Places to put our things

It was a big weekend in casa chappell.  We went organizational furniture shopping.

[Organizational Furniture: a term used to describe furniture that helps you get your stuff in order.  Examples: bookshelves, TV stands, dressers, cabinets, etc.]

I'm happy to report our trip[s] were a big success, and we are on our way to some serious home organization.  Yippee!


The last two days, Eric has spent lots of time on the living room floor making something of this, and things like it.

Our first project was the TV stand.  Our tv has looked like this for the last two months

 

ed note: this photo was taken while Eric assembled the stand.  We both deeply regret the waste of this 2 hours of our lives, but will never make the same mistake again.  Please don't watch this movie.  It will make you want to puncture your ear drums and pluck out your eyeballs. It was painfully awful.

Anyway, by the end of the evening, we were pleased display our old tv on this beauty!  (and the OCD in me is trying not to wince at the clash of woodgrain.)

Our next purchase was the biggie...a DRESSER!
I think Eric let me buy this just so I would stop sighing deeply and frustratedly every single time I walked into our bedroom.  We had NO place to put our clothing for the last two months.

So Saturday afternoon, I picked up this:

and these:

 and folded them nicely and place them in this!!:

isn't she a beauty?  We bought her on clearance from a local furniture store because there is a piece of wood gouged out from the bottom left side of the dresser.  When the dresser is laying on our (kind of) shaggy carpet, it's almost undetectable.  I'm trying to think of a name for her, so let me know your suggestions.

Anyway, this dresser was the highlight of my weekend, and yes--I will eventually put a picture of us in that empty frame.  *sigh*.  (that's a happy, contented sigh this time)

Lastly, Eric's piece of organizational furniture--bookshelves!!

I can't tell you how many books we already own between the two of us (Eric's library makes up at least 80% though).  It's over 500, I think.  We knew we didn't want to display only books on our shelf wall in the living room, but wanted to keep it open looking.  (More on this to come.) So that's a loss of some book shelving space.

Eric had seen a bookshelf system at IKEA that had a piece that worked for corners. (space saving) We decided it was perfect for his office.

 (photo taken at ikea)

Unfortunately, it was not a perfect fit for our little honda.  In order to take it home, we ended up having to open up the trunk, recline my seat and push the shelves halfway onto the passenger seat.  I spent half the drive sitting indian style with my back to the side door, facing Eric, and the other half hunched under the bookshelves.  I'm sorry I don't have a picture.  it was quite uncomfortable.

It turned out to be well worth it.  The nice thing about IKEA furniture is that it's easily added onto.  We can triple the amount of book shelf space by buying just a couple additional pieces.  We'll see how far this gets us for now.

I'm planning to count and catalogue all of our books before reshelving and then I'll show you the final product.

until next time, thanks for coming all with me on the organizing adventure :-)