Great Finds for the Home Archives | Page 2 of 7

The IKEA Family Card and Dreams of a Kitchen & Textiles

11 May 2012 Ibyang Sanchez 2 Comments Category: Charmed Life of a Mrs, Cherished Memories, Deep Thoughts, Food, Great Finds for the Home, The Married Life

We received our IKEA Family Card yesterday and it’s one of the most gorgeous looking cards the Husband and I have encountered.

Be part of the IKEA Family to avail perks and discounts:

Free hot drinks every visit
Discounts on selected meals in the IKEA Restaurant
Exclusive discounts on lots of products
Extended 12-month return policy
10c donated to charity for every swipe
Weekly $250 IKEA gift card draw

For more details, please visit IKEA FAMILY and join for free.

We registered for an IKEA Family Card last month when we took my Mum for a visit. Everytime she’s here, we make sure to drop by IKEA in case she needs something for our home in Manila. Plus, she also loves food at IKEA.

Breakfast at IKEA is always worth waking up early too.

Since my Mum and I were sharing meals that morning, I took this opportunity to grab a slice of their Apple Pie.

The Husband had his favourite, Apricot Pastry.

Other than eat, IKEA is a place for dreaming and research. Even if we don’t really need anything at the moment, we look at the designs, showrooms and products. On our last visit, our we focused on their Kitchen showrooms. I dream of having a gorgeous but functional kitchen someday and these two showrooms below somehow are in line with my idea of a future kitchen. I took photos because one day, I might go back to these for reference.

We opened one of the corner cabinets and saw that IKEA makes use of any space available. You can place a RATIONELL Corner Base Carousel inside your kitchen cabinet so you can store your pots and pans (see photo below). The great thing about it is you swivel the two shelves for easy access to what you need.

I dream of owning this book, “Love for Textiles“. Only a few people know that I love textiles. I never dwell on this interest because I don’t have the space and I don’t have the time. For now, I’m grateful for the thought that when I was young, I had my share of exposure to the textile and fashion industry (thanks to my Dad). My love for textiles and fashion will always be a part of me but in the meantime, I heed to my other calling: writing, food and photography.

It’s always hard to leave IKEA empty-handed. We bought a few items for family in Manila and a few items for our home.

KAVALKAD Frying Pans (sent to the Phils), LEGITIM chopping board, GODTA Green Deep Plate, DINERA Deep Plate (placed underneath the green plate) and STABIL splatter screen.

RATIONELL VARIERA Shelf inserts (for better organization of our pantry), ORDNING Cutlery Stand, GALEJ Tealight Holder, BEVARA Sealing clips (shared them with my Mum & Mother-in-Law), DOKUMENT Pen Cup.

Things I Love: The Scarf Hanger

22 March 2012 Ibyang Sanchez 3 Comments Category: Great Finds for the Home, Things I Love

It’s Autumn in Sydney! It’s getting cooler as the days go by so last weekend, I allotted some time and brought out some of our Autumn outfits and scarves.

Over the years, we’ve accumulated scarves and now it’s hard to ignore the fact that we needed to store them properly. It was good timing that we visited Howards Storage World three weeks and found a SCARF HANGER.

It can hold up to 10 scarves and I swear, it did save space inside our closet. And it’s easier to find the scarf that we’d like to use for the day.

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IKEA Brekky & Shopping

8 March 2012 Ibyang Sanchez 1 Comments Category: Great Finds for the Home, The Married Life

I missed having cheap meals at IKEA so when we found a chance to have a short stopover at their Rhodes branch last Saturday, we woke up early and decided to have breakfast there.

We arrived a few minutes after 9:30AM and the IKEA food hall were becoming busier as early birds like us wanted to have breakfast first before shopping.

The Husband and I each had a plate of their Swedish Meatball Breakfast (AUD$4.95) which had 2 round hash browns, bacon, meatballs, a sausage and egg. This is the perfect cheap breakfast. I think this is the cheapest breakfast one can find in Sydney Metro.

And of course, a glass of long black coffee for me. It was my first time to try their coffee and it was so-so. I found it smooth and not as strong and rich as other coffee.

I find it appalling when people leave their plates and leftovers on the table. IKEA has a designated area where you can place your trays after eating and they have big signs for people to see. People here are supposed to look after themselves–and this is not just an IKEA thing. Just a tip if you’re travelling in Australia: never assume that someone will clean up after you eat. Have a look around if there are people cleaning tables and if you don’t see one, that’s a sign that you should clean up after eating.

Anyway, we enjoyed our IKEA brekky and yes, we were very full from all the meat we had that morning. With the little time we had (we had a lunch party to attend), we made an almost swift pass inside the store. There was no urgency to buy anything but we looked at some stuff closely such as bookshelves, bed sheets and kitchen equipments.

We’re about 25 minutes away from an IKEA store so we always have this blue IKEA bag inside the car so we’re always ready to shop!

