Monday, June 27, 2016

Furniture and Appliance Shopping!

Okay.... so it's window shopping for now. Or more specifically, online shopping.

We have known for a while now that we will need a refrigerator.  Most definitely did not want to pay what Ryan Homes wanted to charge for a fridge, or consider the fact that we would be paying a 30 year mortgage on a fridge if we bought one from them.

So, we started browsing refrigerators.

We had our eyes on an LG one that was super neat, but reading reviews kind of backed us away from it.


Here's the LG we were looking at.  We just kinda fell in love with the little "door within door" feature.  Pretty stinkin' snazzy.  Well, reviews say that this design makes you slam your fridge door a lot to make sure it's closed, and the alarm constantly goes off because that door within door isn't always shut.  Still. It's neat.  But the design just made me see that it wasn't gonna be something that made us happy.

You can check out this fridge here if you want to.  It's from the Lowe's website since I am pretty sure this is where we are going to end up buying our fridge from.

So back to the drawing boards we went.  It didn't take us long to find something similar, with better reviews and to me, an overall better design.

Check it out.  It's a Samsung Food ShowCase.


It's sleek, pretty, and has that nifty "food showcase" door.  The latch to close this one is much better and not as hard to use as the LG one is.

Check out the product here.

Here's our dilemma.... Do we buy this one, which is 24.7 cubic feet, or do we spend MORE money and get the 21.5 cubic feet one that is "counter width"??

The counter width difference from the "regular" one is only 5 inches.  Not a huge difference.  And, our kitchen is open and full of space so it wouldn't bother that aspect of it.

I was originally leaning towards the counter depth version, but after looking at them, I think the larger fridge is better.

There are some AWESOME 4th of July sales that are happening that would allow us to save a ton of money if we get the counter depth one now.  Same goes for the 24.7 cubic foot one, just not "as good" of a deal.

But we are also on the fence as to whether or not we actually want to spend that much money before we close.  It's nice having a big ole fat bank account right now and we kind of want to wait til we close to make sure everything goes smoothly. [insert skeptical laughter here]

So.Many.Decisions.

Luckily, we have a washer and dryer that we LOVE that we have only had for a couple of years.  So we don't have to worry about that on the appliance end.

And, then there's the TV unit we want.

IKEA is literally five minutes from where we live right now.  We go there pretty often and just walk around and admire everything, and occasionally find a thing or two that we like.  Well, on one such occasion we found a super amazing and awesome set up for a TV stand and we fell in love with it.

Check this bad boy out:


It's massive.  And we love it.

We decided a few weeks ago that we were going to go ahead and purchase a few pieces at a time until we move, just to have everything and to lessen the blow of spending THAT much money on something all at once.

And after we decided this, we also decided to modify a few things on it.

The cabinets across the top will all have glass doors.

The side cabinets will have glass doors on the top two and the bottom one will be solid, like it is in the photo.

Here are a few stock photos from IKEA.  Obviously not with our modifications to it, but you get the idea.

We love this because it's that brown/black color that a lot of our stuff in the house is, or will be.  So it's nice to keep that consistency.


So the funny story about this.  We stopped one of the IKEA workers to ask about modifying some things and he gave us our very own shopping sheet complete with diagrams.  Well, halfway through him  helping us, I have a revelation.  I keep quiet til he's done, but immediately look at hubby and say:

"I don't think this is going to fit in between the two windows in the family room where we want it to go"

Cue the sad violin music.

We love this thing.  We have dreamt about one day having it, even before we started building a house.

So, I sit down at one of the set up living rooms in IKEA. I sketch things out.  I devise a plan that will make things work.  It means that we have to put it back on the solid wall in the family room, and that the couch will sit in a way that we will block off the kitchen, so the room is going to seem smaller... but we are gonna make it work.

Keep in mind- we scrambled to get Guardian to come out to the house and move one of our cable locations because we decided we wanted the TV between the tables and not on the empty wall.  And here we are moving it back to where we originally had it (luckily Guardian kept that cable there and just added another where we asked them to).

Yes, that's how much we love this thing.

We head out to the house, and I am pleasantly surprised and think that maybe, just maybe.... this big ole thing will actually fit in between the windows like we originally planned.

Well- we picked up a tape measure this past weekend because mine has gone MIA.

We measured for the frige.  Yay.

Then, we measured between the windows.

Drumroll, please..........

The distance between the windows is 121 inches.

The length of this TV unit, end to end:  118.5 inches.

Hurrah.
Yay!
Jump for Joy!

We are super pumped.

We also are thinking that these may be the tables we end up purchasing from IKEA for our family room..  We don't currently have a coffee or end tables because our town home is just WAY too small for them....



Wanna check em out on your own?

Here's the link for the coffee table  and end table.

