Kathleen Martin: Welcome to Kathleen Can Do It, the DIY podcast celebrating the fun and fails of doing it yourself. I'm Kathleen Martin.

Kathleen Heaney: And I'm Kathleen Heaney. And we're just two Kathleens who spent nearly four hours at Ikea yesterday.

Kathleen Martin: We did. In this episode, we are sharing our tips and tricks for getting a designer look with IKEA furniture and accessories and how to set yourself up for a stress-free shopping experience, because let's be real, it is an overwhelming place to be.

Kathleen Heaney: Oh my goodness. The amount of money I spent yesterday because I didn't have any sort of just game plan is ridiculous. So Kathleen and I came up with a three step system to make sure that the time that you spend there is successful and not a huge waste of money.

Kathleen Martin: If you go in there with no plan, you are going to come out with a lot of things that you never planned on buying.

Kathleen Heaney: Slash don't actually need.

Kathleen Martin: Absolutely.

Kathleen Heaney: So Kathleen, yesterday you and I went to the location, the IKEA location in Elizabeth, New Jersey, and we spent basically half of a working day looking at things, testing out their products, just seeing what was new and cool and how much did you spend?

Kathleen Martin: I spent 115, but some of that was for my mom.

Kathleen Heaney: That is true. Your mom wanted the Lincoln berries?

Kathleen Martin: Yes, that's a staple and a few jars. I got a new duvet, two new pillow covers and some drinking glasses.

Kathleen Heaney: I spent, I'm so ashamed to admit this because I kind of don't even know what I got. I spent $314. Okay, I needed curtains.

Kathleen Martin: And they were a higher end. They were $70 for two panels. So in the grand scheme of things, they're very affordable, but not what you're expecting from price wise.

Kathleen Heaney: From IKEA. So I got the Gold Sanela curtain comes in velvet. I feel like I see it all over the place on Instagram and all of these home decor blogs and stuff. My bedroom needs curtains and I really fell in love with them after I saw them in your living room.

Kathleen Martin: I have great taste. You're going to be super happy with them when you get home, that was a need. So what were some of the random pickups?

Kathleen Heaney: Oh, dish towels, vases. I bought a whole bunch of plants. I got three rattan place mats and I'm like, "Oh, I'm going to paint these and make them wall decorations." I don't know what I'm going to do. What else did I get? Oh, I got a container to put my compost in.

Kathleen Martin: Yeah, that's good.

Kathleen Heaney: And I got a lampshade, which was $39, so that added to the total 330 bill. Still, I don't know why I spent that much. It's crazy.

Kathleen Martin: The lampshade is really cool. Sometimes when the price is really cheap, you just buy things you don't need because you're like, "Whatever, it's $4," but all the little things add up.

Kathleen Heaney: I am such a sucker.

Kathleen Martin: We all are.

Kathleen Heaney: That's true, I guess.

Kathleen Martin: But we are here to prevent that from happening to you because we are going to give you a structure. We're going to give you a plan, and we are going to set you up for success at IKEA.

Kathleen Heaney: So let's talk about why people go to IKEA in the first place. I think probably price is a big factor and also accessibility. You can kind of get everything in the same place.

Kathleen Martin: Including the meatballs, which I had for lunch, which I always get when I'm at IKEA.

Kathleen Heaney: They looked really good. I have never had an IKEA Swedish meatball.

Kathleen Martin: Get the hell out of here.

Kathleen Heaney: I know. Okay, next time we go I'm going to get them, but I picked up a little snacky snack when we were there too. I really like their chocolate.

Kathleen Martin: Oh yeah. I've been eating it all day. It's delicious.

Kathleen Heaney: It's so good.

Kathleen Martin: Okay, we have to talk about something. Let's talk about the price, it has gone up.

Kathleen Heaney: Prices in IKEA were definitely a little bit shocking.

Kathleen Martin: I truly was shocked because I feel like when I bought my favorite IKEA piece of all time, that's rotting in my basement, sorry, my green velvet couch. It was over a thousand and this was seven or eight years ago, and at the time this was the most expensive couch they had. Once you crossed a thousand, you were like IKEA luxury.

Kathleen Heaney: Yeah.

