Hoarders Annonymous

The other night I went across the street to visit a neighbor and when I walked back and gazed into our home where all the lights were on and blinds were open, it looked like an episode of hoarders.

I do not make light of the affliction of hoarding. In fact, I think I have a mild case. Trouble is we've been piecemeal-ing pieces of furniture together to house our bunches of stuff - almost none of which has doors. So you can pretty much see everything we own. From the street. So something had to be done.

Day 1: I set off the next morning with the kiddos and a friend to IKEA, with instructions from the fella not to make any purchases without his two cents. This mission was purely reconnaissance. He and I returned that night to make decisions and purchases. We closed the place down and headed home to start assembly. Upon opening the first flat box I realized we got home with the wrong pieces. 

DAY 2: The fella and I dropped the boys off at school and headed to a different furniture store with Hazel. We perused the sectional couches then went to IKEA to ponder our options. We got the correct pieces of the kitchen storage cabinets we goofed up the day before and purchased a honkin' Besta - an entertainment system which would also have great storage for media, the printer and other office stuff. Behind closed doors. YAY.

We also chose a lovely compact sectional and a rug from the other place.

What I forgot to mention that day 2 was Friday, and on Saturday Hazel and I were to catch an 8:00 a.m. flight to North Carolina. Details...details...

Day 2 timeline:
9:00 a.m. - drop boys off
9:30 a.m. - 1:45 p.m. - shop
2:00 p.m. - home, started assembling.
5:00 p.m. - haul all the old stuff down to the basement
6:00 p.m. - keep assembling
2:00 a.m. - finish assembly, start putting stuff away (fella goes to bed)
4:30 a.m. - it is finished!
4:30 a.m. - take a shower. pack.
5:00 a.m. - head hits pillow. fella's alarm clock goes off. agree to sleep til 6:00.
6:00 a.m. - wake up and go to airport
Zoiks.

But we really like it. There's space and organization and the things we need are still within arms reach but not in plain sight. There is still a little work to do - I plan on recovering the printed cushions and adding some artwork.

 Looks like a grown up's living room, right?

 Storage with doors! Revolutionary!

We certainly did not cure our hoarding tendencies. In fact, the hoard was not diminished at all, just hidden. There wasn't time for both culling the hoard and fixing the new stuff. We'll get to the hoard culling some other time. For now...

we like it! That last photo is just for fun. At Eli's request Hazel is dressed as a pumpkin fairy this morning. Why not?

A Make Over Peek of the Week - January 13, 2012

Ikea...you make my dreams come true. 

I've been dreaming of a sewing room makeover. So this guy:

(The patented Ikea Two Cart Pull)

and I (and Hazel and Yaya (not pictured), and Dizzy in SmalLand) scurried over to IKEA with a $90 budget for sewing room shelving and storage. 

And of course, they had just the thing.

Here is the before:

(Actually this is the during. When we moved in to this house I had a plan to fence off half of the sewing room for a boy play area so I put the giant 8 ft. table on the middle-length wall. Well, the fence plan never panned out, so now to make better use of the space, I put the giant table on the biggest wall, the medium table on the medium wall, and the ironing board on the smallest wall. Sensible, no?). 

And the After:

The cutting table. That's right - a whole table just for cutting!! 

And check out my wood cabinet full of fabric and how it actually closes now!

And look at that beautiful LACK shelf! Perfect for all my loveliest lovelies. 

Hazel likes it too.

But wait. There's more.

Now with the big table on the big wall, Betty is situated right in front of the window. Perfect!

And I have some great inspiration on the new shelves - Photos of my honey, my sisters, and my lady lobster (Sunny B); the lovebirds made for us for our tenth anniversary by the lovely Melinda; the awesome owl plate from potter and Mama extraordinaire, Amy Sanders; and the spool drawing from my craft-sperational friend and ex-roomie Christa (who also painted the J and the "Chaos is Organic" mantra painting hanging on the clothesline in the top photo). She taught me to sew for teeny baby Eli. 

I am so inspired in this new space I have been sewing up a storm. I'll be revealing some of these new projects in the coming days...but this new look is enough for today's Peek of the Week. 

What's Peek of the Week, you ask? It's our regular Friday feature and it's all about you! I want to hear (and share with my readers) what wowed you this week. It could be a cool finished project, a work in progress, a personal accomplishment, a cute kid moment, or something that surprised you.

If we could peek into your week - what would you want to show us?

Each week I'll share my own Peek of the Week to get the ball rolling, and invite you to link to your blog post about your Peek of the Week. I know y'all are up to cool stuff - we wanna see it!

Ok! Your turn!

You could get peeking in three easy steps:
1. Blog about your Peek of the Week - whatever it is. Whatever happened that made you proud, laugh, smile, inspired, excited, or just plain happy - now that's worth sharing.
2. Include a link to this blog or put the Peek of the Week button (on the sidebar) in your post.
3. Link your blog post using the InLinkz button below.

If you don't get a chance to get here on Friday, feel free to link your post up later.
The InLinkz button will be active for 5 days.

Embrace the Swedish Sensibility

Well, I did it. It may have been ill-advised, but as no one officially advised me against it, I went directly from my 38 week appointment yesterday to the grand opening of IKEA.

My facebook status: Me, Myself, and IKEA. And 20,000 other people.

I had a very short but specific list of items I need to feather little sister's nest. Mainly she needed a dresser, but a very narrow tall one. And some other goodies that mysteriously jumped into my big yellow bag.

I narrowly avoided being on the news because my gas light came on just as I got into the parking line. I really didn't want to get out, but I really really didn't want to be that pregnant lady who kept thousands of people from getting to IKEA because she ran out of gas in the parking line, that dummy. Thankfully my gas held out until I got to the first lot that had an open spot (I didn't even try to get close, so I wasn't even in the garage - I was in a satellite lot).

Other than that one hiccup, it went remarkably well. I had friends inside who were giving me updates. They had gone early and had to wait in line 45 minutes at the door just to get it. By noon it was less crazy, and I just walked right in with no wait.

IKEA is a wonderfully international experience. I heard numerous customers speaking in lots of foreign languages. It was cool.

I spent all of two hours and came out with most of the things on my list and a few other goodies. I showed re.mark.able restraint. I even made it out without any cut-your-own fabrics. How strong am I?

The only dicey part (besides the gas) was getting my difficult-to-steer-and-very-heavily-piled pallet cart full of flat boxes of un-assembled furniture to my car. I wasn't about to do drive-up pick-up, lest I run out of gas. So I basically stole a cart briefly and took it to satellite parking.

I'm so happy I did it. Now I can nip the rest of my nesting urges in the bud and it was kinda cool to go to the grand opening.

No baby movement seems to have come of all that walking and standing, although someone told me that "Ikea is a sovereign Swedish territory, which makes all children that are born there Swedish citizens" - So maybe I'll go back and try again. It would be cool to have a Swede baby.

Linking up to Embrace the Camera today, just for fun.

Big Day

Today is big for a number of reasons:

1) It's my sweet niece's 13th birthday. She's the coolest. Happy birthday Fiffin Face!

2) It's the fella's and my 134th month-aversary. Happy day hubby!

3) It's my 38 week appointment! Down to the weekly check-ins. Can't be long, right?

4)

IKEA opens today. And I'ma goin'. I've arranged to have the whole day to attend to #s 3 and 4. Thanks Yaya.

Eric thinks I'm a fool. He's right for sure.

People have been camping out for two days. Highways are rerouted for the next 4 days. Thousands of people will be there.

But I've got my catalog, my list, and my day freed up...and I'm doin' it.

Wish me luck.