APARTMENT GUIDE 2
MAKE IT YOUR OWN
Students develop projects for decorating on a budget
BY NADIA IMAFIDON editor@kansan.com
You've finally found a place that you can call home. The walls are white and cold and there's minimal furniture. The fact that you are a college student means that hiring an interior designer is unlikely. This is the perfect opportunity for you to embark on some do-it-yourself projects.
Bethany Bonebrake, a senior from St. Louis, said that last year she wanted additional furniture for her room, but that she and her roommates at Sellards Scholarship Hall refused to spend money. They decided to build a bookshelf that would convert into a coffee table. Their material of choice: cardboard.
"It was our room project," Bonebrake said. "It was really fun. We wanted it to feel homier."
They went around town collecting cardboard to create a bookshelf that was about 1 foot to 18 inches deep, she said. When they had guests over, they could turn it on its side, and it became an instant coffee table. They mostly kept their final project as a bookshelf after discovering the hassle of moving the
books to another location when it was turned on its side.
"It was our room project. It was really fun. We wanted it to feel homier."
Building the pink and green polka-dotted bookshelf/table was a way for them to bond. They started writing their room's favorite quotes on it. Not only did this bonding experience bring them closer together, it saved them money too. Prices of coffee tables range from $30 to more than $100.
They were not the only students at Sellards who became inspired to decorate their rooms. Bonebrake remembers other students making quote boards and covering their walls with posters.
"One room covered their ceiling with really attractive men," she said. "I should talk to someone about doing that this year."
DIY projects online, her projects did not come without a few minor setbacks. Somiari got a bit of red paint on the ceiling that she managed to fix with a few coats of white paint. It didn't discourage her from completing the task at hand.
BETHANY BONEBRAKE Senior from St. Louis
Sylvia Somiari, a senior from Lawrence, has always loved DIY projects. She gave her apartment at The Reserve a complete makeover by installing shelves and lamp shades, hanging room dividers, arranging small mirrors on the wall, putting up pictures and painting the walls red. Somiari has decorated every place that she has moved into. Rather than hiring someone, she likes that she can save money doing things herself.
"When installing the hanging lamp shades, I dropped a couple and broke them, and I got the wiring all messed up. It took me a while to correct that one," Somiari said. "When I installed the mirrors on the wall, originally I just used sticky tack, because they were relatively small mirrors, but as the days went on afterward, I noticed that every day, one mirror would fall off the wall and break. The guy at the hardware store laughed at me for that one."
A five minute instructional video on making curtains for your dorm room can be found on diynetwork.com. Making your own
While she said that it was easy to look up
curtains is a big money-saver. If you have a knack for sewing, go to the fabric store and pick out your favorite material. Curtains are as simple as making a few loops at the top of the fabric, and buying a curtain rod. Pre-made curtains are generally around $20, whereas fabric is as low as $1 or $2 per yard
on sale. Twin sheets can also easily be turned into curtains.
Before you start buying cans of paint and giving your room personality, talk to your landlord about decorating restrictions. Trista Hagamen, The Reserve's senior community assistant, said that residents were permitted to hang things as long as they touched up any holes or marks before moving out. Charges are applied for any damage that is not corrected. Tenants may also choose from a variety of paint colors in the rooms and paint the rooms themselves. Chris Buse, Legends Place assistant property manager, said that tenants could do anything but destroy or tear down the wall structures. Rooms are expected to be left in the same condition that they were leased in. Restrictions vary depending on the apartment complex.
For more decorating ideas, check out diy-network.com, or creep on your friends' decorated rooms. Remember that you don't have to get fancy with your projects. Simple projects can make your living space your own.
Edited by Becca Harsch
Lease a little fuzzy? Have us clear it up before you sign.
Why?
There are several common lease provisions that could hurt students:
- automatic renewal clauses
- late fees
- security deposite
- move out charges
Call us at 864-5665 for FREE legal advice.
LSS
LEGAL SERVICES FOR STUDENTS
312 Burge Union • 864-5665 • Jo Hardesty, Director
CONTRIBUTING TO STUDENT SUCCESS
1a
MONDAY, MARCH 7, 2011
UNK com
d and
lasma,
led of
ut, lay
r into
Mo,
ankle
doing
ation,
than
prob-
TO MA?
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
hief of medical on.
meetings and rehearsal by visiting artists". Van Leer said.
