Home Decor: The Library

When we walked into our future home for the first time and saw the open loft with builtin wall-to-wall bookshelves, we were sold. Done-zo. Done dealio.

A quick 5 years later and we have finally decorated our beloved space. Bad Julie.

Obviously the books are the stars of the show here. I've written a few posts about the thousands of books we have read, the process of collection, some interesting stats on them, and the hilarious Part 1 and Part 2 of Rejected Books: So Bad, Yet So Good.

I painted the back of the bookshelves a dark slate blue and put an Ikea gold clip light over the overstuffed chair (which came from my late grandma's house). One adult and all 3 kids can sit on it at the same time with one on each arm rest and one laying on the top of the backrest. Cara also likes to tilt the lamp so it shines behind the chair in a little dark corner so she can read back there.

I wanted a bright, fun pillow and had this fabric and decided it works with the colorful children's books.

I bought fabric to sew drapes but decided they were too dark and heavy for the space. It gets a lot of natural light but I need to keep the blinds shut most of the time because of the glare on the computer screens. My sister bought these drapes for her house and changed her mind but they couldn't be returned. I tried them and they look great.

This is the happiest hanging house plant I ever did see. I have always loved hanging plants. They help fill in corners and are out of the reach of pets and kids. You can even see it from our front door downstairs and makes the whole space look more homey.

We desperately needed a new office chair. Our old hand-me-down was broken and dirty and hurt my back so we threw it out and I used Rob's drum throne for a couple of months. I finally decided I needed to stop being so cheap and go get a comfortable chair for me since I write here every day.

This one is wonderful. It makes me want to curl up in it and fall asleep (which can be a good thing or a bad thing depending on how you look at it). It's this Serta chair from Office Depot and I recommend it. They have a higher back version as well.

The desk is huge and dark and not one that I would buy myself but it was my brother's. When he bought it long ago I remember him being so proud of his new fancy office furniture. Then, not long after that, he sat at his new desk and planned his own funeral. Ahem. Sorry. So where were we? Okay. The desk is huge which works out because we can store all of our unsightly junk in it without needing extra shelves or filing cabinets so it's actually nice in that way.

Rob wanted two monitors and after using them together for a couple of years now I can't imagine ever going back to one. It's so handy having so much work space!

I wanted as much desktop space as possible so I had Rob fashion a shelf on the side of the desk tucked away in the corner for the printer.

We have a lot of space underneath the desk so that's where we hid the subwoofer. There is also the footstool I bought when Nate was potty training. I'm so short I don't like having my feet dangle.

I decided to keep the negative space above the desk. I'm sure having nothing there would bug a lot of people but I embrace it.

I wasn't sure what I wanted to do with the wall space around the desk. I had lots of more modern ideas but then I brought home this mirror from Ikea, just to see how I liked it, and decided to keep it.

We really needed a desk lamp but I didn't want it sitting on top so I searched all over online and found about a hundred sconces that I loved but then I saw this one in the store on clearance and the price was unbeatable so I grabbed it.

The trash can is from Pakistan, I think, when Rob's grandparents lived there long ago.

The drums are gorgeous and match the woodwork exactly so they stayed but Rob did downsize them a little for me. Such a gentleman.

Even though a mirror is so predictable, I felt like we needed something reflective on the wall to capture the window light and direct it into the room without it messing up my screen time. Now I can't imagine the space without it. I feel like the wall would look dead and flat without that extra depth and window light reflection.

We've always loved hanging out in this room but now we love it even more. It's so comfortable and feels very inviting.

 

Rob really wants to pretentiously call this room "The Library" but I'm not sure he'll be successful. We've been calling it "The Loft" for so long now that it'll be a hard habit to break.

Dear Tulum: A Love Letter

Dear Tulum,

You stole my heart and I will never be the same again.

I succumbed to your carefree vibes.

I soared when you touched me with your delicate sands.

My worries melted away with every delicious taste you gave me.

Your light shined on my bare porcelain skin and left me in afterglow.

My inhibitions washed away in your secluded waters.

Oh, my dear Tulum. You will always hold my sweetest memories, my deepest love, my heart.

Devotion Forever,

Julianna

Playing in Playa

Even though we stayed our first night in Playa del Carmen, we didn't actually do too much there because of the other locales we were looking forward to visiting even more.

We did walk the touristy street our first night and found somewhere a few blocks off of it for dinner.

The next morning we had a leisurely breakfast

before we had a leisurely walk on the beach. (Ugh. Why do clothes always look so big on me??)

Then we drove into town, took way too long trying to get money out of an ATM, and then spent $20 on a pair of $5 fake, beat up ray-bans since I left my sunglasses at home.

We were glad to leave the hustle and bustle of street vendors and traffic behind as we made our way to our quiet, secluded paradise.

