Basket Found?

As I mentioned on Friday, one of my weekend plans was basket shopping. I know Iead and exciting life lol - but I really needed to find the perfect storage solution for { baby clutter coming in June 2011} I'm pretty sure I found a a basket that will work. Its nice and deep, had a great weave and has handles! The only minus is its not round, but I still like it. I filled it with my sons stuffed animals { yes, I'm that mom who saves stuffed animals that remind me when he was little } 


So I took these pics early this morning with no natural light (boo!) so be kind they suck - but hopefully you get the idea. The best part of the basket is it was only $ 16.99! I total steal for the size and price! Right now the basket is residing on our living room and looks pretty cute. 

Am I the only one looking forward to Spring? I can't wait to have decent pictures to put on the blog! lol

In Search of Baskets

For the past few days I've been in search of the perfect basket for our living room and nursery { read about our preganacy news here! } I want the basket to contain the stuffed aniamals and toys in a cute way. My urge to find a great basket increased while looking on West Elm and Crate & Barrel. My basket musts are: must be mead of natural materials and handles are a must - both for the cute fact and ease of moving the basket around the room and round is a plus. 


I like this soft jute basket from West Elm for a few reasons - I love the braided handles very unique and the large would be perfect in for a nursery of living room. While I love this basket, i'm not crazy about spending $ 79 x 2 for both rooms. 

Next I jumped over to Crate & Barrel, and found the Basay basket which is larger then West Elm basket plus its cheaper. Again I like the braided handles and chunky weave on the basket. This one is $ 59. I'm still not loving the price, so the search continued. 

I like Targets Banana leaf baskets { we have one in our living room for extra storage } I was happy when I came across a large round basket with handles. This basket is only $ 29 and I think would look great in either room. 

Before I decided to head to my local target, I'm going to check out Home Goods this weekend and hopefully I'll come across a large round basket with handles. Crossing my fingers I do. 


What do you use for extra storage in your living room to contain toys / stuffed animals or magazines / blankets etc.? 

PS. Thanks everyone for their lovely comments about our Baby News & Appearing on The Nate Berkus Show Tuesday. If you missed my post about it, click here for the details. 

New Addition

A few weeks back I mentioned wanting to add a bookshelf in out living room. On one side of our TV stand and adding a photo wall to the other other side to create more storage and visual interest on the blank wall. On Thursday night we stopped in Ikea to check out the Expedit bookshelves in person and decide if it would work. We both liked the clean lines of the bookshelf and thought it would be the perfect edition to our living room.

It's always fun take my car on our Ikea trips, luckily folding down the seats made for easy loading and storing our new bookcase. I haven't bought many big items from Ikea to to put together and think this was pretty easy to build.

Here's are our bookcase in our living room. View from the dinning room / kitchen entry. I like how the white bookshelf looks with our darker furniture.

The bookcase fits so well in this corner our of living room

We opted to used large Kassett storage bins to organize and hide our DVDs we watch. The storage bins were a great buy, 2 for $ 11.99!

Next I went though a few hard back books, I recently purchased to begin styling our bookcase.

I removed the covers all the covers on the books, books look so much better without the covers on, when they are on bookshelves.

Instead of discarding the book cover jackets, I place them in a storage container. Just in case we donate the books in the future, they will have their book jacket on them once again.

Next up, filling the bookshelf up. It will take me a while to style and most importantly fill the bookshelves with books with love to read. I'll keep you all updated on my progress.

Thrifty Tip:

To fill your bookcase with interesting books, shop in thrift stores & used book stores and check out their books. Most thrift stores have a huge selection of hardback books in great shape and carry many topics of books. You can buy vintage books there on fashion, design or great old reads like Jane Austin (my personal fave)

I popped into the Goodwill yesterday and bought six hardback books for $ 5.00 - thanks to a half off sale.