A school mum came to our house the other week and commented that she liked the fact that the vibe of our home was ‘very un-IKEA’.  

Which is funny because our wardrobes are IKEA and our kitchen is IKEA.

And we have the obligatory Expedit cube  bookshelf.  And some Billy bookcases and 101 IKEA photo frames …

This last month I have been working on the girls room.  Tidying up.  Moving the wardrobes from one wall to another. Decluttering.  Some sanding of the super bumpy lath and plaster walls. A splash of paint.  Oh, and the addition of more IKEA stuff.  Front and centre this time. 

In particular I invested in more cube shelving.

And did you know that they’ve replaced Expedit with a newer version called Kallax?  And it doesn’t match?  Aagh.

It’s a complicated and somewhat boring story.  But I had 12 cube Expedit shelf, and I wanted an 8 cube shelf (to put longways under the window) and Elise had an 8 cube shelf, and wanted a 12 cube shelf … So most excellently we swapped.  Well Mum, Dad and I wrangled the bloody heavy shelves on to the trailer and off the trailer and up and down the garden path etc. etc. in a heavy lifting project morning (thanks once again Mum and Dad).

All good.  

But then.  

I thought an extra 4 cubes would finish the room off. So I measured up and popped over to IKEA … and bought a new 4 cube Kallax shelf … and realised that the Expedit shelf was 1cm thicker all round.  And a different colour white.  And looked pretty average next to the new Kallax cubes.

And so I just* ducked back to IKEA and bought another two 4 cube Kallax shelves to replace the old 8 cube Expedit.  At $40 each they were pretty great value.

  
And so … Voila.  And matchy, matchy.  And I am happy.  Now I just have to find a home for the 8 cube shelf.

* It took, like, forever … geez I HATE Kew junction in peak hour!