My room is all about my books. I have this wonderful old-school cherry wood podium that has three shelves beneath. Very classy. 
My custom rapier hangs over my door, and my cutout of the Bayeux Tapestry hangs over my desk. As attached to my computer as I am, I’ve kept technology out of my little reading room. I’d keep the doors closed all the time, but my 4 (yes, count 'em, 4) cats would be mighty pissed.
MR
Like CalMeacham, my house is full of kid’s toys. We have less than 1,200 sq feet and three kids, so the toys are the primary decorating motif. Sort of an Interiors by Fisher-Price look. And books. Lots of books.
I love my apartment—10’ ceilings, lots of windows. Light, airy and “under-decorated,” not cluttered. Lots of books, of course, and a few nice paintings and photos.
What I DON’T love is the awful white-trash woman in the downstairs back apartment, with her attack dogs, screaming baby, barbecue smoke, loud boyfriend (and HIS two shrieking kids). Everyone in the house hates this woman, but I’ve heard so many other neighbor horror stories that I know it could be worse . . .
hmmmmmmm, my place is pretty nice. We are renting so can’t paint any walls. We made up for it by hanging canvases with my and SO’s lame-ass artwork everywhere. Living room is filled with books and cds. The best part of the house is a screened in back porch overlooking our neigbhor’s pond.
My most precious things: my 2 cats (of course) Ivy and Cypress, and the cd’s and books. I would have to put cds first because they would cost more to replace and the growing collection is a huge part of my life.
When my buddy from work stopped by, he described my home as “gracious suburban living.” Ha! Believe me, any decorating credit goes to my wife. Since I am not allowed to be a slob anywhere at home, I take those tendencies out in my office where you can easily go from one end to the other without touching carpeting.
My home looks very nice, but is very comfortable to relax in. We just redid the family/t.v. room over entirely - the first time we did such a thing instead of replacing the most ratty object to go with everything else we already had. Go back a few generations and you realize your entire room is built off of an old cable spool and a couple of cases of returnables you had while in college.
So we dumped a shitload on Stickley mission furniture, which I absolutely love. So the kids will have to make do with community college!
Now sitting on my deck or walking through my yard is where you want to be! Entirely perennials but for pots and some herbs, pretty well shaded so heavy on the hosta and astilbe, includes a growing native shde garden I’m pretty proud of with bloodroot, solomon’s seal, jack in the pulpit, shooting stars, may apples, ferns … I’ll mix up a pitcher of whatever turns your crank, you can toss the ball for Daisy, the kids’ rats will run around our feet, we’ll watch the birds at the feeders and baths, and I’ll burn something tasty on the grill whether you are veggie or carny.
Aaahhh! I’ll be there in 7 hours! Now I’m thinking bout barbecued pork chops and grilled marinated asparagus, and I have work to do.
Because it’s not a picture of my friends. It’s of a TV show, ya know? Admittedly, Susan is one of my really good friends, and it’s an amazing drawing, but still. Thought of one more thing I’d grab, actually…my small photo album that’s a record of my last trip to London and Scotland.
A six room apartment filled with furniture that looks like we’re still in grad school. It’s mostly pieces picked up from the curb during the Great Boston Apartment Shuffle in past years. The item we paid the most for is a $60 table. Books everywhere. Bookshelves in every room, plus books tucked into every nook and cranny. Plus a couple dozen boxes of books in the basement. We have a 3-bedroom apartment, one bedroom of which is a sort of guest room with a futon, and another bedroom is the office - jam packed full of computer equipment, books, and papers. There are cables running everywhere because we haven’t finished setting up our intranet. It’s functional, just not pretty.
And no matter how often we vacuum, there is enough cat hair floating around to make another cat.
The kitchen is full of spice jars, on 3 huge racks. We love to cook, and I don’t think there are any spices we haven’t used in the past 30 days, except the saffron, which I am so stingy with it will probably go stale before I allow myself to enjoy using it. Only the essential gadgets, though, like a bread machine, blender, rice cooker and pasta maker, because we have limited space. We have a small pantry filled with food. Some weird things, though, which I’m not sure we’ll ever use up. Like the 5 cans of solid pack pumpkin. I wanted to make pumpkin bread, and they were 3 for $2, so I bought 6. Who knew you could make 8 loaves of pumpkin bread with one can? When we were considering whether to do any stocking up for Y2K, we decided that the worst that was likely to happen was we’d be without electricity or water for a day or two. We have enough food to feed us for two weeks, even though none of it goes together, so we just bought 2 gallons of water. Pumpkin and water… it does a body good.
My most treasured possession? That’s difficult. Probably a dozen or so books I simply couldn’t live without. Or maybe the chrome blender I got for my birthday a few years ago. It’s very stylish and makes great frozen drinks.
My husband and I live in a tiny, cramped, messy, one-bedroom apartment in Manhattan. Everything is covered in cat fur.
We have three walls of books (and that doesn’t count the boxes of books I have in storage–nearly all of my furniture my old apartment is in storage because there’s nowhere else to put it). A beat-up old desk in a corner for my husband’s computer, a bookshelf full of LPs (ah, LPs…), a couch, a coffee table, our dining room table and chairs (which are, of course, in the living room) and our small number of entertainment electronics.
In the entrance way (right by our front door there is a small entrance, sort of) is a chef’s cart (because there is no workspace in the kitchen, the refrigerator (it’s too big for the kitchen, so it’s right by the front door), a typing table (remember those? you could roll it around to move the typewriter into position) which is the lair of my Siamese cat Squirt. The bedroom’s barely big enough for 2 people, 2 cats, a bed and two dressers, but we make do.
If the whole thing went up in flames, besides the kitties I guess we would save all of our photos. And I would want the quilted wall hanging we bought on our honeymoon in Vermont in January (tomorrow’s our 6th monthaversary!).