Our Big Ikea Trip: What we bought

While we counting down the days until move in (two!), I thought it would be fun to go over our shopping trip to Ikea a couple weekends ago.

I had originally planned to go to our closest Ikea (Sacramento) which is 100 miles away, but they didn't have what I needed in stock, so we had to go to Emeryville (San Francisco) instead which is 120 miles (plus Bay Area traffic).

When I say "we", I mean we had to bring along my parents to help push all of the carts and boxes through the store. It was definitely a four person job for what we had to buy.

Since before we even closed on the house, I'd been scheming on exactly what to buy. With the distance making Ikea an all-day event (plus their delivery fees), I wanted to get as much as I could at once.

So I made shopping lists...

This was my "Accessories" list.

I put a few notes on some items to clarify which rooms they are for. I'm dying to get sheepskin rugs for our bedroom, but Ikea's were too small for what I had in mind so I crossed them off my list.

The four Ekby shelves are for the kitchen. There will be two in this empty space on the right (above the base cabinets, between two windows):

And there will be two in the future bar nook (on the far right):

I chose them because none of their other shelves fit quite right and these are adjustable—you can cut off the ends and hide edges with the brackets.

So they will end up looking like this:

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In addition to what you see above, I picked up some extra cushions and pillowcases (for the home theater room), plants and pots, kitchen accessories and a couple other small miscellaneous items that are impossible to resist when you walk by.

Now for the big ticket items (the furniture)...

Let's start from the top.

I found this Sandby sofa and thought it was perfect to put under the window in our bedroom:

The look, size, color and price were right.

Unfortunately Ikea doesn't keep it in their warehouse, so it's a special order delivery item. Not a problem since we were having all of our other furniture delivered.

After we had gone through the store, checked out and were arranging for delivery, I asked about the sofa and they said I was supposed to order it back in the showroom... at the very beginning of the store. By this time we had been there 3+ hours, the place was jam packed, and it was getting late so I had to leave without it <insert sad face here>.

The Linnmon table tops are for the studio. I had to come up with a whole new arrangement to maximize the space. The desks are the same as I have now, just longer, and I'll have to cut them down to fit.

I'll be using two different Akurum kitchen cabinets for our bar area. The combination of sizes was just the perfect fit to leave an opening for a wine fridge. For the top I plan to build a simple wood plank countertop.

Then there's the Akurum top cabinet designed for refrigerators...

I picked up seven of these to use as my bench seats.

There will be three in this size to attach to the back of the island for our dining table seating.

And four in this size which will run along this wall from the edge of the cabinet (on the left, you can barely see it) to the plank wall underneath the window, just for lounging:

I plan to go into tons of detail once we tackle this project, it should be an interesting challenge!

And finally, we have our Pax wardrobe.

I bought two in this size and all of the components separately, including the Bergsbo doors.

They will fit inside this nook we built in the back corner:

For whatever reason, the shelves and wire baskets that were on my Shopping List have been deleted. I tried looking them up today and they are off the website completely, so I guess Ikea is phasing them out?! I don't get it, because Pax is one of their more popular items. How are you supposed to buy shelves to fit now?

I had a total of 8 Pax shelves on my list when I went there. The website said they were all in stock, but when I arrived there were only six left—and two were damaged on the edges. Knowing I wasn't going to be back anytime soon, I just bought what was left and hoped it would be enough. Good thing I did since it looks like they are gone forever. Anyone have the 411?

I knew right away that a built in pantry would be the perfect addition to this corner, and a quick Google search of "Pax Pantry" confirmed this for me:

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To save on costs, I opted for the Komplement wire drawers shown in the first photo (no longer available apparently, BOO!) instead of the wood drawers, and basic shelves. We easily fit all of our stuff in a pantry half this size in our last house so I'm sure this will suit our needs just fine.

And that pretty much covers it. I really wanted to buy new chairs for the dining room and living rooms, but I didn't want to rush into something out of convenience and end up regretting it. So I'm going to try out the spaces for a while and see what we really need.

Oh yeah... I was so focused on trying to shop efficiently and not overwhelm myself that after we checked out, I realized I completely forgot something huge... two more Pax wardrobes for our bedroom!

This was another one of those things that I knew I wanted right away.

The size of our back bedroom wall is ideal for two wardrobes flanking our bed... like this (except with a bed in the middle)

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Between forgetting these and my sofa, unfortunately this means I'll need to take another trip there sometime in the near future. And pay another $240 delivery fee... grrr.

All in all, it was a pretty successful day. We all came back home alive and in one piece—just $2,416.93 poorer. Such is life when you're remodeling (and doubling your house size...)

I'm on my way to Lowe's right now to pick up lumber to build our beams for the kitchen ceiling. Hoping they are finished by the time we move in. If all goes well (fingers crossed) I'll be back with a reveal on Friday!