Well, Good for you, Pidge! I think one lives with the accumulation of the makeshift furniture because it all comes about so insidiously. Myself, I have six fruit crates stacked as a unit in the living room as a stereo/CD station. It replaced a cheesy fiberboard bookshelf bought in an emergency.........and as soon as I find decent old bookcase, the fruit crates shall find their way back up to a spare bedroom. LOL.

No.....I tend to be quite content to live with the bits I have already, or those we inherit by chance. Most of the stuff are like old friends. I have no problem though replacing a worn out item. I'm not much into consumerism, but also get joy out of something new to feast my eyes on, even if it's the occasional pair of curtains or a smelly candle.

I love new furniture and wish I could get a whole house full.
My house needs a make over but i've been holding out
because I felt sure that we would go ahead and sell this place and move back into town. I keep stalling having already missed out on several houses that I would have loved to have moved into.

I have been able to scratch the itch though by buying a few
things for Katrina's apartment. I found a great picture
to hang over her fireplace yesterday. It was a closeout sale and we both fell in love with it. I'm going to try
my hand at re-doing her china cabinet. Wish me luck, i've never done this before.

Like Suzy, i've lived with a bit of this and that.
I have a LOT of built-in shelves and an antique here and there. If I could i'd swap my dining room table for
another one. Mine is a handcarved rosewood oriental with
matching chairs, probably the most expensive thing in my house. It wasn't what I wanted but Neil bought it so i'm
stuck.

Pidge i'm happy for you, new furniture is a good thing.
Enjoy it.

My MIL is in the process of moving in with my SIL, who's having an addition built onto her house for her.

She went through agonies of indecision about what furniture to take with her, and what to sell.

I was enchanted when she told me the other day she gave up and went out and ordered a new sofa and a new bedroom set. "Well, if I can't treat myself to new furniture at 85, when am I going to?"

So enjoy your new furniture!

Almost all our furniture dates back to the early sixties, but it's come back into fashion as "midcentury modern" now. LOL But we also have a mishmash of things I insisted we buy while waiting to be able to afford the more expensive things DH wanted. For instance, we have one small set of walnut bookshelves and miles of plain pine bookshelves. Sheesh...the books are the attraction...who looks at the shelves! Same with tables..I just wanted big and sturdy. We agreed on a huge teak dining table with extensions that pull out to measure I think 90" by 45". Marvelous for crafts and giftwrappimg which was its main role...now holding about 15 potplants! Sold the uncomfortable teak chairs and now use those director's black canvas chairs which can be folded away when not in use. DH and I still disagree...we've 4 of the Eames welded wire chairs in the garden because they're too big for this smaller house yet he loves them. I'd rather sell them and have a small gazebo built.

I do love new bed, bath and kitchen linens, and pottery and baskets and plants...LOL Ithink I'll still be shopping at 85, too. josh

Good for your MIL, sara. I'm in her camp all the way.

In fact, I've been dealing with a husband who says why buy new when we're getting older? *I* say I think going into older age will be much nicer in lovely surroundings. I like nice things around me--not always expensive things, mind you, but "nice" in that they have aesthetic value as well as utilitarian value.

Wow, now that I think of it, that's what William Morris, who was instrumental in the Arts and Crafts movement and no fan of bare bones Utilitarianism, said. I'm paraphrasing here, but his belief was that things should be both useful and beautiful. I like that.

Mishmash of stuff at this house. I agonize so much over each purchase (I inherited a dithering gene along with a frugal gene)that I hate to buy anything. But once I finally find the perfect thing I am so happy. As a kid I always envied my frieds with all the perfectly matched furniture sets. We had all this antique stuff. Now I like the ecletic look.

Enjoy your new furniture!

Enjoy! I'm jealous. I wish we could get new bedroom furniture, but when Steve's dad died, his sister and one of his brothers and their lawyers got so contentious that his parents' estate (his mom is institutionalized w/Alzheimers, but is very much alive, so I'm disgusted by this) had to be auctioned off. The family lost most of their treasured heirlooms in the process. Steve was able to buy a bed and a dresser (along with a few other things) so I think we're stuck with them for the long haul as dumping them would re-open Steve's wound.

I, too, get excited about new additions to the house. They're few and far between, as Steve insists on being part of the process... Selecting our dining set alone involved 17 different shopping excursions, him crawling under all the furniture in the showroom with a flashlight to examine the quality of construction, and returning three deliveries for flaws before we found the lovely Danish table and Italian chairs we have now. Very grueling process. After a few trips like this, we've discovered that Danish stuff generally satisfies my style and his quality requirements so we shop at the skanda-hoovian stores first.

Sara, I like your MIL's attitude. She's right!

Enjoy your new stuff, Pidge.

Jaz, 17 shopping excursions? I would have lost my cool no later than #3! And he would have run for cover after #1, come to think of it.

Actually, I never take my husband on shopping excursions even for big items. I tell him what I think we need, he frowns, than I buy what we need, get it delivered, he makes a face and then settles in and enjoys compliments about how lovely the house looks. The line of least resistance must be tattooed on his brain when it comes to house purchases.

My next purchase will be a new refrigerator. The one I have was bottom-of-the-line when we got it 20+ years ago--you know how that goes, the old one dies and has to be replaced right away and has not been planned for so get whatever cheap thing is on the showroom floor? I'm not looking for one of those behemoths that so many folks seem to find abasolutely necessary--just a nice appliance with decent veggie drawers and good shelf space.

I finally realize that my furniture belongs to the Early Attic series. My living room is Altman's Young Homemaker which we purchased 55 years ago. It has been reupholstered about 8 times and is still good. It has even oulasted Altmans department store.

