Ikea Excitement

Thanks to everyone for the encouraging words about getting back into shape and finding balance after the baby is born.  I agree that factoring in an hour to work out every morning is probably not realistic, and I need to remind myself that a 1/2 hour or so most days a week is a great amount of exercise for good health and, while I won't be running any marathons, is certainly enough to train for some 5ks if I want to race.

On to a much more fun topic... we're two days away from our long-awaited trip to Ikea to buy baby furniture.


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In some ways it feels wrong to drive so far you need an extra large Google map to show your trip just to go to a furniture store, but hey, it's Ikea!  And the truth is, we have shopped around in town, and we haven't found any baby furniture we like as much as what we've seen online at Ikea for the same price.  Yeah,  you have to assemble it yourself, but everybody knows (or should know) that I am terrible at things that involve spatial reasoning (ie putting things together) and am planning to hide keep myself busy during that process.

Right now we're for sure planning on buying this Sundvik crib that can convert into a toddler bed:

And the Hemnes dresser (not the Sniglar, sorry) to use as a changing table:

I'm not sure if/what textiles we'll buy, but they do have some super cute stuff:

Car playmat/ rug

And look at the toys!  Only $8!  Anyone else want to meet us at Ikea?  I think we might need a third car!

If we make it out of the baby section before closing time (debatable), we're also considering are a futon or sofa bed to go in the nursery.  The problem is that futons tend to be ugly (Ikea futons being more attractive than others we've seen locally) but in our price range and sofa beds are more attractive but also much more expensive.  We could potentially get a twin bed just to have something for me to sleep on in the early days, but that's not very useful for guests (don't worry, guests, we would move the baby to our room).  I can see us going either way on this one (and if we don't buy one, that means more room for toys!)

The other thing we need is a computer desk since our kitchen table has finally been repatriated to the kitchen (along with... unfortunately... the computer).  Like the futon, the problem with cheap desks is that they look really cheap and crappy and decent desks are expensive.  Buying a small table to use as a desk is an option, but with the way we have the living room/"office" arranged, we need some kind of storage for computer stuff.

I'll update on Saturday with what we actually buy.  There will definitely be baby furniture, but we'll see how it goes with the desk and bed.  Or if we return to Madison with a car full of toys.