Table Day!

A while back, I set up some alerts so that I would be notified on specific new posts on Craigslist. I used the IFTTT website, which I use for multiple other things, like posting to Twitter, and emailing my Blog Posts. There are so many different capabilities that you should check out and see if they would work for you! If you're looking for specifics, feel free to contact me, too, and I can let you know exactly how I'm using it.

Anyways, one of the alerts that I set up was for the IKEA Stornas Table, and every now and then, I would get an email when one was posted on Craigslist. In the last seven or eight months, a few have shown up, but they always get snatched up quickly. The extendable table, which is the one that I was looking for, is very popular since it's a solid wood table with two leaves and extends to 115"! But, finally, I was able to get my hands on one. A woman in Cambridge, MA was selling one that she had no use for anymore, so I talked with her about picking it up and on a Tuesday after work, my mom and I braved rush-hour traffic from Providence to Cambridge in my sister's SUV - a day I declared as "Table Day," since I had been looking forward to getting this piece for about a week before we finally picked it up.

With only needing to remove the legs and the leaves, the table top fit in the vehicle with one end resting on the top of the driver and passenger seats and the other end resting on the floor of the cargo space. I had to slink down in my seat just a bit so that my head didn't hit the table, but it was worth it. My mom was a trooper though. She's so tiny, standing at just 5' tall, so her head was no where near the table top resting on the headrest of her seat, but she did help me carry the table into the house. When assembled, the table weighs about 170 pounds, according to the IKEA website, so even though the legs were off and the leaves were out, it still weighed a lot! I was so lucky to have her help, since I definitely wouldn't have been able to pick it up by myself.

I washed it down when I got it home and then attached the legs and added in both leaves. There are a few dings and scratches in it here and there, but that was both expected and fine with me since I was able to purchase the table for a significant discount. Plus, I picked up some of the stain that IKEA sells so that I can do some touch-ups on some of the more visible spots. The most important thing, though, is that the table fits really well in the room, although Dylan actually wishes it was longer! We still only have two chairs, and they are a different finish, because I purchased them back when I had plans to build our dining table and stain it a nice rich brown, so we will probably re-evaluate now and try to figure out what we want the chair style to be. Maybe we'll end up sticking with the IKEA Borje chairs but just go with the black-brown finish instead of the brown.

I can't wait to to style this table and the room, but as you can see in the background, I still need to add the chair rail molding and get the room painted, so that's next on the list for this space. What kind of styling do you think I should do for this table? Keep in mind that we have two cats, so tall or breakable items aren't really conducive to every-day decor. Also, with a table of 115", do I make a gigantic runner to put down the middle? Help please!

Dining Room Chairs and Swatches

Rugs have been pushed aside, ladies and gentlemen - and been replaced by Craigslist.  I hinted towards this last week, however, it has gotten much, much worse in the last few days.  It has come to a point where I now have over 45 alerts set for different search terms, and in addition to that, I have nine different Craigslist search tabs open on my Chrome browser.  I have been stalking that site at least once per hour, and have been finding some amazing things.

This weekend, Dylan and I went to visit my grandparents, and on our way down, stopped to take a look at some chairs, which we ended up buying.  These two chairs, the IKEA Borje chairs, are on my shopping list for our dining room, so I was so excited to see that these were the color that I wanted.

The seller said that they had only been used two or three times, and they are in excellent condition, so I totally believe her.  We bought them for $40 combined, tucked them away in the backseat of my car, and left her home with a smile on our faces! I mean, how can you not smile after getting such perfect chairs at a great price?! Each chair new from IKEA is $49, so getting two for less than the price of one was incredible!!

So, getting these chairs brings me to the next part of the plan - recovering the seats. I mentioned last week when I talked about the Klobo Loveseat that I wanted to recover both in a patterned fabric so that it ties the living and dining areas in together.  However, I was kind of worried that some of the patterns of fabric would clash and be too busy with the pattern on the rug - and boy was I right.  I didn't realize how busy some of those swatches ended up being, so I am very glad that I ordered them.

I laid all of the swatches out on the Klobo Loveseat, which is already in the living/dining room so using the natural light from the large picture window in that space, I was immediately able to eliminate some of the fabrics because they weren't the right color I was looking for.  You can kind of see the difference in the color of the fabrics compared to the paint swatch, which is the one that I have bordered in black, but trust me when I say that some of the colors that look like they match in this picture were totally off, like the one right above the paint swatch. Wow, was that an awful clash!

