good morning! we are outside filming on my very unattractive balcony this morning
because I'm going to be giving it a makeover
and I'm so stoked because I have wanted to do this ever since I moved into this house
but just have a really happy time the weather hasn't been nice
but it is just starting to warm up here in Morioka and I thought it would be the perfect
time to make this into a cozy space that I can just relax and play Animal Crossing
or read a book or have a tea or something like that
I did some shopping on IKEA which is actually a really great place for buying furniture in Japan
they're quite affordable! I will have this huge pile of furniture in my living room
and we're gonna put it together today and make the space into something fun
so let's get started!
all right so here is what we're working with
it's quite a small space - this is the typical size of a balcony for a Japanese apartment
they're really only used to hang laundry that's what I do
using this pole here, and that's really all I use it for but it would be really
cool if I could just squeeze some chairs in here and have a place to sit
so I really hope the chairs that I bought fit here! I'm kind of worried about that now
looking at how small it is... but we'll see what we can do!
so here's my pile of Ikea furniture
we've got two chairs here they're like reclining chairs, a table,
a plant stand, bunch of really cute accessories, and my favourite part are
these wooden tiles that I'm going to redo this ugly cement floor with!
these alone should really improve the look of the space. so let's start off
with these and hopefully they're easy to put together! I've got a little helper
with me today! this is Purin, my friend mark's cat.
when he's gonna be out at work for the day
he drops her off at my house so that I can take care of her
you can help me! good girl. what's that? it's exciting!
So each one of these boxes of tiles comes with nine tiles and they are one square foot each
I figured I need about 27 so I got three boxes of them
I've been watching lots of videos of people installing these on YouTube
and they look quite simple. the only hard part is gonna be if I need to kind of
adjust the size. like if the final tile doesn't fit, I'm gonna somehow have to trim it
and all I've got are these crappy dollar-store scissors
so that could be a problem... but we'll deal with it when we get there.
so the box came with instructions, they look very simple! All it says to do is to click the sides
of the tiles together and that's how they attach.
I'm going to try positioning them on the ground where I want them and snapping it together that way
Maybe that'll be easier. I think I got it! I kind of felt a snap.
It's not very satisfying, can't really tell if it's in there properly
The only thing with doing them in an alternating vertical/horizontal pattern
is that when I get to the side here and I have to trim some, I'm gonna have to
trim horizontally like this... and that is not possible with scissors so I'm
thinking maybe I will put them all in this direction
I'm taking a little break, this is not as easy as everybody made it out to be on YouTube!
So keep that in mind if you're trying to put together this flooring for your balcony
It doesn't snap together very easily. I find that I kind of have
to put my entire body weight on it to get it to snap together and even then
some of them aren't properly stuck into place and not to mention using these
shitty scissors to trim the edges that has not been a good idea.
The Daiso scissors do work but it's quite the struggle.
I think the flooring is done!
I cannot for the life of me get this last corner to fit. I'll just put some
furniture over top of that. But overall turned out pretty nice!
There is a bit of a gap here that I might fill in with some horizontal slats later, like
I did here but for the moment I'm gonna leave it like this and start assembling
the furniture! So I'm mainly worried that the chairs are not gonna fit outside on
the balcony, so I'm gonna start with those. They're probably going to be the
most difficult thing to put together too so let's get it over with!
Well it looks like they're pretty much already assembled which is amazing!
Maybe I don't even need to do anything that would be great
So these chairs are actually a really neat design, you can and have it upright
like that or you can just pull the arms like this and it reclines!
That's so cool, I am so glad that it was already put together and I didn't need to build anything!
That's such a relief. Now for the moment of truth let's go see if it
fits on my tiny balcony! I would say that is a success. I've got one of the chairs
on the balcony. I think there will be enough room for the table and another chair!
it is a miracle all three pieces of furniture fit on the balcony with enough
space to walk to the far chair. The only problem is there's no space left over
for the final thing that I purchased, which was a plant stand! I was gonna put
it in one of the corners and fill it with some really pretty plants but I can
put one of the plants on the table for now. So let's do that!
Oh wow that one is a lot bigger than I expected! Actually that'll look really cute in my bedroom
So I'm not even mad. What are these?
Hm. I didn't order those, they must just have come with the cushions for the seat
That's cool! Oh this one's so cute it'll be perfect
for the table, and this one here is super pretty! This was gonna go out the top of
the plant stand and kind of hang down, can't really do that anymore but I'll
find somewhere for it in my house I think and just have the cute little rose out here.
I'm really surprised at the size difference of these plant!
On the website I swear these look the same size. I'm really thrilled that this one
is so big because it'll look really pretty in the corner of my bedroom!
They have really affordable plant pots and lots to choose from, lots of
different styles. I went with a bunch of different metal ones. This cute little
gold one for the rose, I think this was only two dollars?
That's really cute! That can be for this one and I will find a place for it
Probably in my kitchen. I always get fake plants because one I travel a lot and if
I'm not home for long periods of time they will probably die without water and
two because if I ever get my cats back, lots of plants are poisonous to them and
they like chewing on leaves and flowers so I don't want to risk that
So I always get fake plants but IKEA has a really nice selection of fake plants!
they're so pretty, especially the little rose. I'm really happy with that. Let's see what's
going on with these cushion covers. I'm very intrigued by these because I didn't
order these separately. Interesting, looks like there's two zippered pockets that
you can insert a cushion into. Okay I see now, so these are just a very standard
filling. You wouldn't be able to use these without a cover, so I guess
these come together when you buy it. Let's cut these tags off
That's a really sturdy like well-made cushion! I think it will be able to
survive the rain but I'll probably bring them inside on rainy days just so they
don't get all like smelly and mildewy.
I think we're all finished! I'm pretty happy with how it turned out! I'm only
just a little bummed that I couldn't have the plant stand in the corner where
I was originally picturing it. I probably should have measured everything before
buying it but I'll find a place for it. I'm sure there's somewhere in my house
where it will look cute. I can use it as a shelf or something anyway.
So I'll definitely get some use out of it! But let me show you guys the final result!
My helper has retreated to her house. You don't want to help me anymore?
You did a good job, thank you. I'm actually mostly excited
about how cool it looks from inside the house! I think it definitely brightened
up the place and it feels a little more spacious now that it's got this cool
wood flooring, there's some furniture out there and that cute little rose.
All right guys, that is it for today! I'm gonna go outside and enjoy my new balcony while
it's still sunny out. I've got a couple hours left of daylight.
I hope you enjoyed this video, let me know if you have any ideas about what area of my
house I can spruce up next! I'll probably be doing some more of these home
improvement projects over the next couple weeks considering how much time I
will be spending at home so if you do have any ideas or if you have recently
done something to your home and you'd like to share and give me some
inspiration, I would love that! So leave a comment down below. Thanks so much for
watching guys! And I will see you again very soon, bye for now!