Kathleen Martin: Now, many of their couches are over a thousand dollars.

Kathleen Heaney: Yesterday they had couches for over $2,000 and you know what? Apparently just the cost of everything in this world these days with inflation, especially in Europe is particularly high, they had to raise their prices, Forbes is reporting, across the board 22% in all of their categories on average.

Kathleen Martin: We definitely noticed that. I still think there's a lot of affordable options there. One of the couches that we liked was 399, and this leads into our three step system for getting the most out of your IKEA trip and getting that designer look for less.

Kathleen Heaney: Yes. Before you even step foot in IKEA, please listen to our advice.

Kathleen Martin: First step, identify the need. What do you actually need or what problem are you trying to solve?

Kathleen Heaney: You mean problem in their home, right?

Kathleen Martin: Right.

Kathleen Heaney: That makes a lot of sense because I feel like if you don't keep that in mind before you go shopping or while you're shopping, the glamour of the store, it overtakes you.

Kathleen Martin: Yeah, it really can, because you might not know what you need. Maybe the problem is I have 15,000 shoes by my front door and it looks terrible. How do I solve this?

Kathleen Heaney: IKEA does shoe storage better than anybody else because they have these really narrow little cabinets that you screw into the walls, so there's not even four legs on it. There's only two legs and they have them in all different styles, and then the drawers pull out and you can slip your shoes in. I have been toying with the idea of getting four of those from my house, two in my primary closet and two in my entryway because I feel like not only do these narrow, narrow cabinets hold shoes, they can hold junk mail and stuff too.

Kathleen Martin: Another pro tip, throw away the junk mail.

Kathleen Heaney: Girl, you know that I can't do that.

Kathleen Martin: That's okay. Actually, Brian checks all the mail for me so I can't talk.

Kathleen Heaney: It just piles up and I'm like, "Let me stuff it somewhere."

Kathleen Martin: I open the mailbox, take a look, and then I'm like, "I don't like this." And then I close it. I leave it all in there.

Kathleen Heaney: You leave it in there?

Kathleen Martin: Yeah.

Kathleen Heaney: Oh my God, you're evil.

Kathleen Martin: When it comes to storage, IKEA is really great about storage solutions, especially in small areas. They have a lot of shallow depth consoles and shelving, which is great for apartment living or just really any area where you need to increase efficiency.

Kathleen Heaney: Yes. That's where IKEA stands out to me. They do efficiency better than any other brand out there. I think that they also do multi-functional furniture really well. I love the idea of having extra chairs in your house that are stackable. When people come over, you can just pull them out and then they go into the garage or the closet when people aren't there. I think IKEA shines when it comes to lighting. [inaudible 00:07:01], got it. Outdoor space, IKEA, go no further. They have really fabulous and very affordable outdoor furniture because outdoor furniture everywhere else is ridiculously expensive.

Kathleen Martin: Everything adds up.

Kathleen Heaney: And you know what? Just a little friendly, gentle PSA. If you're thinking about getting new outdoor furniture and you're thinking about getting it from IKEA, now is the time to buy it because if you wait until May or June, all of the good affordable stuff is going to be sold out.

Kathleen Martin: Yeah, that's really true. I didn't think of that.

Kathleen Heaney: Yet another reason why you need a plan before you go to IKEA.

Kathleen Martin: You need to know a strategy of what you're going for so that you're not buying the random stuff. So how can people best create that strategy?

Kathleen Heaney: IKEA has amazing inspiration sections on their website where they show you how to set everything up, what items go together. It's one of the biggest selling points for me for IKEA. I love to see how they put everything together.

Kathleen Martin: I think that's something that IKEA does really well both online and in store. In IKEA, they have these little faux homes where they show you every room together. Everything feels like these tiny little dioramas that you're able to walk through and get a really good sense of the product. And Kathleen and I believe in not reinventing the wheel. If you see something you like, that bed's cute, that beddings cute, those pillows are cute. Just buy them all.

Kathleen Heaney: Yeah, buy it all together because IKEA literally did the hard work for you. They did the design work for you.

