HURRICANE MARTHA: Part Three

First, do your homework: 

HURRICANE MARTHA: Part One 

HURRICANE MARTHA: Part Two

Well done. You may proceed:

After the four-hour calendar fiasco, I checked the clock. Only two hours until Jason would get home! Spurred on by panic, it was at this point that my conniving little brain thought of a loophole in my no-spending-money rule. We can EAT the decorations when we're done with them. Off to VEELY'S!!

Apples, pears, tomatoes, and... those tiny little decorative pumpkins are edible, right? I guess we'll find out. And, sadly, I did break down and buy $6 worth of (probably inedible) plants.

Bahhh, they're too cute for me to feel bad. Meet Fernadine and Ruffles!

(Poor babies, little do they know that I'm the Elmira Fudd of the houseplant world. I hope they at least survive until we leave.)

 
Regardless, they made Mr. Sad & Hungry Bookcase feel much better. I also gave him branches, fruit, hats & scarves, and topped it all off with the lid of the Marilyn Monroe poster that we found in the closet.

Yes, that Tabasco bottle is purposely paired with Ms. Monroe. And it looks like Ruffles agrees with the sentiment. (BAD Ruffles!! No more inappropriate photobombing!!)

Moving on, let's meet Mr. Sad & Hungry Bookcase post- surgical operation and wardrobe makeover... TA DA!!!!

Avert your eyes from the second shelf up on the right... the Marilyn Monroe puzzle is now topless.

Satisfied, I moved on to the dining room table. I decided the apartment needed a heckuva lot more clashery, so if you're prone to epilepsy, please close your eyes until I say so:

Now, scroll down. Scroll down a little more. Okay, it's gone; you can open your eyes again.

Blinding, wasn't it? I know! I'm so proud. There I stood, hypnotized by my handiwork, when --BLING!-- the arrival of email ice-dunked me back to reality. Jason was on his way home. Ten minutes, people. I still had piles of branches and miniature squash on the floor.

Fueled by rabid determination, I hurriedly arranged little Sveedish nature artifacts everywhere (carefully arranged to NOT LOOK carefully arranged). (You know how us artsy-types are.)

I stood back to survey the construction zone. Amidst all the wilderness now invading our apartment, a giant, blank white wall glared at me from above the couch. I snatched up our map of Lund and ran from room to room, slipping in my socks. How the heck could I get this to stick on the wall?! Now fully tweaked-out from desperation, I flung open the kitchen cabinets.

Oh, hello, jar of honey. You're going to help me out for just a second, okay?

 The front door opened and Jason stepped inside, expecting to see this (minus himself):

But instead, he saw...


J:      Hey, April, how was your-- whoa. One of THOSE days, huh?

A:     (nods with crazed grin)

J:      Good! Uh, wow... it's awesome! Hey, how'd you get the map to stick on the wall?

A:     atinybitofhoney SOooo, what should we do for dinner?

J:      WHAT?! (laughs nervously as though I'm kidding)

A:     ......


To make a long story short, we compromised by using itty bits of bubble gum to keep the map up. (And once I explained to him the original alternatives, he was VERY glad I had used honey instead of peanut butter.)

 Observe the Matthews-er in his new natural habitat... he LOOOVES it!

HURRICANE MARTHA: Part Two

Please read HURRICANE MARTHA: Part One, if you don't want to be confused while reading this post. And if you want extra credit points, go read about what our apartment looked like when we first moved in. 

I've already gloomily acknowledged that we can't have any IKEA sprees while living here in Sweden, since we can't take stuff back home with us. But for the love of Pete, the Hubster was decorating the apartment with t-shirts. I set out to see what I could do with our glamorous zero-million-dollar budget.

Bundled up and cheerfully roaming the streets, I soon accumulated an armful of daisies, colorful (but thorny) branches, and snowberries. I was then delighted to come across a giant 4-foot-long willow tree limb, torn off by the wind. I added it to the collection and dragged it behind me caveman-style as I headed home.

Looking back, I now realize I looked like a giant, deranged bird in a human body, manically collecting nesting material. A few passersby switched to the other side of the street as I approached. But at this point, nothing could stop the Martha in me. Especially after seeing my sweet husband's desperate attempts to "add a little color" to our apartment.

I had almost made it home when an acorn dropped to the ground in front of me. With my jacket smeared in dirt, hands bleeding from thorns, random foliage in my arms (and hair), and a frantic glint in my eye, I surveyed the ground for more "Festive Fall Adornments."