My favourite space in store would have to be the kitchen area, particularly the storage solutions sections. We don’t buy everything but I like looking at their products because it gives me ideas on proper storage in the home.

We bought a few items: A red container storage box for our vanity area, a small cutlery organizer (for my chopsticks and Korean cutlery), spice jars, clothes pin dryer, a small lamp (for our photography) and scented candles (which I always buy whenever I’m there).

I also bought a new cream-coloured throw. We already have one but in preparation for winter, we needed a thicker throw. We were very happy to find this dotted black and white pillow cases on sale for only AUD$2.00 each. I’ve been on the lookout for pillow cases that can match a set of bed sheets I found in Myer years ago (they were on sale too!). The bed sheets and quilt cover are in shades of grey and midnight blue. When we got home, I put them side by side and it matched!

The one thing that amused us was finding a glass tea kettle. We recently bought a glass kettle (will share later) and when we saw this, we just can’t let it go. It matched our glass kettle and double wall glasses too.

A 30-minute brekky and an hour of shopping at IKEA surely made the start of Saturday a happy one.

IKEA Homebush Bay Drive
Entry via Rhodes Shopping Centre
1 Oulton Avenue
off Homebush Bay Drive
RHODES NSW 2138
Store:
Mon – Fri 10am – 9pm
Sat – Sun 9am – 7pm
Restaurant:
Mon – Fri 9:30am – 8:30pm
Sat – Sun 8:30am – 6:30pm

Now Open: IKEA Tempe
634-726 Princes Highway
Tempe NSW 2044
Store:
Monday to Friday:
10am – 9pm
Saturday & Sunday: 9am – 7pm
Restaurant:
Monday to Friday:
9:30am – 8:30pm
Saturday & Sunday: 8:30am – 6:30pm

Little Japan in Market City

6 March 2012 Ibyang Sanchez 1 Comments Category: Great Finds for the Home

On days when I have to meet the Husband after work, one of the places I usually spend my “Me” time is Chinatown, particularly in Market City and Sydney’s Paddy’s Markets. Both are housed in one building. The lower ground is where you’ll find Paddy’s Markets and then once you go up the escalator, that’s where you’ll find Market City. I can get lost for an hour or two in these areas. Other than shopping, food chains are abundant so if I get tired from walking I sit down with a drink and rest.

Last week, I was at Market City again killing time before I met up with the Husband. I went to Level 3 to have my Chatime fix (I haven’t had one in ages). Afterwhich, I explored the floor and found a dollar store named Dollar King. I thought it was just a normal dollar store but noticed that it was split into two. The other half of the store is Dollar King, while the other half was called “Little Japan“, a 100-Yen store similar to Daiso.

Like Daiso, every item in LITTE JAPAN is priced at AUD$2.80.

It wasn’t a big space but four aisles full of products from Japan such as home storage solutions, dining ware, utensils, cometics, etc. is sufficient.

My favourite space would have to be the dining ware and chopsticks area. As much as the little plates and bowls were attractively tempting, I didn’t buy any. I always say a home can never have enough dining ware–that is so true in my case. Other than food blogging and photography, we like using appropriate dining ware in the home. Maybe next time.

Lots of chopsticks in different sizes and colours. They have chopsticks with cases. And there are chopsticks for cooking too.

Our love for Asian cuisine has made our home very chopsticks-friendly. We have a sufficient amount of chopsticks at home now, most of them came from our travels. I bought a pair of chopsticks with case which I now keep in the office and two pairs of long chopsticks which I can use for cooking.

Whenever I’m at 100-Yen shops, I also look out for chopsticks rests. I’m glad Little Japan had a few when I visited and luckily, I found a four-leaf clover chopsticks rest. Isn’t it adorable?

If you are too far away to visit Daiso in Chatswood, Little Japan in Market City is a good option for you.

LITTLE JAPAN
Level 3, Market City
9-13 Hay Street
Haymarket Chinatown, Sydney
Open Everyday 10am – 7pm. Thursdays until 8pm

S.O.S. = Storage for Tea Bags

19 February 2012 Ibyang Sanchez 0 Comments Category: Great Finds for the Home, S.O.S., Tips

S.O.S. stands for Sorting Out Saturday/Sunday. If I’m not having a busy weekend, I squeeze in some time to organize and de-clutter a certain part of our home. Sometimes all it takes is a few minutes to bring order to a little space.

A few Saturdays ago, our friend Joy gifted me with a tea organizer (Thanks Hane! I especially loved the letter you wrote to me). I’ve been a tea drinker for a few years and have accumulated different kinds of teas.

I’ve a few boxes of teas inside the pantry and it does take space. It only occurred to me that I need to organize our tea bags when Joy gave me a Bamboo Tea Keeper.

This task only took me only 10 minutes and now we’ve got an organized box where we can find all our tea bags.