Come Visit Me!!

You guys! The mattress! It is here and undamaged! And it only took us four freakin' months, but I think our guest room is now finally in a state where I wouldn't be totally embarrassed to have overnight guests.

Like I said in my last post, the room is about 90% ready to roll, but since we started with this:

And this:

I'm pretty satisfied with 90%.

We bought the mattress from Macy's, which actually surprised me. The husband and I popped over there on a whim one day while we were in the neighborhood and ended up finding a Simmons Beautyrest that was reasonably priced and not terribly uncomfortable. I also had a few gift cards and some store credit that I had been hoarding so we ended up getting it for under $500. Oh, and I should also add that we have a platform bed frame for this room which negated the need for a box spring and therefore significantly reduced the cost as well.

We didn't want to spend too much money getting this room in order so I tried to make do with what we had. All of the furniture you see in this room was used in our bedroom until we upgraded to our king set last year. The duvet cover was also originally for our bedroom, but we didn't love it and ultimately decided to find a different one for our own room (more on that in another post).

What else, what else. The curtains, sheets and pillows are all from Anna's Linens, a place that I had never heard of until we moved to Charlotte. Holy crap, this place is amazeballs. The curtains aren't super high quality stuff, but they were $10 for each panel and for a guest room that won't be seeing a ton of traffic, it was perfect. And the sheets (a set of two cost us $15) are actually super soft and I am contemplating buying a set for our own bed as well.

The table lamps were from Walmart (I know, we are super classy folks over here) and everything else you see in the room we already had. This is the first time we've ever had enough room for a real guest room (pretty sure blowing up an air mattress and throwing it on the living room floor doesn't count) so I am probably more excited than I should be about this room.

We were originally going to have some visitors in mid-February, but unfortunately that fell through. Which actually is kinda good because we still have a few problems areas in this room. Mainly, this stack of unpacked boxes that the husband REFUSES to deal with:

Oh and I need to somehow bribe him into hanging up this wall art for me because I am too short to do anything useful around this place.

Yes, I will take the price sticker off before I hang it up. Maybe. I snagged this at TJ Maxx on super clearance for six bucks and am still so proud of myself that I'm just not ready to take the price off yet.

I'm also dying to complete this Pinterest project to hang above the bed:

But we'll see how motivated I'm feeling in the next few weeks. In the meantime, I'm just basking in the glory of having a real guest room for the first time in my adult life. Now don't make me regret putting all of this effort into it... Come visit me!!

Mattress Mayhem

I am starting to wonder if I am cursed. No, that's not true. I don't wonder. I know that I am cursed. I've known it for a long time and I am trying to work on accepting this about myself, but it's really hard to admit that everything/anything you try to do will end in failure.

So. I had these big, exciting plans to share our guest bedroom updates with you today. I even have the post typed up and everything! The room is like 90% done which is probably as done as it's ever going to be so I figured it would be a good time to show it off. All I was waiting for was the new mattress. Which (unlike our couch) was not backordered. It actually arrived on time! And it was defective! 

Oh wait. I shouldn't be excited about that last part. Right.

It's not awful, and I know that it's not incredibly noticeable in these photos, but the padding near the top half of the mattress is all bunched up and wrinkly. The bottom half of the mattress looks exactly like it is suppose to, be something is seriously wrong with the top half. If it was just cosmetic I would totally be willing to overlook this, but when you lay down on it it's lumpy and you can even feel it sinking in a bit on the right side. 

Sooooo I called up Macy's customer service and it was actually one of the most pleasant conversations I've ever had with a customer service agent in quite a while! So thanks Macy's! They quickly set up a day to come pick up our bunchy, lumpy mattress and replace it with a new one, no questions asked.

New mattress should be here on Tuesday. Maybe I will have a happy update for ya next week?

Dude, Where's My Couch?

Oh guess what you guys! We still don't have a couch! Yay! I was actually really hoping that it would never come and we could sit on camp chairs for the rest of our lives. Looks like my dream may finally be coming true.

Okay, you know the story. We were told that the couch would arrive in 8 weeks and it's getting closer to 10 weeks with no word from anyone. So the husband decided to give the furniture company a quick call to remind them that we were still alive and wanted our couch and maybe they could deliver it to us soon?

Turns out our sales dude screwed up and forgot to inform us that our fabric was on backorder so we won't actually be receiving our couch until the end of January. Or maybe February. He wasn't really clear on the details and it was obvious that he didn't want to get into even more trouble by giving us an incorrect date.

He did take $100 off our bill though, so that helps, but since we've been couchless since the end of September I would gladly give him that $100 back if it meant that my butt would be enjoying a sweet, comfy couch this weekend. But alas, it is not meant to be.