On the Arms: Premier Prints Small Dandelion Turquoise/White and Premier Prints Circles True Turquoise (Discontinued) 

On the Seat Back - Top Row: Premier Prints Solid Turquoise, Premier Prints Cameron Slub Aquarius, Richloom Sensu Mallard Teal

On the Seat Back - Bottom Row: Premier Prints Indoor/Outdoor Sticks Pacific

On the Seat - Top Row: Premier Prints Linked Jade, Premier Prints Indoor/Outdoor Towers Pacific, Premier Prints Jiri Stripe Jade, Premier Prints Linked Macon Apache Blue

On the Seat - Bottom Row: Premier Prints Lulu Stripe True Turquoise, Covington Majestic Velour Peacock, Premier Prints Dandelion White/True Turquoise, Premier Prints Nicole Slub Aquarius, Premier Prints Canopy Stripe Slub Aquarius

I wasn't able to test these out with the rug that I bought, because I actually exchanged the 8'x10' for the 9'x12', and haven't removed the new one from the packaging.  As you can see, there is just too much stuff in the room right now to be able to open it up, so I used my iPad to show the rug pattern with the fabric.  Turns out that the rug is a lot busier than I thought it would be, so we have actually decided to do two different fabrics.  And surprisingly, even though we chose a pattern and a solid, we will be using the pattern on the seats of the chairs!  

I love the chevron pattern above, and even though Dylan is not a big fan, he said he could deal with it in small quantities. Plus, this Premier Prints fabric isn't in-your-face chevron, like some of the other ones are, so I think that worked in my favor with getting him to agree to it!  The second fabric swatch is to die for. Seriously.  It's a turquoise velour, made by Covington, and it is the softest fabric I have ever felt. It's even softer than the Minky fabric that is so popular for baby blankets.  As soon as I touched this fabric, I wanted to lay on it, and knew that I had to have it.  Luckily for me, the color in the velour and the chevron is almost exactly the same, so Dylan suggested that we do the print on the chairs, since the angle in the chevron pattern matches slightly with the rug, and then we use the velour on the Klobo Loveseat.

Sold!

So, that's the plan. I have purchased the fabric and I am waiting for it to arrive.  I can't wait to get to work in recovering the chairs and the loveseat - and don't worry, I'll be posting a DIY so that you too can recover your IKEA furniture!

Have you ever recovered a piece of IKEA furniture? What problems did you come across in your process?  

Craigslist Is My Best Frenemy

I introduced you to my new love last week - my library card catalog.  I found that piece on Craigslist, after almost a year of searching for the perfect piece in my price range.

Since then, I have been obsessed with Craigslist, checking almost hourly (and I'm not really kidding) for things on my IKEA shopping list that I can get at a steal and save not only money, but space in my vehicle when I take my epic shopping trip (more on that shopping trip later).  I have started wanting more and more items that I find, which is why Craigslist is currently both my best friend and my enemy.  It's essentially screaming at me to spend money on awesome pieces for the house, but I really need to be careful and make sure that the items are actually great deals and items that we need rather than want.

Rhode Island is situated between two IKEA stores, one in New Haven, CT and the other in Stoughton, MA.  With as many colleges and universities as there are in New England, IKEA furniture is perfect for students as well as young professionals starting out in their first place.  There are easily hundreds of new Craigslist postings per day of just IKEA pieces.  I have been searching through all of these listings for items that may be on my shopping list and for items that I want but wouldn't necessarily need or pay full price for.  I've even gone so far as to set up alerts that notify me whenever a new item matching my search criteria is posted.

Anyways, last week, after coming back with my card catalog, I started looking for some seating for in front of the fireplace in the Living/Dining Room.  We plan on having a large dining table that can seat ten on top of the 9x12 rug that I purchased, and then in front of the fireplace, we want some additional seating that will allow us to relax and enjoy a fire, if we ever get the chimney inspected and cleaned.  I was originally looking for two matching chairs that we could put a small table in between, but everything I was finding was going to cost over $300 after refinishing and recovering.  I was looking for something much less expensive, and I ended up finding the perfect thing.

