Even though I’ve moved to an apartment, I still can’t shake the urge to make a mess redoing things in my living space. I’ve painted everything, installed a new light switch, changed out an old fixture, put up shelving, run coax cable, you name it. I like to make a space my own, and I want everything just so.

The other day I made myself very proud.

I bought an articulating wall-mount for my little 19″ flat panel TV in my bedroom. It’s such a small screen that it does me no good to have it on the wall facing my bed because it’s so far away. So in order to make it work on the wall parallel to my bed, I needed to make it move. So I bought this guy:

It was a cinch to screw it onto the back of the TV. There was a second piece that went onto the wall directly. It even had a built-in leveler so you could mark your drill holes exactly right! Putting the wall mount piece in wasn’t HARD, but it was a little scary because I had to use a 1/4″ drill bit to put in the bolts. It may not sound like much, but that’s a BIG hole to put in your wall. Two big holes, actually. But it worked.  Then the part with the arm just slid onto it and clicked in place.

Then there were power and cable cords hanging down, looking ratty. I picked up some paintable wire covers at Lowe’s and used those to corral the cables and hide them neatly away.

Check it out!

The mounting hardware is rock-solid, and the swing arm is so cool. It doesn’t sit the TV flush against the wall, but that’s the price you pay for that articulating arm instead of a flush-mount. Well worth it, I say.

Go me!