Kathleen Martin: And their website, we were saying this yesterday when we were doing some research. They do such a good job about not only putting IKEA stuff in the images, they make the homes look really lived in with knickknacks and things, and you can really feel yourself in that space.

Kathleen Heaney: Because sometimes companies online or in their catalogs or whatever, they make it seem like a museum.

Kathleen Martin: Yeah. IKEA is great for that inspiration. They have room visualizers. You take the products, you can rotate them 360, you can put them together. The key step is just looking at different magazines or Pinterest or the IKEA website, trying to identify what you like and why. Is it the shape? Is it the color? Is it the way the room feels?

Kathleen Heaney: Yeah. Kathleen and I looked at each other dead in the eye yesterday and we said to each other, how can we express to people the way in which when we walk into an IKEA, we can kind of put our finger on the items that feel more designery and less like junky furniture. And it's kind of like you're born with it in your soul. No, I don't think you're born with it. I think that you and I have immersed ourselves in the design world for so many years that we've developed an eye for, this is an affordable price for a couch that's a good shape, that you could customize or put great pillows with and it'll look designer. And so the advice that we have to offer you is just do your research before you go. Make sure that A, the items that you're looking for are actually available at your local store.

Kathleen Martin: Yes. They very much often aren't.

Kathleen Heaney: There's a whole bunch of things I wanted to see yesterday. I went to IKEA yesterday with one goal in mind. I needed to buy one vase. They have this macaroni shaped looking vase where one end is higher and it's in this rainbow iridescent finish with all these cute ridges and they didn't have it, and then I spent $330 on other crap.

Kathleen Martin: Step number one is identifying the problem you're trying to solve and what products would be good for that. And step number two will be looking up those products, making sure they're going to work, maybe looking at other people who have used them and researching if it will work for you.

Kathleen Heaney: One of my favorite hacks before figuring out what new furniture I want to buy at IKEA is typing the name of the item into Google or into Pinterest or something, and seeing how other people are styling it as well, because there's probably a home decor blogger out there that's putting their spin on that Malm dresser that, "everybody likes too," IKEA hack and do their customized version and that may be the perfect option for you.

Kathleen Martin: Build upon what other people are doing. Look up IKEA hacks, look up best designer IKEA products or things like that, look at the curated list. Look at what IKEA is curating themselves. Because something I always want to warn people when they're looking at inspiration or they're putting something together, they have so many cute rooms there and one of them had this raspberry couch, had a very graphic floral wallpaper. If you don't have that wallpaper, will that couch look good?

Kathleen Heaney: Yeah, that's the thing.

Kathleen Martin: If your flooring is carpet, will that couch look good? Just be realistic when you're going in. It's like when you get the Rachel haircut, but meanwhile your hair is like coarse and curly, it's not going to look the same. Just think about your wall color, think about the lighting you have, think about your flooring and whether that product is going to look as good as it does in the perfectly curated magazine photo.

Kathleen Heaney: It's really romantic to walk through those tiny little rooms that they have set up, and you can get carried away. But you're right, if your flooring doesn't look like they're flooring or your walls don't look like their walls or you can't manipulate what you have to make it look like that room, don't go ahead and buy every single thing that they have set up in that room. Another important thing to keep in mind, because IKEA has gone up in prices a little bit, if you see something at IKEA that's on the more expensive side, I urge you to then check out similar items and similar price points across the board, because IKEA and West Elm are kind of neck and neck now for how their products are priced and West Elm is a slightly better quality than Ikea and you don't have to put it together yourself.

Kathleen Martin: If you're crossing a thousand dollars threshold for a couch, I no longer think IKEA's necessarily the best option because at that price point, there's going to be a lot of companies that I think you could look into and there's also certain things that I would never buy at IKEA or maybe anywhere, like dressers, unless I need a very specific, very weird dimension. You can get solid wood dressers on Facebook marketplace for $100, 150, $200. They're solid wood. Either you love the finish or you can paint them. Whereas an IKEA dresser, it's going to be MDF, it's going to be very thin. It's going to be rickety and don't move with it. They say you get maybe one, maybe one move, with an IKEA dresser.

