My First College Apartment + Life Update

I feel like I've been away for ages, since I haven't typed up a post in almost two weeks. All of the posts I have had recently have been queued, but I finally have my room in the apartment looking just the way I want it to look (for now anyways)! For those of you who don't know, about a week and a half ago I left my southern California childhood home for something a little more...east. Or rather, a lot more east. I moved almost 2500 miles from San Diego to a little town in North Carolina, where I'll be pursuing a BFA in Costume Design. A lot of things have changed, obviously, but I'm trying to make this a fun new adventure!

I think I'm going to do a new apartment favorites post, so that I can talk about some of the great things I have found for someone who has just moved out, but for now, I'm going to do a little mini room tour!

First, of course, the highlight of my bedroom is my bed! The bed set is a bed-in-a-bag from Target. This bed-in-a-bag thing is absolutely fantastic. It makes everything compact and easy to find. I'm thinking I might at some point add like one or two small gray pillows, but I'm not entirely sure yet. Of course, I had to add a personal touch with some of my favorite stuffed animals from home. The giant hippo was given to me by my boyfriend Andrew, since he knows how much I love hippos, the bunny was given to me as a baby, and I got the Alice doll from Disneyland, but you can also order it on Amazon! My bed is a full-sized bed, which is much bigger than I'm used to, so the stuffed animals usually stay on my bed while I sleep since there's plenty of room.

Now for my bedside table, the alarm clock was bought at Walmart. I usually use my phone for an alarm, but it's great to have so that I can see what time it is even from farther away. The statue was another gift from Andrew, and is a statue of the Hindu goddess of arts, music, knowledge, wisdom, and nature, which I think is perfect since I am at an art school! My flowers were bought at Dollar Tree, and the mason jar was found at Walmart, although you can find them at pretty much any craft supply store. 

I am completely heartbroken over the fact that we aren't allowed to have candles in my apartment. My apartment complex -- although off-campus -- is owned by the school, so we have to follow rules similar to the on-campus dorms. So in order to keep my room smelling nice, I have this "Leaves" room spray from Bath & Body Works, which you all should know by now is my absolute favorite scent! I'm considering buying a wax warmer since I am allowed to have those, and then I can just buy my favorite candles and make them into wax cubes! Any recommendations? Let me know in the comments! 

And of course, I couldn't have my bedside table without one of my favorite photos of me and Andrew at Disneyland. I bought this frame years ago in a set at Kohls. 

Above my desk, I have what may be a familiar sight. I have some of my collection of musical playbills hung above my desk, the same way I had them hung above my bed in my old room. The frames are all from Dollar Tree, which I find is a great place to purchase frames for gallery walls because they are so inexpensive! Careful though, they will break if you drop them from too high, so make sure they are secured to the wall. On the chair is a blanket that Andrew's dad bought for me in Mexico, which is perfect because my apartment is always freezing!

My lamp doubles as a desk organizer, and has an extra outlet on it (for those late nights when your phone is losing charge and you have to sit at your desk), and was purchased from Walmart. The frame is another one of those frames from the set from Kohls, and my little cactus arrangement is from Home Depot! I love cacti and succulents because they require so little maintenance, and they remind me a bit of the San Diego desert. To keep up with all my classes and deadlines, I also keep a desk calendar and a small to-do list notepad. The desk calendar was bought at Walmart, and the notepad was bought at Target in the ever-so-tempting dollar section! 

Finally, the gray and orange supply organizer was a DIY project. I took a plain photo box from Michaels and painted it the colors I wanted, then hot glued fun colored paper towel rolls on the inside to create the dividers for the pens, pencils, markers, etc! If you would like to see a DIY post on how I did this, let me know in the comments below! It's a super easy way to organize your desk, and it really makes all the difference, especially when you are required to have as many art supplies as I am!

My room came with a dresser for my clothes, as well as a large closet. The top of the dresser is perfect for storing anything that I might grab for on a daily basis. I put all of my mani/pedi supplies, as well as lotions and hair products that are too big for my bathroom, in this letter tray from Target. It works perfectly to keep everything from slipping and sliding. I keep all of my jewelry on this cute little tree stand, which I got from Michaels ages ago, but you can also purchase it here.

On my wall above the dresser are two square cork boards, as well as this photo print that my best friend bought me. The cork boards actually came in a set of 4 from Walmart, but they were super thin and flimsy, so I stacked two on top of each other and super glued them together, to give them a little more of a substantial thickness.

The little storage bin is a Sterilite bin from Target, and unfortunately they no longer sell this model. However, for makeup or art supply storage, a Sterilite bin like this is absolutely perfect! As for the mirror, this is wonderful for places like dorm rooms and apartments where you can't hang things up, because it actually comes with hardware so you can hang it over a door. I purchased this at Walmart! 

And that's my room! I'm sure that over the next year, it will change, but as of right now this is what everything looks like and I love it! It's great to finally get to start over and have things all exactly as I like it.

Would you like to see more back-to-school posts? Let me know!

- D.