The Blue Couch.

Thanks to our savvy shopping on the Australian version of Craigslist (called Gumtree), Bec and I have almost completely furnished our living room for under $100. We started with a bare canvas, minus a few lampshades and curtains left behind, leaving us somewhat in a panic to find furniture, but also allowing us to make it our own. Enter in Bec’s Peugeot hatchback, a $40 coffee + 2 side tables combo, an Ikea bed frame, odds and ends from the Chinese store, full bedding (for a full/queen mattress), an extra large bag of bean bag pellets, a $50 bright blue couch, a Chocolate Box van and two exhausting days.

Day 1: Because of the Trade Shows I have worked the past couple of weekends, I was allowed days off during the week to make up for it. I had fantasies of going on a quick trip somewhere, or even visiting my favorite City Library and Degraves Lane. Because of my meetings schedule and a large number of errands that seem to pile up after you sign a lease to an apartment, the trip never happened, but of course, there was an adventure. Rushing around on one of my days off, I got most errands accomplished, including a trip to the Chinese store. It’s highly pretentious to say “Chinese” when there could be several other nationalities of people who own these say shops, but that is just what we have come to refer to them as. They are essentially your typical Dollar Generals with any and everything you could every want or need in terms of house wares, cleaning supplies, closet organizers, but say you also need a Buddha statue, a colorful fan, a hat for the horse races and a disco ball – well they have full aisles for you as well. I picked up some essentials, only to drop one outside in the street (a shattered wine glass just gets thrown in the trash – there are no exchange policies, just in case you were wondering). Left the Chinese shop to pick up our $40 coffee table/side table combo set. They were in great condition from a family who no longer wanted/needed them. The little Peugeot hatchbacks they drive over here may seem small, but man do they fit a whole lot. Back seats down, those suckers slid right in. And on my way to Ikea I went. Picked up some other essentials (including one of those last minute impulse buys: a lime green scrub brush for the kitchen). After dropping off my newly acquired bed frame at the “carriage cue” where they watch your items until you bring your car around, I wandered around the parking deck trying to find the “purple level” for a good 20 minutes. All I wanted to do was drop off the small items I had purchased at Ikea at the car before heading back into the shopping center to get a few more things at Kmart. Somehow I had parked on the very bottom of the deck, not even accessible by lift. I can’t even tell you now how I made it back to the car, but nearly giving up to even enter back into the shopping center, I had to give myself a pep talk to get back in there. (The night before I did not sleep more than 3 hours total because a combination of sleeping in a new place, forgetting to close my window and the temperature dropped to 20*F and not having proper bed clothes. Reminding myself about waking up to all sorts of noises, my nose frozen purple and my toes numb was motivation enough. I gathered myself and went back into Kmart. I found everything I needed (somewhat – may have just given up on finding down comforters in the right size and justified buying a king size – it is quite large and fluffy and comfy) – including an essential bag of beanbag pellets. Yes, we bought bean bags for our living room, and they are amazing – red and gray/blue beauties to just pop a squat on when you come visit. After making it down the escalator ramp with my shopping cart full of bedding and beans (visions of my airport entrance into Australia flashing through my eyes) – and nearly knocking out the lady in front of me with a runaway pillow, I made it back to the car. Stuffing the bedding around the table legs and carefully placing the bag of pellets in between the tables and the door, I drove back around to Ikea to pick up my bed frame.

All seemed to be going smoothly, the bed fit in perfectly, I was making some minor adjustments when POOF! An explosion of Styrofoam white bean bag pellets exploded all over the back of the car, spilling out into the Ikea loading area, and creating quite the spectacle for all the other customers loading items into their cars. Every attempt to adjust the bag to keep it from leaking created another cloud of pellets exploding into the sky. Humiliated, I quickly remembered I had also bought on impulse a bag of chip clips and ingeniously closed the hole with the clips. Bec came out to help unload the car when I finally made it home (only after getting a minor bit lost on the way back). We could do nothing but laugh when the bag of pellets somehow was split in more than one place, leaving a trail up to the new apartment. I’m sure our neighbors loved our grand entrance.

Day 2: Bec took a day off work to help pick up our favorite find on Gumtree to date. A bright blue couch for only $50. The Chocolate Box willingly let us borrow one of the vans wrapped in the logo to pick up the couch. Because neither Bec nor I are the best drivers, especially on the wrong side of the road and directionally impaired, we opted to take the smaller automatic van vs. the larger manual van (for the safety of all the other drivers on the road). I brushed off any hesitation that the couch not might fit in the van and off we went. Of course, it starts pouring down rain just as we arrive, but miraculously lets up long enough to haul the couch up a huge hill and into the back of the van, only to figure out, no, the van is not large enough. Thankfully we had a bungee cord and it fit just enough to close the doors with the cord (and we weren’t too far from the apartment). With flashers on and a bright blue couch hanging out of the branded Chocolate Box van, Bec and I received the oddest stares of 1. Who in the world are these girls and 2. Did they steal either one of these large item because this picture does not add up or 3. Who was crazy enough to leave them alone to move this couch using that van?

We got the couch safely into the living room with only one minor scare of the bungee cord breaking (thankfully I didn’t see Bec’s panicked face) and one smashed finger (no worries, Bec said it felt better the next day.) We returned the van to my office with only a few playful jabs of my parallel parking abilities (it’s hard as it is, let alone from the other side of the car!)

The apartment still needs our personal touches, but it’s slowly but surely coming together. There have been only minor setbacks (i.e. finishing assembling my bed frame only to figure out that I indeed have a queen mattress and not a full, so I will be making a trip back to Ikea) and a leaking washing machine. But it’s our home now, and we love it. We intend to create a large bulletin board on the back wall of our living room to hang mementos, pictures and fun things we find that remind us of these many adventures. It’s nice to have my own space, and so close to everything: shops, restaurants, the train station, parks, the Yarra river. But it’s tucked away on a tree-lined street. All the apartments have vines and flowers growing alongside and up their balconies. It’s a perfect tucked away oasis that’s right in the middle of everything. It’s perfect.