After having lived off cheap Ikea furniture for the majority of my twenty-something years, I vowed to furnish my new condo with good-quality, “adult” furniture.

Yeah, that didn’t happen.

Because after the damn wedding, we really couldn’t afford anything other than Ikea furniture.

We (well, it’s mostly me doing all the work while J stays hooked on the XBox) are still working on the two bedrooms, but I’m happy to say that the living room, kitchen, and the master closet are finally done!

What you see as soon as you walk through the door:

I’m not thrilled with the curtains…I just bought whatever I could find that was on sale, because we needed window coverings. I’ll probably end up making my own with my mother (the amazing seamstress) out of the fabric when I have more time.

More of the living room:

The sides of the coffee table pull out to reveal hidden drawers (I *heart* hidden drawers!). Next project: adding some colorful cushions to the couch.

Our big splurge: the 52″ LCD television. At first I was worried it was too big (that’s what she said) but it’s starting to grow on me (that’s what she said!). The tall cabinet to the left of the TV houses half of my DVD collection (I had 300+ the last time I counted…and that was in 2003). And there’s my darling Rooma on the right!

The HUGE bookcase, complete with sliding doors! Yes, I need the little stepping stool on the left to reach the top shelves because I’m so short. And yes, I know I have a lot of books…but these aren’t even half of my collection – there’s more in my parents’ house! What can I say? I’m a total bookworm.

Right next to the living room is the kitchen (the sixth chair is currently residing in the bedroom as a makeshift desk chair). I’m still not in love with the cabinets or the granite, so we’ll probably gut and redo the whole thing next year. The doors are, from left to right, the boiler room, laundry nook, and pantry.

With the lack of counter and cabinet space, we bought a sideboard to keep extra dishes and kitchen appliances. I like how the video intercom matches in with the small appliances!

Did you notice this little beauty in the last picture? It’s my rice storage cabinet! As soon as I finished setting it up (and poured a large bag of rice into it) I declared, “Now it feels like home!”

The pantry! This was just a regular closet with a clothes rail and shelf on top. We trekked down to Home Depot this past weekend and proceeded to build the shelves. I’m soooo happy we have an organized kitchen now…

The master closet. If we had the money, I would’ve went with the California Closet Company (can you tell I’m an organization nazi?). We didn’t, so we made do with the closet system from Ikea. Let me tell you, these were a MAJOR pain in the arse to build – it was very heavy and the almost-9′ height made for a lot of sweating and swearing. But I’m happy with the end result. I have an L-shaped space for my clothes, and we have drawers aplenty for the both of us.

That’s it for now. I feel so…domesticated.