Successful Saturdays!!!

Today was a grand day in the finishing of the Jerdan apartment! Let me tell the story:

A few months back we received a "welcome to the neighborhood" coupon from Bed, Bath, & Beyond (affectionately called "B3"). It was 20% off the entire purchase!!! For newlyweds, who had their registry at B3 to finish off, this is a tremendous opportunity. The coupon expired in February, however I knew that if we weren't careful, we could very nearly forget about it and pass the date by, so I was a bit anxious to get underway to B3. That said, we left it on our fridge for awhile until we identified everything we absolutely needed, not just coveted, from the store. And once we had some free time, we could finish our list at 20% off!

Today was the day! We carefully looked at the list of things we needed: a rug for the hall to keep the carpet from wearing to thin, a pot for soup, black-out curtains for our bed-room (as our window faces the parking lot, there's an oraganeish glow at night), a toaster, a blender, cutting boards and a few more dish-sets, but only if we had remaining cash. We tallyed our remaining cash gifts, gift cards, and credit from returned items, and came up with our budget. And remembering ALL of these numbers and lists (hard for iNtuitive Perceivers), we set off for an afternoon of shopping.

Entering B3, we began - first to kitchen utensils to figure out cutting boards, then to pots and pans to figure out the best value for the best pot. Despite a good deal for spending $300 dollars on Caphalon, we settled on a good soup kettle with steaming features and kept going. Then on to kitchen appliances, and then to curtains, where we found the most helpful lady who helped us identify curtains within our budget. We landed on a pair of blue/grey drapes which had lining sewed in the back that obscures 98% of the light (better savings than the black-out curtain with drapes!). After a bit of effort we found the rugs, and identified one that worked for our hall on clearance! Then, after adding all our totals on our calculators, we realized we had enough left to buy 3 more dish sets, allowing us to set our entire table with the new plates, glasses, and silverware. Fairly confident in our calculations and decisions, we headed to check out.

There, I was anticipating being over-budget, which happens more often than not for me, despite careful calculations and thought. However, we weren't! We actually came in near $50 UNDER budget after 30 dollars was knocked off the rug for some reason.

Euphoric and delighted, we headed to the car, packed it up, then drove to 5 Guys to spend some of our extra cash on some good meat (Jon definitely needed a man-meal after shopping for the home) and a night of no cooking and no dishes. It was a fabulous Saturday. Most of the new items are settled in, and I can't express how much more "at home" I feel without the constant reminders of what needs to be bought for the home to be at a good, functional level (at least in my mind!). The room looks absolutely elegant with the new curtains, I'm happy to not walk down the hall thinking "We should get a rug in here" and I can't wait to make some soup :o)

Other highlights: Talking to the brand new Smiths! It's so much fun to talk to a couple so newly married and in-love like us (actually this was the actual highlight of the day, but makes a less interesting story unless we typed out the transcript of the conversation)! & watching "Guess who's coming to dinner" with Jon, who had never seen it. Yay newly married life.