Kathleen Heaney: Though I do have one IKEA item that I think might be the anomaly. If I had to pick one line at IKEA that is a hard and fast, I would always purchase from there. I think the Malm line is my go-to because I have a Malm dresser. I've had it for at least 10 years. I've moved with it and it is strong and sturdy.

Kathleen Martin: So I Googled it, it's with an A, M-A-L-M, Malm.

Kathleen Heaney: Oh, and last but not least, step number three, join their app. On their app and on their website, you can join their family plan. Basically you just put your email address in and you get 5% off on most of the items that you purchase at IKEA when you're checking out.

Kathleen Martin: Woo hoo. Save those coins.

Kathleen Heaney: Okay, so let's talk about sofas because I feel like budget sofas is one of the big drawing points for IKEA that people go there for. What was the sofa that we found for under $400 yesterday that we thought maybe was their most comfortable/most designery look?

Kathleen Martin: At the 399 price point, I would say the Linanas. It's more tailored. It comes in a nice cream color, which I prefer. I think it also came in gray, which I didn't like as much.

Kathleen Heaney: An important thing when you're buying upholstered furniture at IKEA is to pay really close attention to the shape because if the fabric is already sagging in the store, you can guarantee that unless you're the only one sitting on that couch once every two weeks that the fabric on that item once you get it home is also going to sag. And what I like about the Linanas, I guess guess it's a three seater?

Kathleen Martin: Yes.

Kathleen Heaney: Is that it's just streamlined and it has these cute little mid-century modern legs in a solid birch, wood finish veneer, that they kind of splay out, so it's less traditional and the modern shape gives you that designer feel.

Kathleen Martin: One that we're really liking that's on sale, I think one of the reasons we're really liking it is the color and the texture on top of the shape is the Applaryd.

Kathleen Heaney: The Applaryd sofa is actually 91 inches long, so it's one of the full size pieces at IKEA.

Kathleen Martin: That's what she said.

Kathleen Heaney: And again, it's very streamlined, nontraditional, it feels like any high-end company could put this in their catalog and you would never know that it was a IKEA item and it has metal black legs, which I always feel makes something look like a little more shi-shi, like, "I'm too good for your wood legs."

Kathleen Martin: Has high heels on.

Kathleen Heaney: Yeah. Plus this is a really great tip when you're looking for a couch or a sofa at IKEA that you want it to look designer, traditional couches, sofas, they have three seats, but modern ones have either one singular cushion that everybody sits on or the Applaryd, it has two extra wide cushions, so technically it's a four-seater, but it only has cushions for two seats. That is a characteristic that makes something look designer.

Kathleen Martin: I never thought about that.

Kathleen Heaney: Well now you know.

Kathleen Martin: The reason I love it especially it's the color. It's like this beautiful deep sapphire blue.

Kathleen Heaney: It looks crazy high end. It used to be $1,300, now it's down to 849 on sale and Kathleen, it comes in this deep red brown as well, it comes in gray if you're into gray and it comes in a light gray, so dark gray, lite gray. But what I really like about IKEA velvets is, it makes any item look elevated.

Kathleen Martin: Yes. The majority of my furniture is velvet.

Kathleen Heaney: Okay, I have a theory about shopping at IKEA when it comes to the funky colors.

Kathleen Martin: What?

Kathleen Heaney: I think that if it comes in a fun color like green or blue, something that's not cream or gray, those are the items that are going to look more designery in your house, right off the bat.

Kathleen Martin: I agree.

Kathleen Heaney: Because if they are spending their time and money into making these extra non-traditional colors, you know that it's a good item.

Kathleen Martin: I agree again.

Kathleen Heaney: If you had to pick your all-time favorite IKEA item, what would it be?

Kathleen Martin: So I mentioned it at the top of the episode. It is my green velvet couch, no longer in stock in that color way, but since it was once green and velvet, you know it's the best. It's the Stockholm line.

Kathleen Heaney: Yeah. I can't believe that they stopped making that green couch. I feel like it was in every design magazine for a while and it was this bright Kelly Green. Why IKEA?

Kathleen Martin: I don't know. Let's write a complaint.

