We went to Ikea last week. When we lived closer to the store, we were there pretty much every month. We decorated and furnished our apartment with Ikea things. When we moved to our first house, we bought more Ikea things. I like their clean lines and designs. I like the store itself. I like how they have "rooms" to draw inspiration from and how things are arranged. I could spend a whole day in there without once giving thought to the time.

Since moving here, it's a major drive to visit Ikea now. I think the last time we were there was when Peter was a baby.. over a year ago, maybe. Something like that. I had been talking about going for some time now, and when Mom was talking about getting a headboard/footboard for her bed, I pulled up the Ikea website and she found a bed she liked. Hooray! An excuse to go to Ikea!!

We were there for 4 hours and our time was up when the kids' fuses were just about spent. If it weren't for the kids, I could have stayed longer, waited until after rush hour was over, but as it was, we got out of there just before rush hour started.

The kids had fun looking at everything. Thank goodness Ikea is kid-friendly and there are lots of things for the kids to look at and touch. The plopped on couches and bounced on chairs, fiddled with drawers and opened cabinets. Played with toys and tried every kitchen utensil they had available.

They tried out beds and were especially smitten with these little ones all in a row. They begged for us to get these beds for them, and I was really tempted to. I still need to get 2 more beds for the kids. Peter will be outgrowing the crib soon, so maybe we'll be back in the Fall. See how it goes.

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The visit to Ikea was not the best this time. I think they were understaffed and the store was not as spotless as it usually is. We made it to the cafe just ahead of the crowd and when we sat down with our food, the line snaked out of the roped-in section and into the store. The server ladies were not happy and looked like they wanted to be elsewhere and the utensils and cups were gone, so the kids had to eat their yogurt with extra large spoons and both Andrew and I nearly slipped on a puddle of water by the soda dispensers. Some of the items we wanted to buy were sold out, so that was a disappointment and there were too few cashiers to deal with the large amount of people ready to check out. We waited over 30 minutes in line to pay and with 4 kids, especially Peter who wants to get down and run, that was 30 minutes too long.

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When we finally paid, I found out they no longer provide bags! You could buy one of those Ikea bags, but I have no use for one of those big bags.. they are really big! Would have been nice to have a heads up on their new no-bag policy and I would have brought my own bags. Good thing you're allowed to bring the cart to the parking lot because that would have been irritating having to tote the many little items we bought in our arms. I can appreciate them wanting to eliminate plastic bags, but they should post a sign on the entrances stating they do not use plastic bags and to either bring your own or purchase an Ikea re-usable bag.

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Despite the long lines and the bag issue, I still look forward to the next trip there. If I could, I'd try to visit every 3 months, with lots of money to shop and the kids would be with the grandparents so I could be free to look about and bounce on chairs and couches and beds, finger the lovely fabrics and turn on and off every lamp. Did I mention that Andrew turned on all the timers in the display bin and walked away?? I wonder what people thought when all of a sudden, a bunch of timers went off!