Pidge, I'm longing to get rid of all the stuff in the family room (except the electronics and treadmill) and get all new stuff--wall unit, bookshelves, sofa & loveseat (or maybe just two loveseats), lamps....

Year-end bonuses are only a couple of months away. Maybe I need to check out The Dump.

Uh, I'm the camp with Tibs and Jazz's husband....it took me months and months to finally decide on my first set of real bedroom furniture. I have a small house, so size was an issue and I grew up with Depression-baby parents, so spending was an issue! I knew I wanted good quality furniture though....and a sleigh bed.

I don't know how many trips it took, it probably rivaled Jazz's 17. All I know is my friends have sworn to never go with me again.

Now I'm looking to re-do the living room. I inherited two paintings from my grandmother, they are turn of the century water colors. I'm trying to design the room around them. It's hopeless...or rather, I'm hopeless. I can't find a couch I love, I can't decide on a color scheme, and before I do that I need to get the walls resurfaced (the joy of an OLD, small house!). When I finally get a handle on that, I'm getting the floors refinished.

On the bedroom furniture I finally decided on a Drexel Heritage set. I love it. It was worth every minute of the shopping trips!

Lisa

Here is a link that might be useful: Sleigh Bed

Pidge, enjoy your new furniture. I got a new couch after having the old one 15 years, last spring and I am enjoying it so much.

Enjoy your new furniture Pidge. I must admit, I would be tripping over myself to get to a store calling themselves "The Dump". I'm always finding neat things in the back of Marshalls or the Unfinished Furniture store.

I did finally pull the trigger and went to an actual furniture store for a new couch and matching chair. But not until I turned over every stone within a 50 mile radius. I bought a poofy slipcover couch and chair. Since it's pale yellow, you can imagine it getting dirty in a hurry. Every piece is removable. It takes me a few loads but I just toss it in the washer and it's as good as new.

You'll love the newer options in frigerators these days. Even the standard models have the oversized shelves in the doors and larger veggie keepers. One old idea that's a good idea has made it's way back onto the market. Freezers on the bottom! They are more energy efficient and I believe easier on the body since most of what is retrieved is from the frig which is waste high and eye level.
~di

Di.........you just hit one of my exposed nerves. After living with a 1960s fridge who just wouldn't die (no kidding, we got rid of it with the motor and compressor still functioning and thirty years old) had to buy a new one, the plastic on the inside of the ancient behemoth just petrified and fell into pieces from age. The new one went belly up and rusted out in less than ten years. So when we remodeled I got the best one I could afford in stainless steel front. No water in the door please. But here is what I miss and no unit seems to have this as an option. DANGED GUMMED EGG TRAYS! Where does everyone park their eggs, or do they just leave them in the cartons, or what?

You cannot find them in any of the plastic articles in stores, either. I miss my egg trays!

Like this, Calliope?

Better yet, here's the egg tray from my fridge:
{{gwi:195395}}

It's 3.5" tall, 5" wide, 13.5" long on the top, and 12" long on the bottom (It has a lip at 2.5" tall). It has a removable cover, and removable inserts for 12 eggs. The first thing I did when I loaded the fridge when we moved in was put this thing in the garage, where it has sat for over 3 years. I will never use it. Is it useful to you? If so, I will mail it.

As for me and my eggs, they stay in the carton. If I have some left over from a previous carton when I buy new eggs, I flip the new carton upside down and put the old eggs in the inserts on the bottom of the carton so I can't help but rotate my egg inventory. If I use half a carton, I hack the carton in half and only put the stub of it back in my fridge so it doesn't waste space. I'd be afraid to keep them in the door sans carton because I'd have to either write the freakin' expy dates on the individual eggs or perform individual float/sink test every single time I used an egg.

So anyway, ya want my DANGED GUMMED EGG TRAY?

Oh my Jaz, you beat me to the punch. When mr di and I moved to DE. we had to buy a frig. I tossed my spanky new danged gummed egg tray into the pantry. Sheeeet, I think I was too lazy to take the tape off! Suzy, ya want mine too? That's the least we can do for someone who has the endurance to clean out a chicken house! Great googa mooga
~di

Suzy, I'm laughing about the fruit crates because I had 4 of them for years that held our record albums. They were absolutely the perfect size for them. I moved them from St. Louis to Dallas, but when we went to move out here, I just had to trash them. LOL, after 25 years, they were decidedly wobbly. We've still got the record albums, but DH built a really nice media center with spaces for the albums.

And yes, we still have & use a record turntable.

Well, you know, I am peeved. Once upon a time, not all that many years ago, the appliance manufacturers kept upgrading their appliances with extra little features to entice consumers to buy their brand. Now, something like a flipping egg tray is considered an option? You can hardly find a unit without the stupid icemaker but they remove things like humidity crispers and egg trays evidently to keep their production costs down. The next thing you know, they'll ask if you want to order the condenser option! More bells and whistles every year, like tv sets in the door.........but take out all the things you need for an appliance to hold and keep food. geesh.

Thanks for the heads up, Jazz. I guess Frigidaire doesn't even make egg trays as an option. Although the English models seem to have them standard. They evidently still believe in egg trays. rofl. I'll measure the inside of my fridge doors, Jazz and Di and see if these could fit. Bless your hearts both of you. This is from the lady who could conceivably have fifty dozen eggs at once, LOL. I even had a seperate egg fridge for a long time. I don't reuse the cartons, as a lot of my customers bring back their old cartons when they buy fresh eggs, and um some of them are the worse for wear, and icky. Nice plastic egg trays for my own use....... I can wash in soapy water.

Hey Andie.......I still have two record players. One of them needs the speed belt worked on, when I get time.