Home Ownership Miner Style

I have received one request for pictures of our new home. So I will impose a solitary picture on the Internet at large. Earlier, I had shared one photo on Twitter of our amazing retro bathroom light fixtures. They are in each of the two larger bathrooms. They function in one and appear to be purely "decorative" in the other. 

I have many projects - including ones that involve the aforementioned light fixtures - around the house in the mix and I am no serious DIY-er, but I will endeavor to share small glimpses into our home as I manage to slowly make it more "finished." Friends and family should come visit us now, regardless of the state of the house, but suffice to say I am very motivated to whip more things into shape so we can host plenty of visitors.

Tonight, I bring you our hilarious, but functional, toy storage.

First, it bears mentioning that we would never have had space for all this in our old apartment. We crammed it in there somehow, but this room + the dining room + the kitchen approximate the size of our entire apartment in San Francisco. We are swimming in space here. To illustrate the point, we have one entire (large) room that is devoid of all furniture but a $12 end table I picked up at a thrift shop last week, two lamps, an area rug, and two currently seat-less dining chairs I need to repair. So, perhaps it goes without saying that my favorite part about this toy storage is that we have ample space for it.

I also love that this is constructed out of my cheapo graduate school closet clothes storage (the metal grid shelf structure) and beer boxes from our beloved local liquor store in San Francisco (Reno's*). The guys at Reno's let us use dozens of used beer boxes for moving our stuff. I "wrapped" the beer boxes that remained in decent condition after the move in butcher paper and just taped them up and labeled them. 

The other excellent aspect of this storage is that it actually does not hold all that much. I have always had a tendency to purge whatever strikes me as clutter, but after reading "Simplicity Parenting" several years ago, I try to make somewhat regular attempts to winnow down the girls' toys. It's time to do another one of those major sort-and-donate missions, but for now this is working pretty well. There are far more than enough items to keep the girls entertained and occupied, but not so many toys that they (or I) find it too overwhelming to clean up, or that drown them in so much excess that they don't really "play" with what they have.

So, enjoy the wall color that we did not choose, the carpet I hope to part with, and the sentimental beer boxes turned toy box. This is how we do.

*I miss Reno's so much. It has been surprisingly difficult to adjust to not having a corner store. I miss the community of the Dogpatch present at Reno's, the ease with which I could just run in and grab whatever I "needed" (pints of ice cream, beer), and I hate having to drive most everywhere here. If you haven't thanked your local bodega owners recently, send them my love. I love them with all the nostalgia in my very nostalgic heart.