RugsUSA.com Purchase Review

I posted this teaser about our purchase from RugsUSA.com a few weeks ago. Ok, more like forever ago, I'm a horrible blogger. 

The delivery packaging was a bit sparce, I must admit, but we did only pay $350 for an 8x12 100% wool rug, so I suppose I can't be too picky. And though there was a small hole (maybe an inch), I did rip it open a bit more to get a peek.

Thankfully, it was a nice sunny day when it arrived, but I was home anyway so it wouldn't have mattered in our case. Not everyone is lucky enough to almost always be home for deliveries though.

As you can tell the animals were obsessed with the off-gassing (which really wasn't as bad as I had braced myself for...reviewers can be really harsh on that topic). 

And when it is all put back together, the room looks a bit crazy but I expected as much. You see, the rug purchase is the first step in a nearly whole-room makeover. So, in the end, the chairs will be traded out for some smaller, solid colored chairs, and the couch will be traded out for a brown leather couch. In my dreams, this couch would grace us with its presence, but we'll see how much money we can save up for that purchase!

And while I love the restored antiques we use currently as a TV stand and coffee table, eventually I would like to replace them with some slimmer pieces and move these to bedrooms. 

The gray is a bit darker than I had anticipated and shows our white pet fur like nobodies business but that's not a fault of the rug. 

It is a looped wool rug that I was concerned would be a problem with our darling, un-declawed kitty but thankfully, he hasn't shown much interest in it. He is too set in his old couch-destructing ways, I suppose. 

And a few of the loops are a bit off in a few places where the two colors meet, but again...$350, 8x12, 100% wool. 

And it sheds, quite a bit at first. We're still filling up the Dyson canister every few weeks but it has tapered off drastically in the past few days. I am confident we are nearing the end of that issue. 

And the nasty plastic backing is covered with a nice layer of cotton burlap-ish fabric (pet-peeve from the old rug). 

On the whole, we are very pleased with the purchase (though I'm still convincing Michael of my eventual vision), and I honestly don't think we could have done better for the price. Even those at Value City Furniture that were comparable in size and price were made of horrible scratchy synthetics. No Thank You!

It's here!

The new rug arrived today just as I'm off to visit a friend and her darling baby.

I'll be leaving it in the wrapper until Michael gets home to stretch out the suspense. It's also kind of a joint valentines day gift so I don't feel right opening it without him.

There was a little rip in the packaging though...which I may have made a little bit bigger. So, here is a little sneak peak. I'm liking the feel and color of it so far but we'll have to wait for the full reveal for an actual review.

It's the little things

...that make all the difference. Am I right?

I showed you this picture a few weeks ago to highlight the beautiful work Michael had done carving down and installing the crown molding over our cabinets.

What this photo also highlights is how horribly unfinished the kitchen looks without window molding or a windowsill. (And believe me, it also feels unfinished without a windowsill to sit stuff on!)

I've been trucking along (...well, crawling at a snails pace), stripping the layers and layers of most likely lead laden paint from the original molding and it is finally all stripped, sanded, the seemingly millions of old nails hold have been filled and now it's (almost) all primed.*

 And up on the wall it goes!

How are we doing? Kidding...

I thought this would be as far as this update went; lots and lots of beautiful molding going up all around our kitchen. I was wrong though...

This apparently happened while I was at work** this morning. Granted, the window sill is just sitting there, unattached, and the lower molding is being held up with tape, but it's a start. It needs some further leveling and calking before being permanently fixed in place.

And this is happening now! Working with all the weird/slightly off angles in our house has been no picnic for the resident woodworker, but it's getting there.

Hopefully this week will be filled with lots of sanding, priming, securing, and painting!

*On a related DIY note: while I love, love, love my soy gel paint stripper (it works better and is much less smelly than other products I've used), this job would have gone much quicker had we tried our heat gun first (totally forgot we had that when we started out...oops!). About half were stripped with soy gel and half with the heat gun.

**Yes, I am indeed working again, 2 days per week in a sweet little bakery. I'm loving it but don't want to say much more for now. I am still there on a "trial" period...for 3 more months. Apparently the tight kitchen quarters (and I mean TIGHT) have caused many people to leave abruptly so they do a very extended trial to make sure everything is working out and everyone is happy.