And, just for fun.... if y'all do the whole Pinterest thing... Here's my Pinterest board for furniture.  I love to browse online sites when I'm not busy, haha!  I have soooooo many ideas in mind for when we get into this house.  Even if I hate the vinyl in the bathroom and the stain is wrong on our rails {haha}.

Hoping for good news in the next day or so about our dilemma with the floors.  And the mistake with the stain on the rails!


10 comments:

  1. My aunt did a major kitchen remodel and went with the more expensive counter depth fridge and she regrets it, hates not being able to fit much in the fridge. I say go with the bigger fridge.
    My sister just got a samsung fridge with the fancy door that opens like that and she loves it. :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you for the advise! I am glad to hear that someone actually has some of these things and how they feel about them, haha!!

      Delete
  2. We don't have a counter-depth fridge and it does stick out a good bit. Not a deal breaker, but I may go counter-depth when we redo the kitchen. Crazy to think we've been in our Milan for a year and a half and we're already thinking about redoing the kitchen, but we knew that going into it.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. So I totally just went and stalked your IG to see if I could see your fridge in your kitchen, haha!! I didn't realize we have the same elevation on our Milans!

      I've been trying to find photos or refrigerators in Milans so I can try to make a decision, although I think my mind is already made up that we are going to get the larger fridge. Counter depth is nice, I just hate the price tag!

      Delete
    2. Hah, yeah it's a popular Milan elevation for sure. Our porch is getting ripped out today. I'm dreading heading home to see what it looks like!


      I agree on the price of the counter-depth fridges, that was something we balked at a bit. I think the older layout of the kitchen made the non-counter-depth fridges look better. Sometimes I wish we had that layout. I kind of hate the cabinet between the wall and the fridge... pointless to me. When we re-do our counter tops we may end up moving everything.

      Delete
  3. Love the TV stand!! Sadly, the link didn't work for ikea. What size tv will you be putting in it? Was it offered in any other colors?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Weird that the link didn't work :-( I tried it and it worked on my end....
      But here's a copy of the link if you wanna copy and paste!

      http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/S19086678/#/S49085192

      It's got tons of different colors. It's all pieced together from different shelving units and stuff that's offered at IKEA. That's why we decided to customize it a bit with glass doors and stuff like that.

      The maximum TV size that can go in there is 70 inches. I can't remember how big our TV is {I'm such a girl, haha}. It's either 50 or 55 inches, lol.

      Let me know if the copy/paste doesn't work for that link and I can guide you through IKEA so you can see it online, along with all its options :-)

      Delete
    2. I figured it out :). Reading this again got me to thinking... We have our fireplace going against the wall facing the side of the house which leaves either the wall with the windows or the solid wall for our tv. At our Guardian appointment, we elected to have the TV outlets on the solid wall as that it how it was done in the model home we viewed. Starting to wonder if that is where I want it. We want a large sectional and don't want it to be blocking the windows on that wall. I'm glad you were able to provide those measurements. Do you think a sectional would fit between the two windows? Or do you think it would be wise for us to put our sectional on the solid wall and the tv (and maybe that gorgeous IKEA stand) between the two windows? haha sorry for all the questions as I'm sure your brain is already flooded with ideas for your own home.

      Delete
    3. So. When we first met for our wiring stuff with Guardian, we decided that we should put the TV up against the wall where the fireplace would be (obviously we aren't getting the fireplace). At the time it made the most sense to me.
      We hadn't been in a model at that point as the one we go to now was still being built.
      So once the model was built, we kinda started second guessing ourselves. And then once wiring got started in OUR house, we really second guessed ourselves and decided we would rather have the TV in between the two windows (not even thinking about that TV stand at this point).
      We have a sectional that we ADORE and we don't want to part ways with it yet, as it's only 2 -3 years old. And it's gigantic. 7 pieces total.
      So our plan is kind of like what you're thinking. We will put that TV stand in between the windows, where it will PERFECTLY fit, and then the sectional will go up against our other two walls. I love this because it's going to keep the room so open.
      I think a sectional would fit between the windows, just not sure on sizing. That was our original plan when we were going to put the TV against the wall where the fireplace would be. But I just didn't like that it would close the room off.

      We will be able to tell for sure pretty soon what works!! t-26 days to closing!!!

      I hope all of that makes sense, lol!!

      Delete
    4. That's great info! If we weren't doing the fireplace I would plan on doing the same set up as you. I don't like the idea of closing the room off. I guess we will just have to wait and see. Hopefully a sectional will fit between the two windows and not close it off to much. 26 days!? That's exciting. Still waiting for them to break ground on ours. We're stuck in our lease until December anyways so I guess they can take their time. It's been fun watching your house come together :)

      Delete