IKEA...the amazing maze

So we are pretty fortunate that we have an IKEA about 20 min. from us. I have to say that I don't necessarily love everything there as most of it is too modern for me. We have found some great items there lately-the most recent find on Friday. Speaking of Friday I thought that IKEA would be packed on a Friday night like it is on Saturdays (wall to wall people). I guess only losers like us go to furniture places on a Friday night. Everyone else must have been out partying (we did our partying AFTER IKEA) as the place was pretty deserted. Also, if you have never been to a IKEA it is a giant maze that you must follow and only those that have been frequent times can navigate successfully to end the maze sooner. Another great bonus about IKEA is that they have a really great cafeteria that is reasonably priced. Their swedish meatballs (you do know that IKEA is based out of Sweden right?) are yum-o!!

We went to IKEA last week to find some kind of storage unit for Matthew's bedroom. He has way too many toys that were encroaching our living room daily and I was tired of putting everything away every night. We first thought that we would get an expedit like the one I have in my craft room, but as we rounded the kids section about to leave there was this cute storage piece. Jordan painted the top and sides to match his room so now it is the perfect place to store some of his toys. BTW-the little chair and table you can kindof see in the picture is also from IKEA and will be perfect in about another year for him to use.

Of course like any store I have a hard time just leaving with my designated item of purchase. In one of the last sections before going into the warehouse I found these cute giant stickers. The directions said to place on a clean flat surface and my walls are clean but not flat (all homes in AZ have texturized walls). I am having a few issues having them stick completely but I'm just going to modge podge them down and deal with the consequences later. I put the giant flowers in my bathroom and the swirly golden flower stickers in my Dining room. I love the look and it was pretty cheap. We also found some cute finger puppets for Matthew and some plastic plates for $.99 each.

If you have never been to IKEA once you get through the maze of rooms you are then dumped into a warehouse where you locate your item by aisle, load it onto a trolley, pay and roll it out to your car. All of the furniture is self assembly and usually isn't that hard to put together that I can see (ask Jordan for the real deal). I wouldn't however put our whole house together out of IKEA furniture. When we lived in VA one of our friends bought their entire house out of IKEA and had about 50 boxes of furniture to put together while her husband was overseas for 6 weeks. Jordan was nice enough to help her for about 3 or 4 nights getting everything assembled.

Anyways, if you haven't ventured to IKEA yet, find one in your area and go check it out. It's a great date night....going through a merchandise maze and eating dinner all in one location for a pretty cheap price.