House – Party Pony Eventing

Viva Carlos Bloghop: Home Office edition

I’m nothing if not nosy so seeing everyone’s home office/WFH spaces has given me great voyeuristic joy the last few days. I figured I’d return the favor in case anyone cared what was happening here.

My office is the 3rd bedroom upstairs and has been setup as my office since I moved it, but only halfheartedly until March when SIP started. Once that hit, it became apparent I needed a few upgrades (second monitor, rearranging and new chair mainly).

With the addition of those things, it’s become a pretty pleasant place to be. I actually built this desk (well, Ikea-hacked it) two years ago from two Ikea Rast dressers and a 102″ long countertop. I love it so much – it has room for me to absolutely cover it in papers and random stuff, which is what happens essentially every day. Ironic, considering I work 100% online and theoretically should be paperless…

I have two different backgrounds because I technically run on two separate systems (hospital side VDI and the university network) and it’s the only way I keep them straight

The three drawers on each side have office supplies, file folders, extra notepads, chargers (literally the middle right drawer is nothing but cords) and a few other random things I don’t have a better home for. The board above the desk I made for my bedroom back in college, but is mostly full of photos and other fun things these days. (Yes, there is a spot where I filled a hole and have not painted over in the middle of the wall…)

I have various degrees, awards and prints from college on the walls, although the room’s decor is admittedly sparse. The tiny bookcase has been around since college and is on its absolute last legs of life, but hanging in there. I listen to music most of the day in the background, so I love my speaker, and the fake flowers are there 95% so my Zoom background looks a little nicer.

Fake flowers and trim that still isn’t painted WHOOPS

There’s a full walk in closet in this room, but we use it for storing off season clothes and other random house things (air mattresses, pillows, etc).

Finn sleeps back behind the desk in the lower right corner

Finn the JRT spends most of the day in front of the window in the sun or back behind the dresser on the left (the countertop is deeper than the drawers, so there’s a little nook he loves). He actually has a little bed back there because he loves to hang back there so much.

Also my computer is plugged into an outlet with a switch hence, very classy electrical tape solution

It’s become a pretty ideal setup over the last few months which is great considering we’re hearing return to office dates of February or even later. Honestly, I’d be 100% content to WFH permanently, but we’ll see…

Not bored in the house, in the house not bored

(If you don’t understand the title, I made the mistake of downloading Tik Tok and now this is a thing in my life)

Also THIS is a real diagnosis that showed up in one of my EDs and I have SO MANY QUESTIONS

If quarantine has taught me anything about myself, it’s that I’m really bad at being bored. Once work settled into a manageable routine and flow, my days suddenly opened up and because I wasn’t riding or leaving the house… things happened.

It started innocently enough: I thought, oh I’ll try some color samples to paint my bathroom. At 5pm on a Friday night.

Fast forward to 9:30pm and it was painted. Oops.

Fast forward a few weeks and I had redone the entire thing.

Not to say I’m not happy about it. I’m obsessed and in love with it. I did all the work myself and did the entire thing for about $350. I have plans to do the shower next, but some other projects took priority so that’s hopefully a late summer to-do.

I’ve been wanting to add trim to my windows for a year, but hadn’t gotten around to it either. So, while waiting for paint to dry in the bathroom or something, I just… went to town.

Fast forward a few weeks (are you seeing a trend?) and all the windows in the house are trimmed out. Only three are primed so far because I effing hate primer, and none are painted, but the actual construction of them is complete and I love them. I can’t believe how much character they give to my little builder basic house. Plus, any time I get to bust out my trim nailer makes me a very happy camper.

In the middle of these projects, I decided my workbench area in the garage was a mess (it was) and needed help (it did). One pegboard later, things were improved, if not perfect.

But then I remembered the cabinet I’d bought for the laundry room that has been living in my kitchen for a few months. If I put it up and took down the shelf, the shelf could go into the garage…

So Sunday while waiting for the lawn mower to charge (I have a battery powered mower and it’s amazing and awesome), I took down the shelf and nearly had the cabinet up before realizing trying to hang a cabinet solo while standing on top of the dryer was… not one of my brighter moments. And remembered that time I promised my father I’d stop doing stupid things like moving cabinets as big as I am by myself. So, assistance was requested and by afternoon, the laundry room had a lovely cabinet and the garage had a new shelf.

But if you thought that’s all… well… I decided after doing my bathroom, I wanted to do the second bath too. So an afternoon of paint and a quick fixture change later, it was halfway improved (mirror, faucet and vanity TBD).

Yet, I can’t seem to stop myself. My garage has two walls drywalled, the rest are just studs and insulation. I’ve been wanting to finish the drywall, but… well, that pesky promise to my dad extends to drywall panels apparently. I found someone who was up for doing it next week since it’s a no-human-contact job, so assuming I get the garage cleared out this weekend… next week it will be drywalled and I can finally put up shelves and organize it!

Don’t worry, this is what my bedroom wall looks like…

My Excel sheet of house projects was at 48 pre-quarantine and I’m down 13 projects since SIP started so I’m feeling pretty accomplished, all things considered.

But, just in case I get too high and mighty, there also may be eight sample colors of paint on my bedroom wall and I might hate all of them, plus the cabinets for my kitchen island in the garage that can’t move forward until I pick a color for them. Oops.