 

Princess Julianna & Her Test of Bravery

Once upon a time there was a princess named Julianna. Her life in the Land of Snow was pleasant, until one fateful day when she was forced to take the Princess Test of Bravery.

One night the Test of Bravery unexpectedly began. It came in the form of terrifying sounds echoing from inside the castle walls. The princess had no doubt what was the source of these terrifying sounds. A Dragon. She just knew there was a dragon living inside the castle wall.

The princess decided that the bravest thing to do would be to summon the prince to come and slay the dragon for her, which he so nobly did, cutting off the head in one fair swoop. The princess swooned for the prince and thought she had passed her Test of Bravery.

Little did she know, there would be a second test calling for her to be even more brave than she ever had been before. For the very next day, another dragon escaped from out of the castle wall and scared the very brave princess almost to death. Getting up enough courage as she possibly could, she escaped the castle with her royal subjects to the area of recreation outside the castle grounds, loudly summoning her prince once again.

Princess Julianna ever so bravely plead with her prince to summon the royal exterminator as quickly as possible in order to take care of the filthy, fire-breathing beast and any of its evil friends.

Princess Julianna knew it would be a terrible idea to go back to the castle until all the dragons had been slain so she requested they flea to the Land of Marriott stay in the quaint and comfortable Fairfield Inn. Her request was granted so late in the night the royal family traveled in their carriage to wait out the terrible slaying that, so unfortunately, was taking place right inside their precious palace.

All the next day she bravely stayed away, exploring the unfamiliar land and trying not to think about the predicament awaiting her.

Finally, the dreadful time had arrived and the brave princess slowly, but surely, made her way back to her castle. Alas, 3 more dragons had perished through the night.

Knowing there were a few more dragons waiting to strike, the princess bravely bypassed the cookery and headed straight for her bed, all the while requesting the prince bring her something to nibble on and sip after he'd taken care of the awful scene.

Two more nights of the prince fighting off dragons occurred before the princess triumphantly entered the cookery once more.

At long last, the dragons were no more living in the walls of the castle and were forever more banished from entering into the Land of Snow. And the brave princess (and her prince) lived happily ever after.

The End

These are scenes from our brave explorations after our night in the Land of Marriott.

Making Our Way to Puerto Morelos

Any direct flight to Cancun should be considered the Party Plane, right? Every passenger was anxiously waiting to begin their vacation and the guy sitting next to me was no exception...except that he decided not to wait until landing in Mexico to begin his partying.

In order to keep himself occupied on the plane he decided to pull out his gallon ziploc bag full of mini bottles. Two hours later all but two of his bottles were gone. To be fair, he did offer Rob and I one of his last remaining, so that was thoughtful. 

However, his consideration stopped there. He was LOUD and kept punching and kicking the seat in front of him where his friend sat. It made for an obnoxious start to our own relaxing vacation. Oh, well. 

After landing we made it via shuttle (after dodging many sales pitches) to the car rental company. It took us FOREVER to get our car.

The man helping us was VERY particular about his paperwork. After already waiting 15 minutes for him to verify and print everything, He handed us two receipts to sign. Rob signed one and, to expedite, I signed one. My doing so upset him very much. He said now he had to void everything and start all over again. Okay....sorry. After another 15 minutes of voiding and verifying and printing his second attempt at getting Rob's signature failed. Rob didn't sign it EXACTLY the way he signed his name on his driver's license. Upset again, the man voided everything and start over. After a third 15 minutes of waiting, Rob tried very hard to match his license signature. After a full and deliberate inspection, the man finally decided we were ready and responsible enough to get the keys to the car.

On our way out the door we got another hard sales pitch before we finally made it to the car. All we had to do was sign again and we were off...except for the tip the guy with the keys demanded. After some sketchy change was made and exchanged, we left in a huff, ready to finally let our vacation begin!

But wait, oh, the gas tank is just about empty. Okay, let's find a gas station. After some tense moments when we were trying to decide if we were supposed to pump our own gas or just hand over our money to the guy standing next to the pump, we decided to trust the young man who was asking us how much to put in the tank. We hadn't even had a moment to think about the exchange rate or metric system or the lack of speaking the same language, we said, "Umm, 40?" Surprised, the man filled our tank with about a liter and a half of fuel (40 pesos worth)...enough to get about 5 minutes down the road. After we realized what we'd asked him to do, we turned around and asked him for 40 liters more. Just a tad embarrassing...

A few more minutes of driving down the road and we finally made it to our first destination, Puerto Morelos!

Granted, it wasn't as wonderful as a beach town as I had perceived from my research...

but it was still nice to finally get to the turquoise water!

What a dreamy dusk view!!

Annnnd queue the relaxation...