Surviving 800 Square Feet

Lacking foresight, Matty and I signed a lease on a relatively small apartment in June 2020. Since Matty is unable to work from home and I was supposed to go back into the office the next week, I convinced ourselves that a 1 bedroom apartment would work perfectly! However, per usual, I was wrong. 

I never went back to the office. Instead, I turned our 10 square foot dining room into my office and immediately got to work plotting our apartment escape. We were able to terminate our lease without having to sell a kidney so, I can now reflect fondly on the 7 months Matty and I shared life in a shoebox. 

Our experience summarized:  

(Mis)reading the Fine Print-

Before we moved in, I incorrectly deduced that we could do whatever we wanted to the apartment (paint walls, build a 100 square foot gallery wall ect) and only ever owe the building our security deposit.  Since our security deposit was $200, I considered it a deposit worth losing. I convinced Matty to paint 3 of the 7 walls black. After he did so, we read the fine print and realized that we would owe $600 per wall the building had to paint in addition to our security deposit. 

Nail Holes

Any wall that didn’t receive a coat of black paint received multiple nail holes. Since our space was so small and my frame collection so large, the only place for things to go was up. 

Getting Things for Free

I have an incredible talent for receiving broken packages. Thankfully, Matty is an Eagle Scout with a tool selection larger than Home Depot so, he can often salvage the broken pieces or jury rig a solution. Hence, why our canopy bed (that arrived without the canopy) featured a curtain rod canopy as a replacement.

Closet Space

The only downside of loving such a well dressed man is competing for closet space. 

Pillows

One of my guiding principles in life is “you can never have too many pillows.” One time Matty expressed that we had too many pillows and I just pretended not to hear him. There is no such thing as too many pillows. Ask anyone you meet in an isle of Homegoods. 

Decorative Water

I consider my glass bottles of Pellegrino sparkling water to be a poor woman’s art collection. My decorative water is not to be drunk. Even in emergencies.

The most miraculous part of our 800 square foot endeavor isn't that Matty and I still got married half way through the experience, it's that we received a full refund on our security deposit. Granted there was a lot of painting and patching on Matty’s part but, I did offer to help him one time* (*when he was finished). Much to the glee of our downstairs neighbors, we are onto our next project… a 1,500 square foot townhouse we bought in Alexandria!