CSS Gallery – Showcase – Inspiration

Well, some of you already know and some don’t but I purchase my first home! I have a whole bunch of home buying tips and stories to share that will come soon enough. For now I want to share my thanks with my many friends and family that helped me setup my place, paint, decorate, etc… It will be a work in progress for a while but as of right now I am super happy with how it’s turning out.

The place is in Rancho Santa Margarita, about a mile away from my old apartment. (which I am still paying on until the end of June and will share more on that soon) Its a one bedroom place, not huge but all mine. As you will see in the pics its a corner unit so there is nobody above or below me which was very important to me. I also only share one common wall with my neighbor which is in the living room, another great feature. The one car garage is deeper than others I looked at which will provide plenty of workspace for my bike addiction. (garage rebuild coming soon) Something else that I really loved about this location is at the end of my street is an entrance to the Oneil / Tijeras Creek Trail. Nothing like riding out your garage and right on to the trail in less than a mile.

So before I post the pics I want to say thanks to my family, Ryan, Mike, James, Sean, and Chris for helping me get the place to where it is today.

The corner there is me. My truck is too tall to get into the garage but I knew that ahead of time. There is a cool side door to the garage which will be great for biking, no need to open the big door very often. (Be sure to click continue reading)

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With the new home coming soon I have been searching for new furniture pretty much nonstop for the past 2 months. Why is everything I really like super expensive? Grrrrr. Well, turns out Ikea has a few pieces that I really like and are not all that expensive, yay! Most stuff at Ikea is crap, looks cheap and falls apart easily. I did however find a few items that were not made of that cheap Ikea laminate you see everywhere, instead they are made of actual wood. The Hemnes Collection is turning out to be a favorite and I think the below dressers may end up in my bedroom. What do you think?

I also ran into this wall unit combination that goes for just under $800 for everything you see here (on the wall). Not bad. I like the dark brown/black wood even though it looks black in the pic. I have one wall in the new place that is going to need something like this. I have over 500 DVD’s (it’s a sickness) and a ton of saved magazines (i keep one of every magazine i am published in). I need a place for all those, some books, pictures, etc…

Here is a shot of my friend Chris’ desk at R V C A Clothing. He is also their web designer so go checkout their site. The reason I am sharing this is not because I am totally jealous of his 60-inches of LOVE on his desktop but rather the desk itself. I want something basic for my new place, dark wood like this maybe a shade darker and I dig the aluminum top. I need to find out what I need to make this myself… hrmm… if anyone knows how to apply that alum top let me know! Here is a shot of my desk at work, Chris you suck.

My friend Nancy recently purchase a 3 level home/business unit in Aliso Viejo. If you haven’t heard of these before basically your business is located on the bottom floor and you live on the two floors above it. Kinda reminds me of some of the downtown shops in NYC and Chi-town. Well, it just so happens they have a pretty badass photographers unit demo that I would love to live in. However, for $900,000 it better be damn nice! Here are some shots and a few choice words.

As you walk in this is the lower level. Nice business area setup for clients.

Mini headshot studio setup. I would set up my lower level much differently but I did like the style they had going. Small but ample bathroom unit as well.

Bathroom unit. Love the colored brick and red.

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