First solo shag pad

I'd like to give you all a tour of my apartment. This is the first apartment I've never had a roommate in. It took awhile to get used to, and my tendency to talk to myself has drastically increased, but now I love living on my own! (The main reason being that I can be a total slob with no one to judge me.)

It was a minor miracle that I found this place. I'm sure I mentioned it before, but I moved to Toronto without having a place to live. I was so stressed out in my first week from new-job-jitters and having to learn a big new city that I didn't have the time nor incentive to hunt for a ridiculously expensive apartment.

I was feeling guilty for having mooched off my friends (they were kind enough to put me up on their couches/floors) so I ended up looking at apartments on craigslist. I called a bunch but none were grabbing my attention. And just when I was about to call it quits, I decided to give one more listing a try. It was a basement apartment, but oh-so-pretty.

To shorten my story, I managed to see the apartment the very next day (it had only been listed the night before!) and before I knew it, I was signing a lease! The first week I literally had NO furniture. I slept on a sleeping bag on the hardwood floor with my stuff scattered around. You have no idea how lonely it is to hear the room echo when you're alone in a strange city!

My parents and middle sibling along with her BF helped move my stuff down the following weekend. It went really fast, but 5 years of student living didn't really give me a lot of actual furniture. The only things I had were my computer desk, bed, dresser (which was actually my parents', but I annexed it) and couple of cheap drawers from Walmart. Luckily my middle sibling donated an end table and a couple of chairs which served as my "couch" for the next month or so.

A trip to IKEA got me a couple of bar stools, a shelf, another end table, a TV stand, etc. I also ordered a couch from the Brick. The problem with the shelf that I bought was that my ceilings were too low for it to fit!!! We ended up having to literally SAW OFF THE BOTTOM! It looks good - you can't even tell that it was "modified" but I was horrified at the destruction of my brand new furniture!

A couple days later, the Brick came to deliver my couch. Again, nothing can happen easily for me. I had been really concerned that the couch would be too big to fit down the stairs. My parents assured me over and over again that it would fit. And lo and behold, they were right. The problem though was that the couch was too tall (again, the ceilings were too low) that the delivery guys could not angle it into my living room! Long story short, the Brick ended up taking it back to the warehouse and I got store credit for it, which my sister was able to sell to a friend for me, so I came out no less poorer than when I started. Phew.

On another trip to visit me, my parents offered to pick up a futon for me and deliver it themselves, saving me the hassle of dealing with the Brick again (I have a hate-on for that store now). Although I despise futons, I caved, needing something other than the small IKEA chair to sit on.

So now you can see my shag pad in its fully furnished glory! My only beef with the place is that it's a basement apartment. It's so cold in the winter. Luckily my landlord who lives above me is relatively quiet. Plus, the apartment is in a ridiculously convenient location! I'm sad because I'll have to leave it behind when I move to Montreal...

Bedroom 1, Bedroom 2, Bedroom 3
Bathroom 1, bathroom 2
Living area 2