For the past several years, I have hosted a cookie exchange at our home. A handful of the friends bake up their favorites and come over to spend quality time together. Good food, excellent company, and no kids!
For me, this event means getting things done around the house. I used to be able to clean closets, dust light fixtures, and redecorate, all before the day of the party. These days, with our family size and working outside the home, I’ve got all I can do to simply be showered, dressed, and smiling at the door, as my guests arrive.
I struggle to give up my dream for perfection, though. This year, as I prepared for our special night, my living room furniture kept gnawing at me. I’ve been nursing the sofa along for two years now; ever since the furniture cleaning man wore a teeny, tiny, little hole in the right shoulder preparing for Cookie Swap 2008. Since that fateful day the hole has grown from teeny, tiny, to gaping. The decorative throw, I purchased last year is no longer able to strategically hide the growing chasm. The kids have taken to scaling the back of the sofa as they enter the living room, causing the foam and filling to spill out onto the cushions.
Then there’s the overstuffed chair and ottoman. Naomi recently set one of the pillows too close the the woodburner. The mauve gingham has an odd smokiness about it now. The teeny, tiny, little hole in the ottoman has grown to gaping. We’ve have a good twenty year run with this stuff, but clearly it’s seen better days.
Thus began my “New Couch Campaign.” Dwight’s answer, right off the bat- “No way, absolutely not, we cannot afford it.” He was absolutely right, of course. That didn’t stop the gaping foam hole from taunting me, every time I walked into the living room. I scoured Craig’s List, I dreamed over the Pottery Barn catalog, and settled for the Sam’s Club edition. I even had Dwight talked into it, until we found out about the 6 week wait. I only had one week.
While we were out running errands, the week before the swap, I cleverly suggested we stop in at the furniture store. Dwight just looked at me wryly. As we entered the store, he said, “I know what you’re up to here.” I lifted my brow in astonishment and began my search. I found the perfect sofa and coordinating chair, but my work was far from over.
Dwight never makes a purchase the first time he visits a store. He much prefers to go home and think about it until the item in question has either been sold to someone else or has gone out of style. I had about 3 days to convince my husband that this couch had our name written all over it. First of all, he thought that the sofa I had picked out was too light a color for our young family; impractical. (he was right!) I promised to teach the kids to keep food and dirt off the couch. (yes, I realize the hilarity of that promise) Secondly, he felt that the furniture was too much money- we couldn’t afford it. This had me at a loss, every time.
A friend wisely suggested that I take Dwight back to the store, set him on the couch, and tell him how good he looked on it. This idea made him laugh, at least. In the end, promising to work an extra shift every week until I had repaid the money for my living room upgrade finally won out. At least I’m not pulling sofa filling out of the dog’s mouth anymore…