Kathleen Heaney: My favorite item is a very boring item, but I have this, I use it as my desk. I use it as a crafting table. I use it in all sorts of ways. I got it during the pandemic and it was actually a little bit cheaper than what they're selling it for now. The Norden table, its I guess, not a full size dining room table, but you could sit easily, I don't know, six people at it. You know that would be tight, but six plates would fit on this table and both sides of the table fold down so I can use it as my desk. I usually only have one side of the table folded up, the other side folded down, and then I just put it in this little nook next to my couch in my office when I'm not using it so I don't have to have a desk out all the time. It also has some cool drawers in the middle too.

Kathleen Martin: I did not realize that both sides flipped out, that's actually really cool. It is very functional because what's that called, a drop leaf table?

Kathleen Heaney: Yeah, a drop leaf table. A foldable table, yeah.

Kathleen Martin: When both extensions are down, it is very small. I would say that's one is 12 inches wide.

Kathleen Heaney: Yeah. I use it when guests stay over. It gets used as a nightstand.

Kathleen Martin: Oh, that's really clever.

Kathleen Heaney: Yeah, I think that if you like to have dinner parties or if you sometimes need a table for sewing or crafting or just a desk in general. I have a friend who got it. I have the birch version, but I have a friend who got it in white. She loves it too. It's just a great multipurpose table to have around and actually I bought wheels to attach to the bottom of it, which I haven't yet because it is very, very heavy and I would like for it to be a little bit more easily moved around the apartment, but that's my favorite IKEA item of all time. Another one of the things that IKEA does so well, pieces of furniture that serve multi-functions. They have a bunch of coffee tables where the actual top of it is split in half, and half of it will come up on a hydraulic arm so you can eat your dinner sitting at your couch.

Kathleen Martin: Yeah, we saw that. I think that's genius. Also from work from home, when I say work from home, I work from the couch and then I'm all crunched over. So if I had a coffee table that came up to a typing level, that would be great.

Kathleen Heaney: Your poor back. No wonder you have to do so much yoga. Kathleen, get yourself a proper table.

Kathleen Martin: I don't have any room.

Kathleen Heaney: Or get yourself a, what do they call it, TV dinner tables?

Kathleen Martin: Oh, that's true.

Kathleen Heaney: Another place where I saw a ton of IKEA designer options, high-end looking things was in their lighting department.

Kathleen Martin: Yeah.

Kathleen Heaney: Do you remember that light, that gorgeous goldy amber looking light that looked like it was from the '70s?

Kathleen Martin: Yeah, it was like waves of gold.

Kathleen Heaney: Wavy cellophane, but like classy cellophane. What was that one called?

Kathleen Martin: It was the Alvstarr, but I can't find it on the website anymore.

Kathleen Heaney: Oh my God. It sold out probably because everybody with a good eye walking through Ikea was like, "I'm going to buy that drum pendant."

Kathleen Martin: Yeah, could be.

Kathleen Heaney: They had some at our store. Oh my goodness. Listen, if you're out there, it looks like they're selling them on eBay now for a markup.

Kathleen Martin: I was just going to say that.

Kathleen Heaney: You could get it for cheaper in the store and for the cool price of 48.99, you can't beat it. I think if you need lights in your house, go to Ikea because lampshades out there in the home decor world and pendant lamps, oh my God.

Kathleen Martin: I know.

Kathleen Heaney: They're so expensive.

Kathleen Martin: Why do you think I haven't had kitchen lighting for coming up on a year?

Kathleen Heaney: I go to Kathleen's house, her and Brian have this random lamp-

Kathleen Martin: There's a lamp on the ground.

Kathleen Heaney: A lamp on the ground with no shade on it, so when they need to be in the kitchen when it's dark outside, they just have this lamp.

Kathleen Martin: Yeah, why don't we have a shade on it? It's an old IKEA lamp. Then we have to ask Schmlexa to turn it off and turn it off.

Kathleen Heaney: You should at least have a floor lamp. This is a table lamp. That's just it, it's not even-

Kathleen Martin: That's so true.

Kathleen Heaney: A full size lamp.

Kathleen Martin: It produces no light. You have to look right at the bulb and burn your retinas.

Kathleen Heaney: It's like a desk lamp.

