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Sunday, January 16, 2011

Busy 3 day weekend at the cottage...

I'm hoping to have a little time tomorrow to upload pictures - I certainly have plenty to blog about, just haven't had the time to write!

Mr. Paisley has gone off his rocker. All of the sudden he is nesting. He wants to put new floors in, buy new furniture, paint...and SHOP for all of this stuff. Who is this man and what did he do with my husband?

Needless to say, I am totally taking advantage of this freak state that he's in...this morning we went shopping for a new sofa and maybe a chair. 

I wasn't planning to get new furniture until the addition was done (which doesn't really seem like it's ever going to happen) - because I wanted a small sectional sofa and the current room doesn't really work for one. So I thought I'd just get something nice off Craig's List to hold us over. I found this set - which I love...and he hates. Smaller scale that what we have (perfect!), good color, great condition, it's from Ashley Furniture - $400 for all of it.


He hates paisley. 

No dice. Found one I liked at Big Lots. Simmons. Chocolate color. $299 for the sofa. Small scale - perfect.
It even has velcro on the front edge of the seat cushions to keep them from shifting. Sweet! Nope. He doesn't like the corduroy type fabric. Seriously?
What do I want?
  • Something in a dark enough color that it doesn't look dirty
  • I want it to sit higher than what we have now
  • I want 3 seat cushions
  • I don't want the back cushions sewn on
  • I want it less than 85" wide
  • I want it to NOT have a skirt around the bottom
  • I want it to be made well enough that it lasts more than 2 years
  • I want to like it
When has my husband ever had an opinion about what came into the house? He would have been fine with milk crates and a wire spool for a kitchen table and chairs. His style is vintage dorm room. WTH? WHEN did he decide he had an opinion on decorating?!

So this morning we went to the La-z-boy store. Jackpot - they're having a major sale (ok, it's January - most furniture stores have a big sale in January). Inventory blow-out. Excellent. The guy tells us "reclining is the left half of the store, regular on the right, sizes are listed on the tags" Excellent. What do I go right to? This...


Ok, this is a crummy rendering of it. Beautiful velvety soft chocolate corduroy LOL...for $800.  No sale...I mean with Mr. Paisley. What does he have against corduroy?!

But then...there it was.

Have you seen this ad in the magazines lately? I tore it out months ago for my inspiration file. They had the sofa, the chair and a half with the ottoman and a small recliner (instead of the slipper chair in the floral).  Fabulous sale. Nearly 50% off. Less than $600 for the sofa. What does it have in common with my list? Ummm...oh, it's skirt-less and it sits higher than our current sofa...and it has a lifetime warranty on the frame.  2 cushions, back cushions that are attached, it's red (well "flame"). It's 81" long. The floral comes with a black or chocolate background. I really like this sofa. I can't commit to the floral chair. I don't want a recliner. They have 1 in stock in the warehouse. Otherwise it's a 2-3 week waiting list. Not a big deal...I expect it will take Mr. Paisley at least 2 weeks to paint and put new floors in. This is based on the fact that I asked him to finish painting the one window frame in the living room (he painted the trim when we were last working on the LR, but never painted the INSIDE of the window frame) and finish the tiny little hallway (meaning paint 2 doors and one strip that he painted trim color that should have been wall color) yesterday. He managed to take down the window blinds and paint around the window. That's it. Just the window. 

I don't know what color to paint the walls and ceiling to go with a flame sofa. It's not RED, it's more mellow, not quite rust colored. I have no idea what colors they used on the walls in the above ad. They look good with it though. Right now the room is a creamy beige with pink *gag* undertones and a darker sandy beige for the trim, ceiling and one end wall. The ceiling and the end wall are tongue and groove knotty pine...which HAD to be painted. The room also gets a TON of natural light because there is a large window behind the sofa and the other end wall is almost totally glass...and the top half of the door to the back porch is glass - no fear of darker colors.

Any suggestions? We haven't purchased the sofa yet. Tomorrow we are going to go to Haverty's, Sloan Brothers, Baer's, Aaron's Fine Furniture, Ethan Allen and LightStyle (which is a lighting store, but they have some random furniture pieces as well).

This is the flooring we are looking at. It's a Click-Lock carbonized bamboo - click-lock because we can pull it up and mix it into something similar when we DO the addition and you won't be able to tell we didn't do the floors all at the same time. Money saver!


Of course i'll need a rug...
I like this one a lot...but the reviews online are not so hot. Evidently the bursts are made from some kind of ribbon (?) and they fray. Badly. They are on top of "main rug" background and not woven in so they are higher. Bummer...and totally not practical with Mr. Paisley living here. Hopefully I can find another that I like just as well.

So there you have it...furniture shopping is what's going on at the Paisley Cottage these days. Stay tuned for a finished project. I hope.

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