I love nice things. I especially love nice clothes and home gadgets. I have always wanted a nice house with nice things in it, despite – or probably because of – my shopping addiction, there are quite a few things around the house that J and I have that are less than ideal.
When J moved out of his parent’s house, he was starting with nothing. For the first half of a year that he lived alone, all he had was a used mattress (which I scored for him from a friend), some dollar store dishes (which we still have and work great) and an exercise bench.
Since my mom had gone through a divorce and then re-married, and also loves making her home perfect and therefore buys new things all the time, I came with a whole bunch of stuff when I moved in with him.
My mom set us up with dishes, forks, knives, cups, mugs, a microwave, blankets, a TV, shoe & coat racks, and several other things that she had started putting away for me when I was a toddler.
While I don’t see any purpose in replacing our plates and glasses, which are fine being a bit mismatched, there are a few things that J and I would love to replace when/if we get into a new place.
A New Mattress
The first and most urgent of those being a new mattress. Ours was donated to J by a friend of mine. It was clean and rarely used, but in storage under a bunch of boxes for years. We’ve had it for about 4 years now, and it’s horrid.
I wake up every morning feeling so sore. I can’t sleep in on weekends past 6 AM because my back starts to kill me.
I can’t sleep on my right hand side because my lower back gets a dull, aching pain until I roll over.
This isn’t just a back problem. This doesn’t happen at my mom’s house, or at hotels. We’ve been saving change for a new mattress for a little over a year, and have about $700. When we move out of this apartment, we’ll buy a new one. We’ll have to subsidize the money we have saved by about half, but I think it will be worth it.
Many of our prospects are online vendors like Casper, Purple and even Nolah. They’re all pretty affordable and are suppose to be great choices for relief from this type of pain. Might need to pony up a few more dollars for premium versions, but the reviews suggest it’s well worth it.
A Couch
Another thing we desperately need is a couch. Preferably a sectional.
Right before I moved in with J, his landlords were cleaning out their parents garage and they found two couches. They’re hideously ugly, but in relatively good shape. They noticed that he didn’t have any furniture, and donated them to us. That was about four years ago.
These couches are horrible. One didn’t last through the last move, so we have one couch and a Walmart fouton. They’re actually love seats. We’ve tried slipcovers, but they don’t stay on.
I think we’d have to budget about $1700 for a new, good quality lasting sectional. This won’t be happening until I have a steady paying job and we have some savings.
A Dyson
One thing I’ve been dreaming off for years is a Dyson vacuum. I love Dyson. J didn’t have a vacuum for three months after moving out, and I used a Future Shop gift card to buy the cheapest one I could find for him. At $40, the vacuum is a complete piece of crap, but has moved from place to place with us.
A New TV
Finally, we desperately need a new TV. The one that we have is from the early 90’s. It’s unbelievably heavy, and really, really big. I don’t mean big in screen size – I mean big. It’s only a 27″, but it weighs more than I do.
It’s a burden, but it’s a TV. We don’t have cable so it’s pointless to buy one now, so we’ll wait. I dream of a nice, sleek flat screen that we can mount on a wall. That will be about $600.
Especially since I don’t have a permanent job and still have tuition to pay, none of these things are going to be gracing us with their presence, except for the mattress, until I’m done school and find a steady, decent paying job. But a girl can dream, right?
We bought an extremely cheap mattress when we bought our house, we really regret it. A mattress is one of the things that I will NEVER ever scrimp on again.
While I don’t suggest completely skimping on the mattress, you can easily get a decent one for less than you already have saved up. I bought a foam mattress at IKEA and a space foam matress topper at Costco a few years ago for about $450 total. I know not everyone likes foam, but mine has held up quite well. The Boy has commented that my bed is really comfy. Even if you don’t get a mattress right away, I’m definitely recommend the space foam topper. It makes a HUGE difference.
Actually, I’d recommend skipping the nice, new mattress, and getting a memory foam mattress topper instead. I swear. My mattress is about a zillion years old and three times handed down and it’s so terrible that I literally can’t even sleep on it, but the topper makes all the difference. I’ve actually slept on much more expensive mattresses, but I find my bed even comfier. You can get them for about $150 for a double at Walmart or Costco.
I echo everyone’s sentiment about the mattress topper! Also my BF and I purchased a memory foam mattress at wal-mart for about $200. It was the best money spent! If you add a foam topper it would be about another $100.
We donated an old couch and mattresses to our new tenants too 🙂
I know what you mean about a vacuum cleaner- I have one and it’s a piece of crap (actually its a handheld vacuum cleaner!)
For TVs are you going to check out the boxing day sales for that? Usually TVs during boxing day is the only thing that is worth lining up for.
You’ve just been Leibstered! (as in I nominated you for the Leibster Award!)
http://indebtfatshortbadteeth.wordpress.com/2011/12/19/hello-taylor-this-ones-for-you/
Buy a new mattress.
Seriously. Save one up. It’s not even “need” but NEED. I used to wake up sore every night. I bought a new one in August and it’s GORGEOUS. It’s not even top of the line but I feel great wakign up in the morning now. No more sore back pain!