Kathleen Martin: It's one of those things. It's been so long, it's truly, May will be a year of this situation. You just stop seeing it.

Kathleen Heaney: You do. You do stop seeing it. You really should have been spending more money at IKEA yesterday on lighting.

Kathleen Martin: Kathleen, I am on a money freeze.

Kathleen Heaney: Oh my goodness. Do you have a bed? Because I feel like beds are another big ticket item. Do you have a favorite bed of yours from there that looks like a designer would pick it out?

Kathleen Martin: I really like the Tufjord. It comes in like a slatish blue.

Kathleen Heaney: Oh, I'm looking this up right now.

Kathleen Martin: It's an upholster bed. The headboard comes up pretty high, which I like because it can hold a lot of pillows and it curves in and it has a really high end look.

Kathleen Heaney: And you know what? All of our other designer picks for furniture at IKEA, the shape is streamlined. Oh look, it comes in a velvet dark green as well.

Kathleen Martin: That's how it's a good one. It's 649. I feel like that's a fair price.

Kathleen Heaney: Yeah, for a queen size bed, that's about right. The only thing that I would change on this would be the chrome legs. They kind of look like skinny upside down mushrooms.

Kathleen Martin: I wonder if you can swap them out because we saw in the bookshelf area that they have all different feet that you can switch them out, so maybe you could.

Kathleen Heaney: Yeah, the leg options. But it's like one of those things where you get it home and you're never looking at that level, you're never laying on the floor.

Kathleen Martin: This is not true.

Kathleen Heaney: Really?

Kathleen Martin: You want to know why?

Kathleen Heaney: Why?

Kathleen Martin: My green velvet couch from Ikea, I spray painted the wood legs gold once I got it home.

Kathleen Heaney: Because it bothered you so much?

Kathleen Martin: I just always knew.

Kathleen Heaney: Interesting. Okay. Well yeah, the Fjord. Tufjord. It looks like a designer upholstered bed, but the legs are [inaudible 00:24:08].

Kathleen Martin: And it also has a storage option. There's two different versions because I stuff everything under the bed, like I mentioned in the last episode. If I had this one at home, I could have a drawer that I put all the things.

Kathleen Heaney: Yeah, if you need a storage bed, look no further. IKEA is where it's at. I've had two storage beds from IKEA now. I had one in college. I don't know what the name of it was, but it was a single bed with pullout drawers. And then I have the Nordli storage bed in the guest room at my mom's house, which has held up really nicely. I don't know if you can do this, but I've always dreamed of taking one of IKEA's storage platform beds and stacking two on top of each other.

Kathleen Martin: That would be wild. That's a lot of storage.

Kathleen Heaney: We should also talk about how in awe we were of IKEA kitchens yesterday. Legitimately so good. Actually, I was reading online that, have you ever heard of that company, JD Power and Associates?

Kathleen Martin: Yeah, for sure.

Kathleen Heaney: Yeah, they do surveys. Well, they did a survey about kitchen cabinet customer satisfaction, and it turns out that customers who got their kitchens at IKEA had higher satisfaction rates than other big box stores.

Kathleen Martin: So satisfied.

Kathleen Heaney: I swear. Don't write off IKEA, they've got good kitchen stuff.

Kathleen Martin: I really like IKEA kitchens because they have so many different options for so many different styles of kitchen.

Kathleen Heaney: Different handles. They have real wood, they have laminate, any price point. I wouldn't hesitate to put in IKEA kitchen where I live.

Kathleen Martin: I think IKEA is perfect as is, but if you want something even more custom, there is that company, Semi-Handmade.

Kathleen Heaney: Oh, is that the company that does the cabinet fronts for IKEA cabinet boxes?

Kathleen Martin: Yeah. Our friend Ashton did it. And you order the cabinet fronts and they're solid wood and you can custom paint them.

Kathleen Heaney: That's a really smart idea, Semi-Homemade. Didn't you live in an apartment where you put in a IKEA kitchen?

Kathleen Martin: Yes. When I lived in Hoboken, my home, it was like a single family home, flooded in a hurricane and we had to rip out the kitchen and we put in a whole new IKEA kitchen.

Kathleen Heaney: And you liked it, it was functional and everything?

