IKEA - April 2023

FIRST POST! FIRST POST EVER! (Thank you to my first 5 subscribers. 🙂 )

While I did run into Ikea once during the midst of COVID - masked, quickly, to get a milk frother (I bought three - they are $3 each and work just as well as anything that costs more and I missed my lattes) - this was the first time really GOING IN and DOING THE IKEA THING in years.

My kid wanted to go - she says it’s her “favorite store” - and she’s on spring break, I took the day off, so we were able to go in the morning of a weekday when it’s not QUITE as crowded and overwhelming as on a weekend. (Which is why we rarely go - Ikea on a weekend?! No thanks. I actually paid the delivery fee to get my laptop desk recently because that fee was worth not needing to go in the store. As you’ll learn, I hate paying shipping.)

First we did the walkthrough all the fake apartments and furniture.

Me: But I won’t buy anything in this part.

Also me: Ah, Ikea, you are ridiculous and I need these chocolate bars and this box of paper napkins as I wander the fake kitchens and dream of redoing just about everything.

I mean, they really just KNOW how to sell their merch. TO ME.

I narrowly avoided buying every single stuffie I saw (those dinosaurs!) before we left for the far more dangerous and far more fun store section.

Ikea is where I go and dream of being organized and living a Swedish life of order rather than m personal life of chaos. At least this time I resisted buying all the organizey things that are just so dreamy.

Instead, we FINALLY became adults and bought a full set of dishes (large, small, bowls) to replace our mishmash set of chipped things, things that don’t match, and a smallllll handful of pieces from my favorite dish set that we got for our wedding (20 years ago) (I have China too - what a waste, how useless it is) as most of those were destroyed in our last home when the floor was the floor of doom that shattered everything that touched it. The Ikea set looks like those and everything’s so pretty and shiny and also USEFUL and I am so pleased.

Related, we also replaced the drinking glasses we’d managed to shatter over time.

But my biggest downfall on this trip? REUSABLE SHOPPING BAGS.

I’ve become a collector of reusable bags. When I was in both Lisbon and Helsinki, I decided that would be my souvenir, so I have shopping bags in various languages and various materials from various stores. Friends figured it out so they also have given me bags - Germany! Iceland! But I COULD NOT RESIST AT IKEA.

I mean, they have a Marimekko collection and while it’s much more affordable than ACTUAL Marimekko (I wanted everything I saw in Helsinki and could afford none of it) it still was a little pricey and a little impractical (I don’t have a sauna!) - but I could afford two reusable bags that are ADORABLE (ONE HAS A ZIPPER!) and practical. And also I don’t need them.

But then ALSO I got a bag with Swedish horses on it.

And then ALSO I got two little bags that fold up all cute because they were marked down to 90 cents.

And then ALSO I got another little bag that folds up all cute because even though it wasn’t marked down, I liked the pattern.

And then ALSO (!!!) I got one of the pride rainbow bags because OF COURSE I HAD TO COME ON NOW.

[Husband and child also bought housewares.]

Husband and I both oohed and ahhed over a gorgeous glass hourglass with green sand and bought it for no reason other than it’s so pretty.

And then at the end, I FINALLY FINALLY was able to get Ikea’s gelatin-free MOOSE SHAPED COLA gummies. The Europeans really know how to make good gelatin-free gummies - no American brand I’ve tried has come close - and I regretted not buying the cola-flavored ones there. Verdict: Yes, very good, worth it.

AND I finally was able to get the seaweed pearls aka vegan caviar. I haven’t tried it yet but it was $3/jar and I like making vegetarian sushi so I think it’ll be great on that.

My point, and I do have one, is that some people apparently go to Ikea and buy FURNITURE. I did not do that.

*Although I made notes because my husband may go back alone and buy that later.

PS Definitely get the Ikea Family Card if you’re going to go - I got 5% off of everything, and that DOES add up.