Day 40

Well, once again, we rolled up a pretty formidable sized rug, hauled it out of the den, trudged it through the kitchen, struggled to get it out the door, wormed between whatever car was in the garage and the plywood stacks that leaned on the opposite wall and shoved it into the wagon. All of this, only to hear Mr. P say "that's OK, I don't need to see it if you want to keep it."

Are you kidding me?

I mean, it was awfully sweet of him to take our word for it (about the size discrepancy.) I just wish he would have told us that last week!

So, there we were, back at Bloomies, surrounded by the beautiful rugs in their inventory. There were some moments of weakness (the silk rugs are stunning) and I knew that my husband really wanted to look for a bigger rug, but I just couldn't bear the thought of starting the whole process over again; going through rug after rug, picking one out, getting it in and then out of the car, moving all of the furniture aside, laying the rug, putting the furniture back, deciding if it worked or not and - if it didn't - bringing it back - only to have to start the whole process over again! Just thinking about exhausts me.

If we were going to get out of Bloomies without another rug, I had to make a pretty air tight case. Here is what I went with:
1) We all really like this rug (that, in itself, is pretty amazing!)
2) It fills the room nicely (albeit a tad small)
3) It actually compliments our furniture (which is no easy task, given the busy pattern of our fabric -- which I still happen to love) and,
4) At a certain point, you have to move on.

I made my argument well. My husband agreed (truth be told, I think he was as tired of the rug schlepping as I was) and Mr. P gave us a nice credit.

So, we are almost done with this phase of our "Den Transformation Project" (the next, and final, phase will be when my husband lays down the black walnut floor in the spring - wo-hoo!!)

The remaining items are:
1) The carpet pad needs to be trimmed
2) The coffee table needs to be returned to its rightful place in the middle of the room (my husband hates this coffee table - mark my word, he will find every excuse in the book to keep this chore at bay) and,
3) We have to "repopulate" the stereo closet.

There may be a few more interesting posts yet...

Day 35

This weekend we addressed the rug dilemma (in case you forgot, the second rug we purchased - and love - is substantially smaller then what it was labeled and what we paid for.) We figured we might as well use this as an opportunity to check out some other stores and see what else was out there.

So, we drove downtown to this place that I had found online. We looked through a pile of very boring rugs and actually ended up taking two home. We laid them out, each on top of the next, to see if they worked in the room. Both were exceedingly dull, but my husband really wanted a bigger rug and they were definitely bigger. I was trying desperately to like one of them.

Thank goodness, my son came home, walked into the room and said "I see you got another ugly rug." That was all it took! We realized that we were really compromising. Both rugs went back the next day!

We stopped by Bloomies on the way home to talk with Mr. P. He was, as he always is, a pleasure to deal with: "That's not right! Bring the rug back - I'll take care of it! No problem!" he declared. His deep, Iranian voice accentuated the gravity of the situation. As we stood talking with him, I looked around the room. Every rug was absolutely lovely. It was so obvious that the quality was superior to those at the "Oriental rug specialists" store we had just been to. There was no comparison.

So, next weekend, we roll up my beautiful rug and bring it back to Bloomies. We will either get a price adjustment and keep it (which is what I really want) or look for a similar rug that is larger.

We are getting really good at rolling up and transporting rugs :)

Day 31

Garbage pick up today. The last of the old particle board sub floor made it's way into the trash container and is officially gone - wo hoo!

Day 30!

Last night, we all tried out the new furniture arrangement. I have to say, it wasn't as bad as I thought.

Both dogs seemed to like it. They were back to normal - playing tug of war, running around - totally unaffected by the change. Even my daughter seemed to like it (she was the most adamant about not changing things.) It was good to have a "normal" evening after a month of disarray; just hanging out in the den, watching tv and relaxing!

On a totally different note, my wikis and blog class was today! I had a very nice turnout - eight people (not bad, considering the busy schedules everyone has.) We had good conversation with lots of great questions, while we enjoyed some home baked cookies (thanks to my daughter!) and freshly brewed coffee (thank you, Amy!) I think everyone learned a lot and had fun at the same time.

Here's us learning about the vocaroo tool. Do we sound like we're having fun?

Day 29

We finally put most of the furniture back in the room today. The two chairs are now facing the tv and the love seat is sitting in the bay window area (yes, the men have won - at least temporarily.) I'm not sure if I like it, but I have to admit, I'm not sure if I hate it either. We really need to live with it for a few days to see how it feels.

The rug is still an issue. It looks great, but the extra size that we thought we were getting would have really been nice. The call to Bloomies still has to made. We'll see.

Day 26

A few days late on this post (computer issues at home have prevented me from going on line - I feel lost!) Here's where we are: the paint problem was resolved by mixing a leftover can of very, very dark green (my husband calls it "almost black") with the reddish brown "oops" paint from the Home Depot. He was skeptical, but I was pretty sure it would work. I was right (whew!) - the resulting color was the perfect warm, dark brown we were hoping for! Two coats later, Phase 2 of our "Den Transformation Project" was officially done!! Well, almost...

When the new area rug was laid out, my husband discovered that it was substantially smaller than it was supposed to be (about 9 inches length and about 4 inches width.) He was extremely disappointed and is now leaning towards getting a new rug (the idea of going through piles and piles and piles of rugs a third time is killing me!) I happen to think that this one still works. The colors go perfectly and it is still large enough to cover the entire open area around our furniture and then some - which is what we wanted. The extra rug was nice, but not necessary. My husband's point is, that's not what we paid for. Very true.


We will have to call Bloomies and work this out.

Day 25

Last night we hit a road block: it turns out that we can't use the stain we bought because it requires 48 hours to dry! (Why didn't the guy at Home Depot tell us that when we asked him if what we got would work for what we wanted to do? He had no problem mentioning, several times, that he had been a professional painter for over 20 years!) So, now we've got to figure out what color we can use from our stock pile of left over paint that, when mixed with the reddish brown paint, will give us the warm, deep brown color we were hoping for.

I'm afraid that this isn't going the way I had planned it.

When I left the house this morning, all of the furniture was out of the den so that it could be painted today. My husband said to trust him with the color choice. Frankly, I don't, not when it comes to color. If it were anything else - installing a hard wood floor, plumbing, electric, any work on any car - with any of those things it's a no brainer - he is the best! But, color? No, no I don't think so...