Another Craigslist Buy: Computer Desk

It really is hard to find decent office furniture for affordable prices in Hawaii.  Therefore, I've been checking Craigslist for furniture every so often.

Since we have a new desk top computer, I needed a desk to put it on.  The folding table just doesn't look very nice with our cherry bedroom.

This afternoon I checked Craigslist and saw a desk going for $25.00.  I showed it to Art.  He was very dubious since the last two we went to look at were priced at around $100 and were in horrible condition.  I didn't even want them as temporary desks.

But this seemed to have possibilities judging by the photos.  I wrote to Bob and asked why he was selling it for so low.  He said it was priced to sell.  I asked if it had termites and he said none that he knew of.

He did say he had a couple of other interested people so I told him we'd be right over.  He promised not to sell it to anybody else until we got there.

Bob lives high up the mountain in Kaimuki... way high up.  We'd never been in that high altitude, high priced area.  When we saw the fancy houses we didn't know what to expect.

The huge, beautiful gate had us even more puzzled.  Why would  somebody who lived here want to sell something on Craigslist?  (I respectfully did not take a photo of his house or area to insure his privacy.)

Well, we met Bob and he was just the nicest fellow ever!  We liked him right away.  He and his friend helped us load the desk in our van and we headed home.  He joked that he hadn't seen any termites but if there are, it would be our problem now.

Going down the hill we could see a different view of Diamond Head.

What an amazing place to live.  If I had a trillion dollars I wouldn't mind living here too.

 

It really is sort of just what I was looking for.  It may be particle board with veneered paper, but it's in great condition.  I've had to glue down some of the veneer and we're going to have to cut the back out of the cabinet on the left because the desk does not have enough depth for the tower to fit.

But this will do very nicely until I find the PERFECT desk for the perfect price.

 POSTSCRIPT:  And here's the desk all set up and being enjoyed. 

Craigslist Buy in Makiki: Night stands, Foot and Bed Updates

I've been looking for a pair of night stands for the Guest room/Art's office for the longest time. The biggest problem was the bed's super height. When we were sleeping on it I felt like I could touch the ceiling. OK... I'm exaggerating. Anyway, it was very difficult to find night stands that would be tall enough.


And then... Hurrah! This pair came up yesterday, just in time for all our guests who will be arriving next week. The height was just right and I got them both for $130. Incredibly, the person who was selling them turned out to be a relative of a good friend of ours. Hawaii is like that. That was quite a surprise.


There were some scuff and paint marks on them and the legs were wobbly. A screw driver tightened the legs up perfectly and my fingernail managed to scrape off the paint. That was a surprise. Now they look almost brand new. Not exactly in our style but it matched our older looking furniture.

Bring on the guests!

Foot Update: I went to see the new orthopedic doctor today and Dr. Quinn said my foot is almost completely healed but it will be another two months for it to be truly like new because there is actually little blood supply going to that part of my foot. Art liked Dr. Quinn the best because he noticed that this doctor actually asked me to remove my shoe to look at and manipulate my foot instead of just studying the X-ray. I don't have to wear my cast anymore but he wants me to get new gym shoes.

Bed Update: I e-mailed Chris, the owner of America's Mattress who sold us our bed and told him my concerns. He wrote back right away, "Kay, the latex will not get body impressions, however, the Tranquility has convuluted foam and Body Loft foam in the quilt which give it some softness. Slight body impressions are normal and supposed to occur as the material mold to your body's impressions."

Chris also said he was going home and sleeping on his Tranquility mattress and would take notice of what kind of body impressions he can see. I do have to say I've been sleeping through the night without getting up (except last night) and the bed is comfortable. I just have to find a good pillow. Art says he's fine with anything and that he can sleep on the wood floor just fine, too. He can be so aggravating.

Craigslist Buy in Aiea: Stressless Chairs

We have this open space in my office in front of the TV. We couldn't decide what furniture piece we should put there. Anybody who reads my blog knows we have a very hard time making up our minds. We didn't want the room to be busy looking so our first choice was to put a futon bed with no arms.

We looked everywhere for different kinds of futon beds but most of them seemed of poor quality. They were also too big for the area.

Then we thought a loveseat might work. We hunted everywhere for the perfect loveseat.On one of our hunts, Art fell in love with recliners. We researched recliners. We saw one microfiber recliner at Room Stores for $699. Then we looked at Homeworld and saw a La-z-boy leather recliner for $2,100.
Hmmmm... Which to get?.... Which to get?... Art was really liking that La-z-boy because he thought it would be better made. Then I looked online and saw a lot of complaints about the warranty and quality so we were twiddling our thumbs again about what to do.

My daughter said, "Life is short. Get exactly what Dad wants."

My son said, "Do you need such an expensive recliner? We have a recliner at work that's not that expensive and everybody sits on it comfortably."

This is the space where we needed something to sit on to watch TV.


Then last night I happened to see two Ekores (Norwegian) Stressless chairs selling for $400 a piece. Art told me to bid $500 for both which I did with some misgivings. It's a lot for used furniture.

