Choked

The boys and I went to Ikea this morning - it is always an awesome place to spend a day with kids!  Sadly, we didn't realize that you needed socks to get into Smaland, so we for a while we just gazed longingly through the windows at all the kids having fun... After recovering from that setback, we continued on through the store, finding all kinds of things to justify buying. (Fabric toy vegetables promotes healthy eating, don't you think?)

Of course my favourite place in the store is the As Is section, and I was so happy to find some complete covers for the Karlstad sofa we bought on Craig's list.  I debated between a fun stipe and the light blue, and ended up with the light blue. It was still in the box and half off the original price.  Sweet.  I got home, read the instructions, and realized that I had to take the ends of the sofa off to put the new cover on.  Out came the wrench and much wrestling of the sofa ensued.  With the first arm off, the second almost done, and my first floor in complete disarray, it dawned on me that the fabric wasn't velcro-ed on like our sofa downstairs, it was stapled. Also, the new cover looked a little long... Finally, I looked at the tag found inside one of the covers I had taken off, and realized that the new cover was simply not going to work.

When I was looking for a sofa, I had wanted this one below:

But was pretty sure I had ended up with this one below (with the wooden legs) according to the Craig's list post.

Turns out I actually got this one below.  No wonder it seems like poorer quality that my other Karlstad - it isn't a Karlstad, and it is much poorer quality. Gah.

I did only pay $180 for it, so I really shouldn't complain, but the money isn't the issue.  I don't think I would have bought it had it been properly posted (the guy even provided the link for details to the Karlstad page, and used the photo from the Ikea site.)  It is much smaller than what I wanted and the pillows are already quite misshapen.  I wonder if I would have noticed any of this if I had been the one to go pick it up?  Probably not... and who cares at this point anyway.  But I am still choked about all this and now have a spare cover for a sofa I don't own.  Oh, and I did this to the wall mid-wrestle:

(Sorry Chris...)

I guess it doesn't look that bad, but instead of ending up all proud of myself and my frugality, I feel like a chump.  A chump who wasted a perfectly good "quiet time" taking apart and putting back together an impostor sofa, taking a chunk out of the wall, spending money (in an effort to save money) on something I don't need, and generally getting myself into a foul mood.  Sigh. Anyone want a perfectly good-if-you-have-Karlstad-sofa cover? :) Grump, grump, grump.