Why hello, summer!

The weather was absolutely gorgeous in NYC over the Memorial Day weekend -- after what seemed like weeks of endless rain, summer made a bold appearance. Yay! To celebrate, I added a few spring/summertime touches to my apartment:

{these pretty peonies replaced the ranunculus on my media console}

{the console table in my living room -- look closely and you can see the reflection of the rather unsightly overhead light that came with my apartment -- it's shining just above David's head}

{my reliable peace lily, which I've had since February 2010! the pillow in the foreground came from the new Home Goods store on the UWS -- I braved the grand opening las weekend to get it!}

Three-Day Weekend DIY

I understand that I may be the last person to embrace this trend, but I've been eyeing chalkboards in the kitchen on some of my favorite design blogs for months. (Maybe years?) This weekend, I finally put the finishing touches on my own DIY-version of chalkboards in the kitchen. I found this great contact paper on Amazon.com. (And I followed this reviewer's amazing advice for "curing" the contact paper before using it as a chalkboard. Her method is fool-proof!)

This project couldn't have been any easier -- after measuring the cabinets and cutting the contact paper to size, I carefully applied the contact paper to the cabinets, smoothing out any bubbles as I went along. And that was it! It took ten minutes (fifteen, tops), and I'm really pleased with the results!

Ranunculus

The Weather Channel tells me to expect rain every. single. day. this week. As long as I have this little bouquet in my apartment, I don't care what the weatherman says.