We went to see it in Aiea today and met Cheryl who was selling the chairs for an elderly friend. When I saw the pen stains and grime on the chairs, I was even more hesitant. She offered to sell them both for $400 so she could get them out of her livingroom. We thought about it and decided... what the heck! Now we don't have to worry about KC walking around it with her marker a couple of weeks from now.

We've brought them home, cleaned it with Mr. Clean Magic Eraser which took off the grime but not the pen marks and have set them up. They are pretty low profile so we're pleased with our purchase. Art says we should go rent a movie and celebrate.

Does anybody know how to get pen marks off of leather?

Craigslist Buy in Kailua

There's this weird thing about the Windward side of the island. Whenever you go there you feel like you're going to the other side of the rainbow into another dimension. The Windward side is the wetter more lush side of the island. I live on the Leeward side about 20 miles away. It's dryer and hotter. Sigh... However, all my friends and relatives live on the Leeward side. It's rather a strange thing about Oahu.


You go through this long tunnel that's cut into the mountain and when you come out, it's like you're in another world.


I think it's the prettier side of the island. I hope nobody on the Leeward side gets mad at me for saying this.


I was actually taking a quick look on Craigslist this morning to see if they had some taller nightstands. Instead, a 6 feet x 4 feet magnetic whiteboard caught my eye. They were asking only $45.00 but it was in Kailua... the other side of the world. Art, always kind to limping people said he would take me to look at it.


When I saw the white board, I was disappointed. It was bent and dirty even though they advertised it as hardly used. However, they were right that magnetic whiteboards are expensive. I'd looked for one a long time ago and large boards cost several hundred dollars. Art looked at it and said I should give it a try.



I must say, I'm really pleased. It cleaned up beautifully after Art straightened it and it filled up the huge blank wall. I can now play with it all I like adding my magnet collection from our travels and moving around our family photos. It's been a happy Monday!

Bradley University St. Patrick's Day Reunion Party

I'm half asleep right now after the Bradley University (Peoria, Illinois) Reunion at our house last night. No, I didn't have any green beer. In fact, the most potent thing that was consumed was caffeinated coffee. We served corned beef and cabbage, grilled veggies and flan. Everybody else brought, sushi, garlic chicken, chicken veggie noodle dish, 2 kinds of salad and teriyaki venison that one of the alumni actually hunted and prepared. It was much more tasty than I expected. There was also a 5 layer lemon crunch cake that was out of this world.

Here's the Bradley guys who haven't seen each other in about 40 years.

The wives got to chat together in the kitchen. I had such fun meeting and getting to know them. We shared parenting war stories.

The guys had a blast recalling memories of leaving Hawaii so many years ago for the mysterious, exciting Mainland. Everyone stayed until well after 11:00 and we went to bed after midnight. I feel like I have a hang-over this morning, but we all had such a great time.


I love Hawaii parties. It's generally pot luck and very casual. I never have to ask anyone to remove their shoes and everyone pitches in to help. At the end of the party everybody takes home food for the next day's meal. We still have a ton of food left over so we're inviting my brother and sister-in-law for dinner tonight.



HOWEVER: Would you believe I found a pair of night stands on Craigslist (before I went to bed last night) so we're going to look at it today to see if we might be able to use them next to our new-old bed. We'll see...

POSTSCRIPT: Well... We went to see the night stands but didn't buy them. They just weren't of very good quality. Oh shucks! Back to the drawing board.

Another Craigslist Buy!

We've had our mattress and box spring sitting on the floor ever since we bought it last year because we just couldn't find a bed frame we liked and well...... have you seen how expensive bedroom furniture is? So... of course, I've been on the hunt in Craigslist.



I was looking for maple or maybe oak but then I saw a metal and brass bed that grabbed my attention. Kristi was asking $500 for it but I offered $300. She e-mailed asking whether we would go to $350 but I said I'd like to stay at $300 because I was really looking for maple with 2 matching nightstands. (In fact I missed out on a maple bed frame for $125 over the weekend. Sigh...) I told her she should just put me on a bid list and she could wait and see if she might find another buyer who would offer more. I thought that would be fairer. Well, she wrote back that I could have it for $250! That was a surprise.

We went to look at it yesterday evening and liked it although it had rust spots and there was a little dent in one of the brass balls at the top. Whatever the case we loved meeting Kristi and her partner. That was the best part. I can't believe I actually hugged the both of them before we left. I gave her $300 in an envelope. This is a photo of just the foot board.


This morning I got another e-mail from Kristi saying we'd agreed to $250 and that she wanted to send me $50 back or she'd send me $50 worth of cleaning supplies. I can't tell you how touched I was. She had lost her mom two years ago and her partner had lost her dad about the same time. In just a short time time I feel like we'd gotten to know each other. Kristi is from Ohio so we had the Midwest in common. I have such a nice feeling about this bed just because of the provenance behind it but now, I do actually have a lot of work to do. I'll have to strip it, clean the rust off and lacquer it. I think it'll be worth it.