It also probably didn't help that I was humming "Santa Claus is Coming to Town." Don't ask.

Having stuffed my pockets with nuts (no, I didn't stuff my cheeks. I have to draw the line somewhere), I accepted that I couldn't carry anything else, and should probably head home before I had to explain myself to Swedish law-enforcement.

As a reminder, this is what I had to work with when I got home (minus Mr. Matthews-er, who was working hard at school and had no idea about any of this):

First, I faced that damn bookcase. The one that looks sad and hungry, for lack of possessions to display. Well guess what, Bookcase? You're the one with a problem, not us.

I did my own little version of Gastric Bypass surgery and took out half his shelves. HA!

This still left one large, open space which just screamed, "Cheesy Seasonal Display!!" So, by the power vested in me from years of watching Martha Stewart Living as a child... one Cheesy Seasonal Display coming right UP, Mr. Sad & Hungry Bookcase.


Materials:
    •    pumpkins & candles
    •    scavenged leaves & twigs
    •    appropriately color-themed book
    •    string and clothespins I found out on the patio
    •    Jason's old research papers
    •    every last drop of ink in the only pen I could find 

Time:
    •    I wasted FOUR freaking hours tearing all those pieces of paper (because I lost
         the scissors again) and tracing the words/dates onto them from my computer screen.

Cost-Benefit Analysis:
    •    NOT worth your time.

Yes, the calendar's in Sveeedish.
YES, I said "LUMOS!!" as I lit Harry's candle.
NO, they don't really celebrate Halloween here, and this probably looks insane to our neighbors.

Part Three coming tomorrow: the rest of the bookcase, & the rest of the apartment.

We also have things other than a living room

I decided I needed to get a better feel for the metric system (Europe is so inspirational like that), so I drafted our Little Sveedish Apartment using meters. And enjoyed it. This geekery knows no bounds.

This is how she spends her spare time?! Get this girl a job, STAT.

  

There are a few peculiarities we need to discuss. First of all, what the heck is up with all those doors? Theories include:

• you can save energy by only heating the room you're currently in
• door manufacturing is subsidized in Sweden and they have to do something with all those doors

Moving on: "bed(s)?"

For some reason there were four twin beds when we moved in. Like any grown, mature adults we crammed as many in the bedroom that would fit (3). And we still steal the covers at night.

The bathroom looks pretty inconspicuous from this view, but it's actually quite the adventure. First, see that first closet in the floorplan above? Those lines so artfully drawn across it (thank you, thank you) are several rows of bars to hang towels. Then, in the bottom of the closet there is a radiator heater. Dry, warm towels every single day. Genius.

Next, the shower. That tub is really just a tub, like as in basin, that drains onto the floor. It sits in the bathroom, not attached to anything. Luckily, there's also a drain in the floor beneath it. So, lessons encountered in Swedish bathrooms:

• Don't leave your clothes on the floor.
• Make sure you're not wearing shoes, socks, or slippers when draining a bath full of water (courtesy of Jason).

Now you don't have to learn those the hard way. You're welcome.

What's black, white, and red all over?

Our apartment.

Bad news? It's furnished... à la 1999 IKEA "Mid-Century Post-Modern" hip. Guess my personal aesthetics aren't too funky-fresh, eh?

Good news? It's furnished! We didn't have to bring our couch on the airplane.

Meet our living room:

Why, heLLO, handsome.

And another angle:

He looks pretty good from this angle, too.

It's pretty ironic how our Eugene apartment has TONS of stuff and very little storage. Then, we come here with almost nothing, and behold the most glorious abundance of built-in shelving known to man.

See the empty bookcase? It looks sad and hungry, yes? So I ransacked the apartment for things left behind. So far, our pseudo-belongings proudly on display include two tennis rackets, the seventh Harry Potter book, and a 1,200-piece Marilyn Monroe puzzle.

As much as I'd love to turn this blog into an INSPIRATIONAL INTERIOR DESIGN MAKEOVER EXTRAVAGANZA!!!!, (seriously, I really would), we're only here until December.  Not that it would take that long (are you kidding me?? I'd "Martha-Stewart-meets-Tasmanian-Devil" this place), but it would kind of be money down the drain because we wouldn't take much of it back with us.

So no IKEA sprees for me. Even though we're merely a train ride away from the original IKEA in Stockholm. (*bites lip...)