Our New Abode - Week Seven, dated April 18, 2003

Monday we zipped over to Ikea to get the Billy bookcases in beech, but they were out of stock. So, I've been calling every day and they finally came in yesterday! Yeah! I picked hubby up after work - none of that waiting around until he got home on the bus stuff. Right now we only have room for 2 bookcases, but I bought 4, knowing where I want to put the other two. Hubby agreed to rip out the built in bookcase in the living room (don't need it with the wall of books I already have up), add flooring to that section and then the other two cases can go up there. Hopefully he'll make good headway on it this weekend. I will need to do some painting in that area once he rips it out, so we'll see how far along we get with that project. So, if you hear a loud scream this weekend, you'll know it's from me picking up a paint brush once again.

Like a friend told me once, it would be real easy to decorate your entire house from Ikea. Boy, was she right. That store is dangerous. Last night we also walked out with a new computer desk for me and a little table to go under that table. That way I can store computer paper and such right at hand. The computer workstation we wanted for hubby's computer was out of stock in beech, but we can wait since it'll be a while until we have that room ready.

And it's a darn good thing hubby has a truck, as all of those boxes sure wouldn't have fit into my Trooper. The computer table alone weighed 110#. My poor back! The bookcases were something like 89# and very awkward to handle as they were so large. They just barely fit into the back of the truck.

Last night hubby put one of the bookcases together. It looks great! Nice beech color, with glass doors. The doors have the same color of wood (well, particle board, but it still looks nice) as a frame around the glass. There's one wood shelf as a support shelf in the middle. It came with other wood shelves, but I'm not going to use them; instead we put in glass shelves. I'm going to be spending some time today cleaning the glass as well as using Goo-Gone to get rid of the sticker residue. I don't know why companies can't use easy peel off stickers on glass. Pet peeve alert! Hubby also installed two sets of small halogen lights - one set of two on the top shelf and the other set on the bottom of the wood support shelf. There are now 5 glass shelves in there. We'll see how far the lights reach after I wad them full of figurines. Last night I put a few in, just to see how they look. They look great!! I've been wanting to use these bookcases for display cabinets for years, so I'm really excited to finally be able to have room for them. I'll take some photos after I've filled the first two up.

Other new updates to the house. In our initial trip to Ikea we also bought a wall unit that can also double as a coffee table. I had liked our old table, which was narrow and two levels, as it stored the remotes out of the cats' way. However, it's getting pretty beat up and I wanted something newer. I was going to use my old coffee table, but it's wider than can really fit in here comfortably and only one layer. So, it's going to be going to Goodwill eventually. This wall unit is also in beech (preferred color at the moment), is narrow, but wider than hubby's old table and has 3 "shelves" on it, which separate it into different sections. Instead of mounting it on the wall, it's been flipped onto one long side and castors added, so you can wheel it around. It works great and was pretty cheap. I've already got it covered with bunches of stuff.

We also got another CD tower, so now I have 5 of them in a row. It's nice to finally be able to have all of our CDs in one place. I was able to absorb my mom's CDs in with ours. They're now sorted by type of music - rock, new age, classical and other. The towers are in one corner of the living room, between the wall (along the long hallway) and the entertainment center. Of course the towers are in beech. That was the color I originally picked out and I'm glad I got that color instead of the lighter birch, which is pretty much the same color as our flooring. That wouldn't have been enough of a contrast for my tastes.

The other Ikea purchase was one of their rocking type chairs. I wanted to get a recliner, but didn't want one where the cats could hide underneath when it was opened. Plus, the handle thingie really kills my hand, so the normal type of recliner was out of the question. This one has a beech (of course!) wood frame, with an off white cushion. It gently rocks a bit back and forth/up and down, but doesn't rock like a rocking chair does. Am I making sense? HA! You can also get a footstool to go with, which we did. It's very simple, with clean lines and looks good in the living room. Of course the cats think I put in here just for them. Why did I even think we would be able to use it? HA!

I also had to take my plants off the teak cabinet, as the cats think it's the perfect place to snooze in the sun. So, my dreams of wadding it full of plants might go out the window. Yep, the cats have the run of this place. Did you expect otherwise?

Wednesday I spent most of the day hanging up pictures. I wadded the wall behind the couch (along the long hallway) full of prints, as well as the wall behind the wood burning stove (easily removed the few times it'll get used). I'm glad to finally have room to put up all of my prints. I still have a few more to put up, plus a few that need new hangers on the back.

Did I mention the flooring is all done in the living room? Yep, Dirk got it all done. Well, except for the part he'll have to add in when the built in bookcase is removed. There's still a bit of molding to put in along the walls, as well as the flat molding section around the fireplace area. But for all intents and purposes, it's done. Dirk did a heck of a job in getting it done and it looks really wonderful. But, boy does it sure show the dirt and cat hair! I'm used to carpets that absorb all that, so you don't have to vacuum/dust every day. I'm a lazy housekeeper, so we'll see how it works using the Black and Decker cordless vacuum every day. But for right now I am using it every day, as we're still busy admiring the clean lines of the floor and how bright it looks. Ask me in 6 months if I'm still vacuuming every day. HA!  My brother saw a similar type of vacuum in a store and mentioned it to me. I'm glad he did, as this smaller vacuum works quite well on the wood floors, plus it's rechargeable.  The wiring isn't the greatest in this house and will be replaced eventually.  For now I have to be careful what all I use at one time, so for now I don't have to worry about the powerful vacuum sucking up all the power.

Once that was done we were able to haul over the entertainment center. Ended up hefting that thing on top of the canopy of hubby's truck and carefully driving back with it. Fortunately it was about a 6 mile drive and it wasn't raining. It got here safely and now has the TV and a few other components on it. I can't find the shelves and doors that go with it, even after rooting around in the storage units. So, either they're hidden really well, or they're still over in Spokane with the few things we left over there. Oh well, they'll get found eventually. If not, hubby can saw away at the Billy shelves and use them. So what if the wood colors won't match? I didn't like how Ikea figures you should display your TV, so we didn't get anything from them in that regards. They want you to have your TV lower to the floor than I prefer. Oh well, spend that money on more Billy bookcases, right?

I hauled over bunches of my figurines, so once the glass shelves are clean, I'm going to start rooting around in those boxes. I'm not sure what all I'll be putting up, but I'm sure going to have fun while I'm doing it. I've already found one horse that I forgot I had. A nicely colored grey Lipizzaner from Creart (from Mexico) that I had the factory paint in that color, as it usually came in a creamy white. I had forgotten I had it, as well as forgetting how nice he looks in that grey. He may have to make it to a few shows in the near future.

To show you how excited I am about this bookcase, I got up before hubby did (at 5AM) and have been up ever since. I hardly ever get up this early, but no way could I sleep knowing that bookcase needs filling up.