The pavilion will be a place for visiting and local artists to engage with the community. The Lied Center offers specialities in education and engagement programs such as pre- and post-performance discussions, demonstrations, lectures, workshops, master classes and more. It will create more possibilities and special occasions for the Friends of the Lied to celebrate the arts.
$10 million to the University in order to fund the construction of the Lied Center.
made possible by a $2.5 million donation to the University by the Lied Foundation and a $300,000 donation from the Kemper Foundation
function
"The new Pavilion is made possible by a gift from the Lied Foundation Trust. Construction began in September 2010 and we anticipate completion of the Pavilion this summer." Van Leer said.
The public is invited to the ribbon-cutting ceremony and reception at 4:30 p.m. on Tuesday in the new Kemper Foyer.
Edited by Danielle Packer
According to the Lied Center's mission statement, the purpose of this organization is to promote the arts and education through performance.
The expansion will provide additional practice space for state productions as well as displays providing information on the history of Ernest F. Lied and the Lied Foundation Trust.
trivia
The $10 million Lied Foundation Trust donation to initially construct the Lied Center was the largest donation to KU ever at the time
The Lied Center expansion was originally proposed in 2005, but the project was scrapped due to a lack of funding.
CHALLENGE | 3A
KU residence halls are participating in the Take Charge Challenge, a competition to conserve energy and go greener.
Take Charge! Challenge
Classifieds ... 9A
Crossword ... 4A
Cryptoquips ... 4A
Opinion ... 5A
Sports ... 10A
Sudoku ... 4A
All contents, unless stated otherwise, © 2011 The University Daily Kansan
BASKETBALL | 10A
Jayhawks limp into conference tournament
+
The Kansas women's basketball team hopes to bounce back from its two recent losses while the focus shifts from the starting lineup to the bench.
Can beating processes plasma to take out specific proteins and antibodies needed to fight disease.
"Well, it's extremely important for people with rare diseases such as hemophilia, immune deficiencies, inherited respiratory disease and a number of other serious rare diseases," said Christopher Florentz, manager of cooperate communications. "We take the plasma collected by our CSL plasma collection centers and we put it through a process called fractionation where basically we separated out the proteins in the plasma and we use those proteins to make biotherapies that are used to treat various diseases."
To create plasma products the company needs raw plasma. This is where the donation centers and students like Holbrook Walker come in.
"I told everyone I was doing it for a good cause but really I wanted money for back to school clothes," Walker said. "My paycheck I got all went to my rent and I needed some extra money to do that."
Holbrook did not want to have to get a job and balance schoolwork.
"I basically got paid to sit there and study," he said.
"I basically got paid to sit there and study," he said. During the semester, Holbrook sometimes made biweekly trips to the CSL plasma donation center, earning about $400 from more than 20 trips.
Donor compensation differs by weight class. The more a donor weighs the more plasma the center can take and the more money the donor can make.
"If you weigh under 150 it's not even worth it" Holbrook said. "It's like making minimum wage."
With his ankle weights, Holbrook tipped the scales at just over 150 pounds.
Florentz said that on average, a CSL plasma donation center pays $2 million per year to donors and that in total, donors made 18.5 million plasma donations in the U.S. in 2008.
"We refer to it as donating because we compensate for their time as opposed to their plasma," Florentz said.
Kansan: Is donating plasma a good idea or not from the donor's perspective?
Denning: From the donor perspective it could cut either way. For people who are young and healthy it doesn't impact their overall health in the long-term. However in the short term it can impact even healthy young people. When you donate plasma they are taking off specialized proteins called antibodies. They are our first line of defense against infection. And personally in the height of flu season I would not recommend anyone donate plasma because we all need to keep our antibodies at a nice healthy level.
UDK: Have you seen students come in with problems or injuries cause by plasma donation?
Denning: I do on occasion see people who come in who are sick who have influenza or respiratory infections who have donated plasma. And I'm like, quit doing that until flu seasons over!
UDK: Some people bruise at the location where the needle is used for plasma donation. Is this serious?
Denning: It's not uncommon to get a little hematoma here or there. It's uncomfortable and does look very ugly and scary but those generally go away.
Edited by Tali David
The amount of money a donor receives for a plasma donation varies with weight, visit number and the amount of donations the donor has made in a week. This graph shows what donors will make during each visit to the CSL Plasma Donation Center assuming they give plasma twice a week.