At this point I'm just praying that we'll have something by President's Day weekend since there is a good chance we will be having some out-of-town visitors that weekend and it would be nice to offer them something to sit in other than a folding chair.

In other news... We've got art! On the walls!

And of course, I don't love it. I love the pieces individually, but I'm not sure if it's the frame colors or the layout, but something about it is irking me. I think the top two frames need to be higher up. Or maybe I need to put something in between the two small frames and the bottom one to break it up a little bit? Not sure. Bear with me on this one, it's a work in a progress.

Suggestions are always welcome, but in the meantime let's take a quick, close-up look at this poster cuz I loves it:

Ignore the glare. Maybe one day I will be a real grown-up blogger that takes pictures with an actual camera instead of my iPhone. In the meantime, many thanks to Karisa for cluing me in to Wine Folly. The second I saw this poster I knew it had to be mine.

Alrighty, that's all I had to share with you today. Time to go relax and sit on my not-couch!

Cabinet Chaos

One of the things I wanted to accomplish this year was to reorganize our kitchen cabinets a bit. I have a feeling this will happen a few times over the course of the year as we slowly test things out and figure out what works best for us and our kitchen layout, but this weekend I did a little experimenting.

When we originally moved in I placed all of our dishes and mugs in the cabinet directly above the dishwasher. In the cabinets to the right we're storing all of our drinking glasses/wine glasses/beer mugs, etc. In my head it made sense to have everything stored near the dishwasher and sink.

After a few months however, it became clear to me that this system was actually making my life more difficult because I am super short and can't put the dishes away while the dishwasher is open. I know, it's pathetic. Instead I have to stack everything on the counter, close the door and then put everything away. It's just really awkward and annoying. And on top of that this little nook somehow became a dumping ground for any extra snacks and food that wouldn't fit in the designated "food" cabinet.

And that's probably because I picked the tiniest cabinet in the kitchen to use for food storage. It's literally bursting to the seams and I can't fit anything else in there no matter how many times I reorganize it.

Finally, add in the fact that we have this super underutilized cabinet over here and it's clear that we were overdue for a much-needed cabinet overhaul.

The first thing I did was empty out the cabinet pictured above and replaced it with our dishes and coffee mugs. Some random appliances stayed (blender and waffle maker) and I threw our extra supply of coffee and tea in here as well.

It actually works out perfectly because right below this cabinet is where I have my little coffee bar setup.

Now when I'm jonesing for a coffee (which is like 10 times a day) I can just reach up and grab a mug. It probably seems like common sense to y'know like everyone else in the world, but for whatever reason I didn't think of it until this weekend. Fail.

Now the cabinet above the dishwasher that held those dishes and mugs was empty. I wanted to move all of our pantry foods over here since it's a much larger cabinet and it's right above where all of that extra food was accumulating. 

Ahhh, that is so much better. Everything is a lot less cluttered and I even managed to fit most of the countertop food in here with room to move things around so I don't have to empty the entire god damn shelf when I need something that's shoved in the back.

Finally, I tackled the tiny cabinet where our food stuffs used to be. I decided to keep all of our baking supplies in this cabinet as well as paper products. Oh and our steak knives too? Mostly because I couldn't find a more suitable location for them. They will move at some point I'm sure.

Now I personally love the new layout (so far) but the husband - who hates any kind of change ever - hates it. I told him take a week or two to get used to it and then tell me how he feels, but he responded by putting things "back where they belong". Yesterday I found the peanut butter in with the baking supplies and a coffee mug mixed in with the tomato sauce.

So yea, fun experiment!

Did you get any projects done this weekend?

That Time I Convinced My Dad I was Pregnant. Or Maybe Getting a Divorce.

Okay, first of all, I am not pregnant. Just getting that out of the way. This story is actually like six months old and I never got around to writing it down. The content's a bit dated, but the story is fantastic and now feels like a good time to talk about it so I'm running with it.

I am a planner. I have accepted this about myself. If I am not actively planning something I go stir crazy. I can't help it, it's in my blood. When I showed my father the spreadsheets I had compiled for my trip to Disney last year (yes, I really did this) I think he was more proud of me than he had ever been before.

Being engaged was an awesome outlet for my crazy planning shenanigans. I got to plan things for TWO WHOLE YEARS PEOPLE. It was glorious. Then the wedding came and went and I was left without anything to plan. So sad. So boring. And when I get bored, I scheme. And this time, I schemed up something reallll good.


My parents celebrated their 30th wedding anniversary in May. And what better way to celebrate than by throwing them a surprise party?! Perfect. Done. Something new to plan! And so I started planning... I collaborated with my parents' friends and siblings, found a date that worked for everyone and sent out invitations. I even drove three hours upstate (twice!) to check out venues and confirm other such details. I also wanted to have some photos of them throughout the years so I even broke into conveniently dropped by their house when I knew they wouldn't be home. Both times I stayed the night with a friend of mine who lives in the area and my parents never found out until after the party.

