its own basement area and HVAC closet. There’s also a detached garage for each unit and a guaranteed parking spot right in front of the garage. Oh, and central air.

This post is a bit long, so hang in there, but there are pictures and some links to things I’ve purchased for the condo!

Kitchen

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True story: there are so many cabinets in the kitchen that I doubt I’ll ever use all of them. And I also can’t reach the ones above my fridge—which is a dumb place to put cabinets unless you’re seven feet tall. Maybe next year I’d like to paint the cabinets a lighter color, something like a light gray, just to lighten up the kitchen a bit more.

Also, nine times out of ten, you can guarantee there will be dishes drying in the rack on the counter because I don’t use my dishwasher. I didn’t grow up having one, and I’ve never used one, so I just don’t use it and hand wash all of my dishes instead. It’s normally not terrible but there are some times when I’m like, I’m one person how am I making this many dishes? I just let them air dry and put them away later/whenever I’m in the kitchen next to make a meal.

All of the appliances were included, minus the microwave, which is from Amazon. My favorite appliance so far is my air fryer. Best Amazon purchase so far. 

There’s enough counter space for when I’m making meals, and I like that it’s a galley style. I feel like there’s more space between each side and two people can comfortably fit in there. I also like that I can see out my kitchen window to the main road of the condo; sometimes I’ll stand there if I’m waiting for someone to come over since I can see them pull in. A perk of being on the second floor.

In the background in the picture on the right, you can see the front door in the background. The entry way bench/rack is from Amazon, and it’s really useful.

Dining room

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If you were here with me over the summer, then I’m sure you remember hearing about the IKEA dining room table drama. I don’t think I ever shared what happened after I ordered it online from IKEA. 

When I ordered it, it said it’d get delivered by the end of June, which was fine since I wasn’t moving until July. The day it was supposed to be delivered, it never showed up. The next day I got an email to re-schedule the delivery, so I set it for the following week. The day of the scheduled delivery, it was raining so bad; I was tracking the truck on the website and could see it was in my town and then it left. I set up another delivery, and the day of that one, the order just canceled itself. 

My mom called IKEA and asked why it got canceled, and the guy said I canceled it, and we’re like, nope, wouldn’t have done that. So we just asked for a refund because I didn’t trust them to ship it again; I did get the refund to my credit card a few weeks later. I ended up finding a cheaper table from Walmart that was delivered within a week and I actually like better.

The chairs are from IKEA and matched the “table that got away” and the placemats are from IKEA, too. The setup is big enough for just me but also if I have guests over. I usually set up a placemat and coaster at the end of the table so I can watch TV when I eat.

Living room

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For the first month of living in my condo, I didn’t have couches. I knew there was a backlog of furniture and appliances because of COVID and supply chain problems, so once I bought my condo, my parents and I went to look at couches pretty early on, about a month before I moved in. 

We went to Bob’s Discount Furniture, and I looked online before we went and found a loveseat and sofa set I really liked. Luckily they had both on the show floor, so we were able to try them out. We explained to the sales guy my situation and I’d have to get in touch with him about setting up a delivery date, hopefully sometime in August, about two months later which wasn’t terrible.

Once I moved in, my make-shift living room furniture was a butterfly chair from college—which is now in my office—and an air mattress. It looked kind of sad but worked for the month until the couches came. And I was so happy when they did in the middle of August. They finally made the living space look like a home, and they’re super comfy, like incredibly comfy.

There’s a sofa table behind the loveseat that was re-homed from a former co-worker, and it works really well in the space and helps push the loveseat up a bit because the living room is pretty deep. The TV is from Costco, the TV stand is from Bob’s, the end tables are from IKEA, the lights (I got the black base ones) on the sofa table are from QVC, and the blanket bucket and blankets (cream, navy; the brown one came from home) are from Amazon. The wire cat was from my mom’s decoration closet, and the tan fake plant is from Target. The tan pillows came with the couches, and I bought the dog pillow from JoAnn’s. 

I’m glad I have a space to burn candles, since I couldn’t burn them in my room at home without the fear of setting anything on fire. It’s nice to have one burning at night and I’m in there watching TV; the fall-scented ones I’ve been burning make it so cozy.

Balcony

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Having a little outdoor space was something I wanted when I was looking for a condo; it didn’t have to be much but I wanted a porch or balcony area where I could sit outside. It’s right off of the living room. The table and chairs that are out there now were left by the previous owner, so I’m using them for now but want to get a new set next year along with an outdoor rug.

I really like sitting out there and reading on the weekends, and it’s super peaceful. Aside from the squirrels. You know how squirrels on college campuses are a bit weird? Like it seems something’s just off about them? I’m convinced the squirrels that live in the trees at my condo place were once campus squirrels in their past lives because they’re weird. All they do is chase each other up the trees and make an awful screeching noise. It’s great.

Office

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In the condo listing, this was listed as a “second bedroom” but there are no doors on the room and it’s right off the kitchen. I think it’s considered a bedroom because of the closet? Regardless, I think it’d be weird to use it as an actual bedroom, so my original intention was to use it as an office/library/craft area. 