Last of the Roller Shades, Craigslist

We have one crazy window that is over our stairs and difficult to reach. I asked Art how he was going to be able to hang the roller shades on it. Well, he remembered how the carpenters were getting to high places and copied their technique. Looked pretty precarious to me but it got the job done. Now, we just have four more windows to put vertical blinds on... once they arrive. Hopefully the reordered blinds will be correct this time.



In between getting the roller shades up we went on another Craigslist hunt. This time, it was a 4 feet high very heavy mirror. We'll hang it up tomorrow.



Art says I must have been a hunter gatherer in a past life. I hate to go shopping but I'm getting such a kick out of Craigslist. Maybe it's the idea of recycling. Maybe it's getting more for our money. Maybe it's sort of like gambling? I do tend to bargain. Art thinks it's all pretty funny.


Can you see the kraft paper behind me on one of the four windows we have left to work on?

P.S. Good grief! Would you believe it's still raining? The Hawaii Marathon was this morning and those runners got soaked!

Brighter Day

Well, yesterday had it's dark moments but today improved after the startling news about our old, corrupt Illinois governor. Sheesh!

We went down to Home Depot with our too small, special ordered vertical blinds and found out from the customer service person, Sarah that the person who took care of our order previously did it all wrong. Sarah was such a huge help. She redid the whole order. We're keeping our fingers crossed that it will be correct this time. We'll find out in 6-8 weeks.... again.


Once that was done we went to Honolulu to look at some lamps I spotted on Craigslist. I thought it was going to be too big. They looked smaller in the photo. He was asking $50.00 for the pair. I offered $20.00 for both just because it would be a long drive into town and I didn't think Art would necessarily like them. I was surprised when he e-mailed to say he just wanted to get them out of the apartment so we could have them for that price. Art was kind enough to drive me to see them and was pleasantly surprised to find he rather liked them. One of the little legs on the stand was chipped but it was in otherwise fine shape. They seemed to belong in our living room. When I asked my mom later if she noticed anything, she stared around the room and actually did not notice them. My goodness!

Our next stop was to a lighting store to pick up a chandelier for our dining room. I'll post a photo once Art installs it. It's a bit of a job to do it. We couldn't decide whether to do the chandelier or track lights. I hope it'll look OK, too.

The day ended with a webcam visit with our granddaughter who is not calling me "um humh" anymore. I'm now either Harmonie (she must be mistaking me for her Korean grandmother), Noni or Nana. I almost told her to just call me Tutu which is grandmother in Hawaiian. Ah well, all's well that ends well.

Craigslist: Buyer Beware

I’ve gotten several lovely buys from Craig’s List but I have to tell you that you’ve got to be very careful. I recently saw a lamp that was touted as an Ikea desk lamp for $40.00. Well, I’m not sure people in Hawaii realize that Ikea is known for their low prices and good but not necessarily great quality. We have a desk lamp just like the one being sold that we bought in Chicago at the Ikea store for about $13.00. I’ve seen other items going for very high prices that make me wonder if people really get anywhere near the prices they are asking. I guess with these tough economic times people are just trying to get the most that they can. But then again, why even bother to try to sell $4,000.00 pieces of furniture on Craig’s List? People go to Craig’s List for bargains. Then there are those people who try to sell their things without a photo. Oh dear! Would you even think to consider something without seeing what it looks like?

And speaking of bargains, have you noticed Macy's slashing prices on a number of their merchandise? It's been helpful for me since I'm trying to replace the things I did not bring with me when we moved to Hawaii a few months ago... silly things like muffin pans, cookie sheets, stock pot, etc. I've told my husband that I need to go out there and spend just to help the economy. He's not buying that though.

Craig's List Bargains!

I can't believe I'm doing my third posting for today but I just had to share this with everybody. I'm so excited!

We've been looking for a coffee table and end tables for the livingroom. Our problem is that we actually wanted something simple and lighter. However, we've got dark mahogany sort of Victorian type furniture in the diningroom/livingroom that we brought with us from the "mainland." We went out looking at Scan Design, Homeworld, Inspiration Furniture for something that might work. The one we finally thought would work was a coffee table for $899.99 and end tables for a little less. We were aghast at the prices.

Then I remembered my son saying to check out Craigslist. I got on-line and we saw this Broyhill Queen Anne style set that WASN'T what we were looking for but could fit the look we already had.

I doubt any islander would have bought it because it just isn't the island style. I e-mailed the person selling it and they said we could come and look at it. Our daughter and son-in-law didn't particularly like the style because they're more into modern but felt it would match what we already had. What the heck! The sellers were asking $100.00 for all three so (with our daughter's encouragement) we decided to buy it. When we brought it home, it really looked like it belonged in our house.

We're thrilled! It's in excellent condition. It does have one little scratch and I'm sure KC will add to it but I'm just so happy we were able to get it for such a nice price. I'm all for Craigslist now. Hmmm... what else do we need?