In order to lure my parents to the restaurant I told them that the husband and I were coming upstate for the weekend to visit some friends. We wouldn't have time to stop by the house so would they like to meet us in Albany for dinner? They agreed and everything was going perfectly.

Too perfectly.

A few days before the party my dad sent me an email. He was so sorry, but he completely forgot that he had to march in a parade (he is a town board member and often has to attend various town events. Even ridiculous events, like a parade) at the exact time that I had made dinner reservations. Could we maybe push dinner a little later?

Hm. Okay. I start to panic. But just a little bit. I quickly type up a reply.

"No, that won't work for us. We need to meet friend at XYZ time and if we push our dinner any later we won't make it in time. Is the parade really that important? We would really like to see you guys!"

Yep, looks good. I mean, come on... It's just a stupid parade. At that moment I was feeling pretty confident. Until...

"I really can't miss this parade. I gave them my word that I would be there and you know that I hate to break promises like that. I'm really sorry we won't be able to see you guys this time, but you'll be up again soon, right?"

Shit.

Shit. Shit. Shit.

Now I'm panicking. Like calling my husband from work in a frenzy kind of panicking. This whole thing is about to blow up in my face and there is only one thing I can do to stop it. I review the game plan with my husband and now rope my brother into it as well. I take a deep breath and type a response.

"Hm. I didn't want to have to tell you this over email, but it's really important that we talk to you in person this weekend. We even arranged for J [my brother] to take a train in from Philadelphia. We were going to pick him from the train station and go straight to the restaurant. Are you sure you absolutely cannot get out of this thing?"

You guys. I felt terrible about this. It was just vague enough that it didn't require me to create some elaborate lie, but just specific enough to freak him out. I had no idea what conclusions he would draw from that email, but I hoped it sounded believable enough that he would cancel his plans (and not see through my complete and utter bullshit).

Waiting for his response was the most excruciating hour of my life. I walked around my office in a state of distress, lamenting my sorry situation to anyone who would listen. And oh did people listen. They were soaking this shit up and thought it was one of the most entertaining things they had ever heard (seriously, these people need to get out more).

And then... The response.

"Ok. I'm sorry I had to pull it out of you this way. I will do what I have to do to get out of this thing and I won't say anything to your mother about this conversation. See you Saturday."

What. Just. Happened.

For five whole days I was inconsolable. I was going to Hell. I just knew it. What's that commandment? Honor your father and mother? Well, this certainly wasn't honorable. But what other choice did I have? After months of secretly sneaking behind their backs I was not going to let it all fall apart over a fucking PARADE.

Saturday came and well...

See for yourself.

My aunt was filming for me. Moments to note: 38 seconds in, where she says, "Your daughter's not pregnant!" and 2:05 where the godforsaken parade was mentioned.

Needless to say, they were surprised.

A good time was had by all.

But I definitely will NOT be hosting another surprise party any time soon. My morals and my blood pressure just can't handle it.

Have you ever hosted a surprise party?

Fucked Up Kids

I have a real blog post coming soon, but until Blogger fixes their ish and lets me post a video, I'm leaving you all with this instead:

Last night the husband and I were having a particularly perverted conversation that had me laughing til I cried. When I finally caught my breath, I looked at him and said, "Wow, our kids are going to be really fucked up, aren't they?"

Without even missing a beat, he looked back at me with the most serious face in the world and said, "Oh, absolutely."

Please tell me we're not alone.

Have a Seat

No seriously. This is a really long ridiculous story, but the world needs to know it. You might want to be sitting down for this.

A million years ago the husband and I found ourselves in possession this couch:

Actually it was a couch AND a love seat combo. A practically brand new set that we snagged for $200 total. Honestly, it was a great deal. And it was a great couch. For a bunch of broke college kids. The husband and I had many great years with this couch. It moved a total of six times. Usually in the back of the husband's Jeep.

But after eight years with us, the couch had seen better days. The frame was broken, there were stains on the cushions and I can't even count the number of people who have slept/gotten sick/had sex on that couch (hey, we had some wild parties back in the day... what can I say?). So it was time to part with our party couch and get ourselves a real adult couch.

Easier said than done.

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year everyone! Yea I'm a few days late and yea, I took an unintentional hiatus last month, but I promise I have a really good explanation for that. Except I'm not going to talk about that right now. That's a post for another day that I may or may not write. I mean, come on... You've seen my track record on this blog. Don't hold your breath.

Anyways, I last left off with a not so great apartment tour and now it's time to chat about what needs to happen in order to make this place not look like some college kid's first apartment. So let's do the room by room thing and we can make a game out of how many things I will completely give up by the end of the year!