This weekend was the best one I’ve had in quite awhile.  I had absolutely no work to do – no design jobs that needed finishing, no band practice (although those are fun, they are still “work” sometimes), no projects that absolutely needed finishing this weekend at the house, no music festival details, nothing.

I literally hung out with friends and family and did whatever I felt like doing…for 2 whole days and 3 whole nights.  It was amazing, and so refreshing – I actually went to bed early last night for work this morning.  Normally on a Sunday night, I end up staying up WAY too late because I’m trying to get every second out of an all-too-loaded weekend.  But not this time.  This time, I felt no rush to get into bed, but I just felt like going to sleep and I felt completely okay with that because I had been so refreshed from the weekend.  Love when that happens, don’t you?

Saturday was probably my “busiest” day…but again, it was filled with so many things that I wanted to do, not things that I had to do.  Stephanie and I went thrifting bright and early Saturday morning – Starbucks in hand of course.  I think we both did pretty well – bought some new things for the shop, and of course a few things for myself…working on replenishing that vintage wardrobe, remember?

Then in the afternoon, we had an ice cream sundae birthday party for Miss Guini (Stephanie’s second born – who is growing up way too fast btw)…isn’t she the sweetest?!

This was immediately followed by a trip to Denver to visit the new Ikea store with my sister, Tara.  This, my friends, was my first time to step foot into one.  You’re shocked, aren’t you?  I am a little shocked myself – if I’m really being honest.  Everyone has always told me I would love it there but we’ve never had one close to us – and who doesn’t have some sort of connection to it after watching the ever popular and amazing 500 Days of Summer?

My first thought was, “Oh my gosh – there are parking attendants!”

It was insane.  So many people.  Saturday was maybe not the best day for us to go down there, but it just happens sometimes.  Seriously though –  parking attendants?  Tara and I were joking around about how it reminded us of the music festival we just did a few weeks ago…stinkin parking attendants people.  Wrap your head around that…for a store.  One singular store – not even a whole mall, just one store.  Anyway, moving on from that – there were also hoards of people being filtered in the doors.  I told Tara they looked like cattle being shuffled along.  I was amazed at the amount of people there were.

When we finally made it up the levels and onto the floor where the full room displays were, I literally didn’t know what to do with myself.  I am a shopper, I am used to crowds – but this was just crazy.  It was slightly hard to even look at anything because of how many children were running around whose parents were taking up every last inch of space.  I have to say that the full room displays were my least favorite part of the store.  It is a little too overwhelming with everything spread out in different sections.  I like to be able to look at all the lighting in one shot if I need lighting, and so on – otherwise I feel like I am missing a lot of good things and I don’t like that.

The lower levels were better for me…but can I just say, the carts are so lame??  Tara did most of the pushing and she told me about them, but it wasn’t until I tried to push one myself that I actually realized just how insane these carts are.  They are designed so that you can push them forward/backward and side to side all in one swoop, but you just end up skating sideways with them like a dog on roller skates (you’re welcome for the killer imagery)…it’s near impossible to actually move forward in a straight line.  They feel more like bumper cars than anything else.

Holy cow – the warehouse is amazing, and I kind of loved it.  I decided that I needed to buy something while we were there and one of the only things that I actually grew attached to was a rolling utility cart.  I’ve been wanting one for my kitchen and while normally I would hold out for something vintage, I liked what they had and decided it was worth it to go ahead.

Thankfully, even with the crazy lines – we were both able to get through with our purchases in less than 10 minutes…not too shabby.  I love a lot of their stuff and will most definitely be making more purchases in the future – however, the best part about the whole store to me (and you may find this extremely weird) is that they don’t even have plastic bags there.  If you don’t bring or buy a reusable bag there, they don’t give you a bag – you just carry it out sans-plastic…love that.

And no trip to Ikea would be complete without one last bout of cattle herding…or so I’m told.

After Ikea, we decided to hit up my favorite store, since it was right there – Anthropologie.  It was absolutely lovely, as always. 

I tried on a fedora for the first time while we were there – sort of as a joke – but I actually fell in love with it.  I decided I couldn’t spend the money on a hat (even though it was on sale)…but I may be regretting that decision.  We’ll see.

Currently my new Ikea cart sits here, next to the fridge – but it will be moving soon and will have some company with other pretty items on it.  For now, I love that my mixer has a spot – instead of sitting on a stool in the corner because my counter tops are too small.

So that’s that, I have now been to Ikea.  I know now what the fuss is about…I definitely like it.  The pricing is great and they really have some good stuff, but I still love my vintage.  I am now working on incorporating more modern pieces with my vintage – it makes such a nice juxtaposition.

What do you think?  Yes or no to Ikea?  Yes or no to the fedora?  Yes or no to me winning the bet Stephanie mentioned here?

Love love,

Stormie Dae