Before I moved, it was like my part-time job to fantasize about how I would decorate a new apartment, if I ever got a new apartment. (Did I mention that before this, I lived in a 240-square-foot studio for 9 years?! It was actually very nice and really well put-together, but there was no getting around its tininess, and after 9 years, I was definitely ready to take on a new space.)

But now that I actually have a new apartment, I'm being strangely slacker about getting it set up. Like, I've been there 10 months now and when I refer to the new apartment, friends say, what, did you move again? It's really not new at all anymore and I better get on the ball and get this place finished. Sometimes I just don't feel like myself and I swear it's because I don't have a balanced home to come home to.

So. Now that the kitchen is done, it's time to tackle the living room. Here's what the living room needs:

• carpet (I have NO idea what kind)
• things hung on the wall
  
• curtain
• hanging lamp above dining table
• dream accent chair with cool upholstery
• new shelving

Let's talk about the new shelving. When I moved in, we got two of these Ikea Lack bookcases, just to control the clutter. I knew I probably wouldn't love them forever, but I thought they were a pretty decent "good for now" choice:


However, I hate them. Very much. I chose them because I liked the large spaces in between each shelf, which I thought would be perfect for our stereo, wine racks, and large books. And they are, but everything else looks terrible on these shelves. The spaces are so tall that regular books only fill about half of the vertical space, and things just look lost and cluttered. It's a disaster, I tell you.

I can't wait to get rid of them. What I really want is one or two vintage china cabinet type pieces. My vision is that I will paint over the wood, and the top portion will be great for books, while the bottom drawers and cabinets will be good storage. So imagine each of these pieces with a nice, new paint job - maybe high gloss bright white, or even a wild poppy color or something off-the-wall:

This piece has that nice mid-century thing going on, and I love that it has so many drawers plus the wide shelf (great for the stereo!), with shallow shelves on top.




This one seems kind of uninspiring at first glance, but I think all those chunky wood lines would look really cool in a super-shiny paint, again either white or something crazy like red. I kind of love it.

But this is what I really, really, really love:

How awesome is this piece? My friend's mom has one very similar to this in her kitchen, and I almost freaked out when I saw it a few weeks ago. She painted it this great pale blue-green and it is just gorgeous. I can't believe I found this one on craigslist today. The problem is, I think the shelf space is the least functional of all my options, and with those tall legs, it has much less storage space than the other styles. Still, it's soooo cute. I think this one will have to stay on the wish list, though. Sigh.

What do you think, could any of these work?