The desk and chair that were once in my bedroom at home are now in the office, facing the window. The white cube bookcase was re-homed from a co-worker, and it’s great to hold all of my books and knickknacks. The blue butterfly chair and 5-head colored lamp are from my college days. The silver floor lamp in the other corner was left by the previous owner and I’m keeping it for now. Since there’s no overhead light, I need to have lamps in there, and I might get nicer ones in the future, one for each corner. The closet has become sort of a catch-all of items as well as where my vacuum lives on its docking charger.

Of all of the rooms, this is the one that’s the furthest from being complete. The things that are currently on the wall are hung up on rogue nails that were left. A fall/winter project I have is to take out all of the leftover nails and patch those holes as well as the handful of other random holes that are in those walls. Once I do that, then I’ll be able to hang everything up. I might also get some sort of table/cubby thing to hold craft supplies, that might be a next year thing.

Bathroom #1

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Yes, I know, the lights in front of the mirror are ugly. That was the one thing I noticed when I first looked at the listing pictures. I don’t know who thought they looked good. I still haven’t found new lights that I’m in love with, so I’m waiting until I find something I really like. Hopefully that’s soon. 

As you can see, the toilet is off to the right and to the left across from it is a walk-in shower. I only use this bathroom to shower and if I’m in the living room and have to go. All of my personal stuff is in the half bathroom off my bedroom that you’ll see down below. 

The countertop is pretty big, so I wanted to find some cute things to put there since guests also use that bathroom, too. I quickly learned that the Magnolia section at Target is a very dangerous section to be in. I wanted everything there. Everything but the painting to the right of the sink is from Target (woven tray, canister, fake plant, small pumpkin, hand towel, candle, soap dispenser). The painting is done by my mom; I liked the colors of it and think it goes well in the bathroom. I also got the metal basket on the floor that holds toilet paper from Target, too. I’m hoping to get a few things to hang on the walls in there, and I also want to replace the towel bar and toilet paper holder to match the towel ring on the wall by the sink.

Laundry

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I’m super grateful that 1. The condo has its own washer and dryer space, and 2. The washer and dryer stayed with the condo when it was sold. Laundry inside the unit was my #1 want when it came to looking at condos; I did communal laundry in college, and I don’t want to do it again. 

It looks like there were once track doors hung up in front of the machines (you can see the old track for them if you look up), but I think I’ll hang up curtains in front down the road. For right now it’s fine, but I’d like to hide them behind some nice ceiling to floor curtains. 

Bedroom

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The plan was for me to take all of my bedroom furniture from home. The room is pretty big, so it looked a bit empty with just a twin bed in there. But I already had it so I was going to live with it for a while until I bought a bigger bed.

One of my friends was looking to get rid of her guest bed to turn her guest room into an office, and she offered the bed frame, mattress, and box spring to me. So of course I said yes. And now I have a queen size bed! It’s the first time in my life I’ve slept in something bigger than a twin. I love it, and it fits in the room pretty well. I had to get queen size sheets and I ordered a queen size quilt of the one I already had for my twin bed; I knew I already liked it and the colors would still match in the room.

Not pictured but there’s a walk-in closet along the wall to the left of the bed (if you’re looking at it). It’s so much bigger than my old closet, although it’s already starting to fill up with my things. There’s a bar on each side of the wall along with shelving above each bar. I bought shoe racks and keep my laundry hamper in there, too.

I’m not planning to add any more furniture to the room; if anything, I’ll hang some things on the walls. I like that I no longer have to basically live in my bedroom like I did at home. I’m able to just sleep and get ready for the morning in there.

Bathroom #2

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This is solely my bathroom, which you can tell from all of my stuff on the counter. It’s a lot easier to get ready in the morning in my room since I just use that small bathroom. I keep what I use the most on the counter and keep the rest in the cabinets, like my curling rod, blow dryer, makeup brush cleaner, etc. I like the lights in there as well as the colors, so I won’t be changing anything in there.

Fun quirks!

Most of the top outlets are connected to a switch in the room, as is the case in the living room, bedroom, and office—meaning that the switch has to be on for the top outlets to work but the bottom ones are always live. It took us a few days to figure out what was going on. There are also two switches that I have no clue what they go to, and I may never will.

There’s a hole punched in the wall in my bedroom. We have no clue why it’s there. I’m going to hang something over it to hide it.

I’m missing a drawer in the refrigerator. It’s not a big deal but was weird when we first noticed it.

There’s incredibly tacky 1970s contact paper in all of the kitchen cabinets.

The dial where the shower handle is on the wall is labeled backward. You have to turn the handle to “cold” in order to get hot water and if you turn it to “hot” you get cold water.

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Some days, it feels like I’m away living at college, like I’ll be here for four months and then go home for winter break. But other days, it’s like, this is mine and I can make it my own home. I’m still adjusting to living on my own but I have a great support system to help me through this transition. If I get any fun new furniture or re-decorate, I’ll definitely make posts for those in the future. But I think this is a great overall recap of my condo and what I’ve been able to do so far two months in.