I came across this walnut-veneered side table and console at Overstock.com - they’re from La-Z-Boy and only $55.99 and $129.99, respectively. I love the hairpin legs and the storage possibilities in the side table. Apparently, Overstock has a shipping deal going on right now - only $1 for everything. I’m tempted to get these side tables to replace the IKEA Lack tables in my TV room.

I love these genius paintings by Flickr user thequietsmirk. They’re such a nice antidote to those insipid motivational posters you see in offices. These look great against the boldly colored walls and great furniture in her home.

I’m not sure if thequietsmirk sells her paintings, but I’ll try and find out.

Mahar Drygoods has been in my bookmark list for a couple of years now, and I’m excited I’ll finally be able to shop online for my own baby. I particularly love these crocheted little booties:

Earlier today I was perusing one of my favorite blogs, More Ways to Waste Time and came across some great stuff Leah found on UK’s IKEA site. I too am wondering if they’ll be making their way across the Atlantic. I can’t wait for the new IKEA catalog to come … it seems like they’re usually sent out around this time of year.

Karlstad Swivel Armchair:

Tirup Swivel Armchair:

While we’re nowhere NEAR ready to re-side or paint the house, I’m dreaming up ways to improve its curb appeal anyway. I used Photoshop to mock up the color of the house and add a portico over the front stoop. I can’t imagine the house any other color than blue - unfortunately the neighbors to our left and across the street have blue houses as well. I wonder if they’d mind. The inspiration for this new look came from Blueprint magazine’s first issue.

Photoshop house:

Current house:

The inspiration:

I’d consider leaving the black storm door off, since it probably wouldn’t be that necessary with the portico overhead.

… or you will end up with this:

Since Friday, we’ve been battling our dishwasher and the never-ending production of suds each time we run a cycle. I Googled “suds” and “dishwasher,” trying to diagnose the problem and concluded that some liquid hand soap must have found its way onto a dish or bowl in the first cycle on Friday. However, after removing all the dishes, using salt, ice cubes and vegetable oil to dissolve the suds, the dishwasher was still producing suds. So last night I popped open the rinse agent dispenser and noticed a few bubbles in it. It then occurred to me that Andrew, when refilling the rinse agent last week (Friday!), must have accidentally placed Dawn instead of Jet Dry into the dispenser. Sure enough, when I asked him, he realized his mistake. I called Bosch’s customer service line and was told to continue to run the dishwasher to try and run out the Dawn. Yeesh. I hate hand washing dishes in the meantime.

A lot of people find this site by Googling “IKEA Arild sofa,” so I thought I’d post a photo of our sofa in its natural habitat:

It’ll be moved to our larger living room later this week when we get our new IKEA sofa, the “Sater,” which will replace the Arild in our TV room.

The kitchen is just about finished … all that’s left is the mosaic tile backsplash, getting the floor polished, installing the wood open shelving and finding a ceiling light fixture.

To see the complete set of pictures taken yesterday, see my Flickr page.

The area above the Kitchenaid mixer is where the shelves will be installed. We’re using 2 48″x15″ IKEA birch countertop pieces with hidden supports. They’ll wrap around the wall bump-out as well. The trim around the window needs to be painted and I’m still trying to decide what to do about curtains.

Those are 2 Target placemats serving as the backsplash behind the cooktop right now. My mom had the brilliant idea of placing them there. I went out and bought enough of them to do the entire kitchen backsplash with these placemats until we get the tile backsplash done. I’m hoping I’ll get to that project sometime soon. The doors in the background are the same yellow as the old kitchen … gotta paint those when we get to the trim.

We LOVE our new Electrolux induction cooktop. It boils water in the blink of an eye and wipes up so easily. In fact, I’m able to place a silicone potholder under my cookware to help keep the cooktop from getting scratched or dirty.

Here’s our mixer with the potential placemat backsplash.

Our new faucet is the Grohe “Minta” and the sink is the Kohler “Verse.” The faucet is beautiful, but I don’t recommend it. The lever is placed so far out that it blocks the 3rd hole of the sink, so we had to swing it out over the sink. The water stream falls short of the sink’s drain - I’m not sure if this is a flaw with the design of the faucet or the sink, but it has the unhappy consequence of creating a horrific splash when the faucet is centered and hits the rim of the drain.

The rope lighting you see peeking out at the top of the cabinets is our over-cabinet lighting. It still needs to be secured to the cabinets.

We went to IKEA in Stoughton, MA, last night to pick up some things for the kitchen. While there, we came across this great new sofa - the “Säter.” It’s dark brown leather and beautiful … and only $449! I’m thrilled because this means we can finally get rid of the old (but in great condition) flower-upholstered Henredon sofa we received as a hand-me-down from my parents. The new sofa will be delivered next Friday.

Here it is:

It’s not on IKEA’s U.S. site yet. I’m glad I snapped a picture of it with my cell phone. I also couldn’t find it on any of the European sites, but I did find it on a Western Australia IKEA site, interestingly. Here’s their picture of it:

It reminds me a lot of Room & Board’s “Jasper” sofa, but IKEA’s has metal legs instead of the tapered wood legs of the Jasper.