Enter the Klobo. The Klobo is a discontinued IKEA Loveseat similar to the Klippan series that is currently available.  It's a really low profile couch that will allow the heat from the fireplace to spread throughout the room and for us to be able to see the fire from sitting at the dining table.  It is only a loveseat, so it will fit only two people, or maybe three really small people, but it's still better than nothing. Plus, the price.

I only paid $75 for this.  Really.  And it's original list price was somewhere around $150.  It's in near perfect condition, despite it having a natural/off-white canvas fabric.  There are only a few dirt marks on the front side of the loveseat, and those could probably be washed out with some spot remover, but I'm not sure if that's going to bother me right now, because I am almost 100% sure that I'm going to recover it.

And speaking of recovering it, I put a couple of throw pillows that I found in the prefect colors for the room on it, and then took a few pieces of fabric out of my stash that I could potentially recover the Klobo with.

Premier Prints Circles True Turquoise (Discontinued) and Premier Prints Small Dandelion Turquoise/White 

I also just ordered a bunch more swatches from Fabric.com to see if I can find one that I like and that won't be too overwhelming in pattern. I'd like the pattern to be able to be used on the seat cushions for the dining table chairs too, since I don't want the space to have too many different patterns.  Plus, I need to make sure that the pattern I choose doesn't clash too much with the rug that will be going under the dining room table.

Fabric Swatches in Snake Pattern: Premier Prints Canopy Stripe Slub Aquarius, Premier Prints Solid Turquoise, Premier Prints Indoor/Outdoor Towers Pacific, Premier Prints Cameron Slub Aquarius, Premier Prints Dandelion White/True Turquoise, Richloom Sensu Mallard Teal, Premier Prints Nicole Slub Aquarius, Covington Majestic Velour Peacock, Premier Prints Linked Macon Apache Blue, Premier Prints Indoor/Outdoor Sticks Pacific, Premier Prints Linked Jade, Premier Prints Jiri Stripe Jade, Premier Prints Lulu Stripe True Turquoise

I can't wait for them to come in so I can see which will look best with the rug and the other furniture I have planned for the space.  Anyone else have a love/hate relationship with Craigslist?  What kinds of finds have you drooling and pulling out your wallet? Which swatch do you love the most right now?

And It's Mine, Mine, Mine

I've finally found it!

And 5 points to Gryffindor if you can name the movie that the title of this post comes from!

Yesterday, you may have noticed this little gem on both my Instagram feed and the Rhody Life Facebook page.

I drove all the way from Rhode Island to the Connecticut/New York border to pick up my lovely.

And if you can't tell from the picture as to what this is, here's the full shot!

Isn't it beautiful?!?!?! Please ignore the paint swatches on the wall and the absolutely terrible picture quality - my real camera battery was dead and this was taken with only two hallway lights and no day light since it's dark at 5pm now.  

I can't believe that I found myself a library card catalog! I have been looking for one of these at a reasonable price for almost a year now.  I've driven to probably 10 different antique stores, in addition to emailing every library in Rhode Island (yes, seriously), and stalking Craigslist on a daily basis. I've seen plenty of these card catalogs pop up online, but they are either not the style that I was looking for, or the seller was asking over $750!  I paid way way less than that, even talking the seller down from his asking price, which is one of the benefits of buying items from Craigslist.

The piece isn't in perfect condition, but I knew that for the price that I wanted, that it wouldn't be perfect.  The wood veneer on one of the sides is missing a few pieces and is peeling, but that will just take some glue and replacement veneer to fix.  Also, one of the pulls is pinched closed, so I'll have to unbend that, and the shelves are a little wobbly.

I haven't quite figured out if I want to stain it a different color or if I should paint it.  Part of me thinks that this piece is so sacred that I should just clean it up as much as I can, but the other part of me wants to make it so colorful and fun, since I'm going to be using it in my craft room, holding all of my thread spools, my knitting needles, craft paints, and all those other fun things I use.

Here are some of my favorite inspiration pictures of what I'd like to do with the piece.

Image via DesignSponge

Image via Red Hen Home

Image via Dishfunctional Designs

What are your thoughts? Restain the card catalog? Paint it? Stain it dark or light? One color paint, or multiple?

Too many options!!!