Kathleen Martin: Yeah, it was great.

Kathleen Heaney: It held up?

Kathleen Martin: It's great, soft close doors.

Kathleen Heaney: I love soft close doors. Whenever I'm at someone's house because I'm not used to them and I always go to shut the cabinet myself. They're yelling at me like, "Don't, you're going to ruin the soft close. Don't force it shut." Another item at IKEA that I think you and I are both enamored with is the Billy Bookcase in the navy color.

Kathleen Martin: Billy Bookcase is one of the most amazing IKEA products because it can turn into anything. I'm on a site, I'm on my domain and it's 15 Seriously Genius IKEA Billy Bookcase Hacks.

Kathleen Heaney: Yes.

Kathleen Martin: They are so elevated. They're just like this beautiful blank canvas bookshelf. And you can make them look custom built-in. You can add doors that are solid. You can add doors that are glass. You can go to the hardware store and get trim to make it look really fancy. House of Esperanza, an accountant to follow. She did three stacked on top of each other. She had one of those super vaulted living room entryway spaces.

Kathleen Heaney: Oh, yeah. I've never lived in a place like that.

Kathleen Martin: No. It is the most dramatic bookcase wall and it all came from Billy Bookcases. Look at your phone.

Kathleen Heaney: Oh my God.

Kathleen Martin: It took her a really long time to get enough books. She was getting them at all different places. But it has a giant ladder. She added lights on the top.

Kathleen Heaney: Oh my God. And I cannot believe this is IKEA. That's incredible. Maybe she should be our social shout out today.

Kathleen Martin: Go over to Instagram. Her account is @HouseofEsperanza. E-S-P- E-R-A-N-Z-A. Her name is Monica.

Kathleen Heaney: If you have a favorite IKEA item in your house that has lasted you for many a year, please let us know. Go into the Facebook group, post it, because I think once upon a time I was like, "I'm done with IKEA. I'm not doing IKEA ever again." But I'm walking backwards and realizing that IKEA does have a lot of strengths. You just need to shop strategically.

Kathleen Martin: And I think IKEA was like, "Oh, first apartment, IKEA," and you think you've grown out of it like, "Oh, I'm too good for it." No, you can get great stuff, no matter how old you are or no matter how much money you have.

Kathleen Heaney: That is the dang truth.

Kathleen Martin: And as always, everything that we talked about today over at our website, kathleencandoit.com. We are updating it. It is fresh and it is revived. Check it out.

Kathleen Heaney: Yeah, you can follow me, Kathleen Heaney, @KathleenLovesColor.

Kathleen Martin: You can follow me, Kathleen Martin, @CreateAColorfulLife.

Kathleen Heaney: Follow this podcast, @KathleenCanDoIt, everywhere.

Kathleen Martin: Join the Facebook group. It's fun and popping in there.

Kathleen Heaney: Somebody posted the other day.

Kathleen Martin: I know what you're going to say.

Kathleen Heaney: They painted their room. The trim, the door, the ceiling.

Kathleen Martin: And the ceiling.

Kathleen Heaney: All the same color and it looks so good. Who was that?

Kathleen Martin: Amy. I was messaging her or it was in a comment and she's like, "I remember an episode you said when you paint the walls and the trim and the ceiling, it's living the dream." And she said, "As her neck was craned painting, 'I'm living the dream.'"

Kathleen Heaney: Yeah. The room looks so elevated. I'm obsessed with it. I need to know what this dark moody, sort of teal blue, slate blue color is because it is on fire.

Kathleen Martin: It's in the comments. How many comments did it get?

Kathleen Heaney: It got 27 comments.

Kathleen Martin: It got a lot. People were loving it.

Kathleen Heaney: Yeah. And you know what? Her dressers in that room, those could be very carefully chosen IKEA dressers and with the painted walls, looks like designer.

Kathleen Martin: Absolutely.

Kathleen Heaney: Leave us a voicemail. Let us know what you got at your recent IKEA shopping trip, or let us know what you're working on. Our phone number is...

Kathleen Martin: 201-378-3378.

Kathleen Heaney: And don't forget...

Group: If Kathleen can do it, you can do it too.