The Interior DIYer
Uncategorized

Updating our [landlord’s] Ikea shelves

This isn’t a particularly striking nor interesting blog post, but over the past few weeks I’ve been reorganising and updating the stuff on our [landlord’s] IKEA shelves. I styled our shelves like this close to 2 years ago and they’ve barely changed since. Recently, I spent a few minutes each day while Cora isn’t making unrelenting monotonous teething sounds content, so I had a chance to move things around.

I added the second large door back onto our shelves, and it seems I did just in time as 2 days later [on Father’s Day], Cora started crawling. All she wants to do now is crawl and it’s the sweetest and most exhausting thing ever [for both of us].
I also hung up Cora’s Elodie Details playmat. It spends most of the time on the floor in our living room, but when Cora’s asleep, we hang it up on the wall so we’re not walking on it and so the cats don’t get [extra] fur all over it. 

I’m finding it more and more difficult to photograph these shelves [7 years living with them and their yellowedness is making me want to ram them into a wood chipper]. I tried to photograph them over 3 different days, and each time I uploaded my photos onto my laptop, I was underwhelmed. You’ll have to trust me when I say the shelves look half-decent now, but they’re just so tough to photograph. Am I the only one with a tricky part of their home like that? It looks good in real life, but completely impossible to photograph? For now, they look about as good as I can get our landlord’s shelves to look.

p.s. When I was looking at my posts on these shelves over their lifetime, I found this haggard blog post and I take back anything negative I said about these photos today. Woof. 

Uncategorized

My HomeSense Ireland launch haul

This morning we had good light and I had a few minutes to myself so I took pictures of my HomeSense haul I picked up on Wednesday night.

As mentioned in yesterday’s blog post, I didn’t realise I got a gift card to spend in store at the launch until almost an hour into my visit. It was a happy surprise and because I’d already been around the shop twice, I had a few [massive understatement] pieces in mind that I wouldn’t have had a problem bringing home. And here they are …

[Above photo] DECORATIVE MAGNIFYING GLASS, €9.99 AT HOMESENSE
I’ve always wanted a magnifying glass for our coffee table, but it was one of those things I never ended up actually getting. I saw this one at the launch on Wednesday and it was the first thing in my trolley. The first of many. 

ROSE GOLD BOTTLE HOLDER, €8.99 AT HOMESENSE
HomeSense have an actual rose gold section in the kitchen area. I saw this wine bottle holder and picked it up because Robert and I spend a lot of time at home, so if we do have a glass of something, this will make us feel fancier. Even if we’re in our PJ’s on the couch watching Better Call Saul. 

[That bottle of wine is a screw cap. I put the cork on the table in an attempt to look sophisticated. Full disclosure].

WINTER GREEN THROW PILLOW WITH POM POMS, €16.99 AT HOMESENSE
Of HomeSense’s pillow aisles [yes, aisles as in plural], I kept going back to this dark green pillow. It’s my favourite deep green [just like our footstool] and in the softest fabric. I wasn’t sure about the bright green pom poms, but there are tiny hints of bright green in our living room [like on one of my iBride trays], so I went for it and I’m surprised with how much I like such a bright colour on our couch.

BLACK VANILLA VEGETABLE WAX CANDLE, €8.99 AT HOMESENSE
There’s a black candle section in HomeSense. I stood there for about 10 minutes looking at all the black candles and eventually decided on this black vanilla candle. It smells like heaven. I’m a sucker for a pretty candle.  

I got 2 more pieces in my HomeSense haul; something for Robert ahead of Father’s Day and something for my mom, but didn’t want to share them in case they see them here. 

Thank you again to the lovely Kate and Kayla and HomeSense for the invitation to the launch and for the generous gift card! It worked. I’ll be back.  

DISCLOSURE – while this blog post is not sponsored, I did receive a gift card to the amount of €50 free of charge to spend at the HomeSense launch. As always, all words and opinions are my own. I only work with companies I like and of course, think that you will too. Thank you for supporting the companies that support The Interior DIYer.

Uncategorized

Not quite Home of the Year

In September of last year, an RTE researcher contacted me looking to have our apartment take part and be in the running for RTE’s Home of the Year for 2017. After much hyperventilating I pulled myself together, but I decided, however exciting it was to be asked, it wasn’t something we could do. At the very least, the show tours each home for roughly 10 minutes and as I later said to the representative, the camera man would pan our living room and filming would be done. It would take all of three and a half seconds to feature our apartment. Our apartment simply isn’t enough of anything. And TBH I didn’t know it I was up for scrubbing the entire apartment at 8 months pregnant, because there was no way I was going to allow a TV crew and judges into our home without scrubbing an inch off everything.

We had a lovely discussion, I thanked them many times and politely declined after explaining my concerns. As it turns out, we couldn’t have been featured in the end as we don’t own our apartment and that was one of the base guidelines in order to be featured.

It’s a slightly pointless blog post, but the truth is that I’m very proud of that offer and opportunity. Our home didn’t need to be on the show. Having been asked was more than enough for me. 
Happy Friday, homies x