I’m working on changing my apartment. I’m trying to get it to the point where all of the things that I own are things that I truly love. That means getting rid of all of the secondhand junk and things that I’ve outgrown and replacing it with truly lovable stuff. I’m not planning to spend tons of money or to make huge dramatic changes. I’m just tweaking things here and there to create a space that really means something to me.

Most of the house is a mess while it undergoes these changes. However, I’ve finally gotten to the point where at least one room in my apartment is filled with things I love. It’s my bathroom. Hey, you have to start somewhere right.

Ten things I love in my bathroom are:

1. My flower girl vase. You’ve seen it pictured here before. I found it a thrift store in Ohio last year and totally love it. It’s an old Gibson girl vase that I keep fresh flowers in on the sink in the bathroom.
2. Vintage mouthwash bottle. I just added this to the sink’s countertop as well. It’s silly but I hated the big Listerine bottle that doesn’t fit quite right in the medicine cabinet. My new vintage mouthwash holder is small and cute.
3. Pretty soap dispenser. For the first three years that I lived here, I used throw-away plastic dispensers from the store. Now I have a pretty grey-and-white soap dispenser that’s so much nicerh.
4. Lips shower curtain. I have a totally flirty, fun shower curtain. See it in the picture of my bathroom shown above.
5. Pin-up girl towels. I love the new towels that from Sin in Linen that I bought. They’re grey with pinup girls on them. Pricey for towels but totally worth it since I love them so very much.
6. Pin-up girl pictures. Sticking to a theme here, I have a few cheap framed pinup girl photos in the bathroom as well. They were one of the first things I changed to make the bathroom more lovable.
7. Bathmat and toilet seat cover. They’re a pretty purple pink color that matches the shower curtain. I do wish the bathmat was bigger and more comfy than it is though.
8. Sugar body scrub. I don’t use fancy soaps but I found this sugar body scrub from Trader Joe’s that smells like tangerine and I adore it.
9. Space heater. I like to use a space heater to keep warm when I get out of the shower.
10. Bathrobe. And I like to cuddle up in a big warm black bathrobe when I leave this room so it hangs right on the door at all times.

Tags: bathroom, decor, home, house, kathryn vercillo

A topic that I’ve only recently started to read about in the last year or so is the topic of home decor. I always just kind of did whatever I wanted to do in my home without much thought to what people do for home design. I still kind of follow my own tastes in my personal space but I’ve also started to get interested in reading about what techniques there are for various types of interior design. I’ve become a big fan of interior design blogs and magazines.

One of the things that I’ve been reading more about lately is how to choose and use tile in a home. There are so many different choices here! The size of the tile that you choose, the colors that you pick, the way that you lay the tile out in a pattern and the rooms where you choose to put tile are all factors that can significantly alter the impact that a tile design choice has on the home’s overall feel and appearance. I don’t even have much tile in my place and I still find this really fascinating.

I’m particularly interested in learning about mosaic tile designs that are used in homes. I think that there are a lot of cool pictures and murals that can be made using tile if you are willing to get creative with what you’re doing. I haven’t learned a lot about this yet but it’s the next thing that I’m planning to research as far as tile work in the home goes.

Tags: home decor, house, houzz, Interior Design, kathryn vercillo, tile, tile work