Home Decor - Pocketful of Joules

My Thoughts on the Toms + Target Collaboration

Have I mentioned my Toms obsession? It’s kind of funny, when I first saw someone wearing Toms shoes, I thought they looked kind of weird – they’re just normal old wrapped canvas shoes.

What’s the big dealio?

They totally grew on me over the years though and I finally bought my first pair of Toms over the summer. They were a snazzy pair of zigzag slip-ons and I wore them ALL summer long. Then, Hautelook had a Toms sale… and I bought a couple more pairs. A few months later while browsing at Nordstrom Rack, I found two more pairs to add to my collection.

So yeah, now I have kind of a Toms issue.

As you can imagine, when I heard that Target and Toms were launching a collaboration I marked that shiznet on my calendar WITH an alert so I wouldn’t miss the good stuff! I stalked the Look Book and picked out a few of my favorites and waited until the collection went online on 11/16.

That morning, I clicked over… and was kind of underwhelmed. I don’t know why, but there just wasn’t much that rocked my world. The one pair of women’s Toms shoes were kind of boring and initial feedback on the website was that quality was lacking. The sweatshirt that I’d been eying just looked kind of ‘eh’ and nothing else was really calling my name.

I love the brand though and especially love that they would be donating shoes, blankets and meals to those in need for each purchase. I decided to order a few items and planned to return what I didn’t love.

Women’s French Terry Sweatshirt in Black & White
I was initially drawn to this sweatshirt because of this picture from the Look Book:

The nubby fabric was super cool and I imagined it being delightfully over-sized and looking adorably chic with my distressed jeans, boots and a scarf. Since I wasn’t quite sure how it was cut and I really wanted it to be large and flowy, I ordered it in both a Large and an Extra Large.

Um, what the heck. There is nothing adorable or delightful about this. I’m actually wearing the Extra Large in this picture and it’s still quite fitted. In fact, it’s practically a crop top and you’d be able to see my navel if I raise my arms. Not exactly the look I was going for.

Three Bracelet Sets
I ordered two different versions of the bracelet sets because I thought they were super cute, especially for just $15.

I have a friend who I think will love one set and I may be using the second set for an upcoming Secret Santa get together at my house. The sets in person are exactly as pictured and I love that they are already boxed nicely for easy wrapping!

50” x 60” Acrylic Fringe Throw
When I saw this online I loved the yellow and white version.

This is a really nice sized throw for $30 and I loved the way it looked online. I was just crossing my fingers that it was as soft as it was in my imagination. I ordered two of these, with plans to give one as a Christmas gift.

Unfortunately, when it arrived it was NOT the yellow version I had been coveting. I called Target’s customer service and apparently there was a mistake in the programming, so EVERYONE who ordered the yellow version was sent the wrong color! To thank me for my patience, they gave me a $25 Target gift card, which was pretty nice of them. I took a quick trip to my local Target to return the sweatshirts and exchanged the blankets for the color I had been wanting.

I’m so glad I did, because these blankets are so pretty and extremely soft! They are wrapped up really nice with a bow for easy Christmas giving, which is great for the one I’m giving away. I am keeping one of them for myself though… and Ollie approves!

All in all, I really like the Toms and Target Collaboration. I checked out a few more items in person when I was at Target and the clothing items and home goods all seemed to be made really well. I think it was really smart of them to launch this in time for the holiday shopping season, because there are some great and affordable gift options.

The only place where I feel the collection REALLY needed improvement was the shoes. I wish that they had offered more of the Toms shoe with funky designs that I love. I did get a chance to see the black women’s Toms in person… and just like the reviews said, they were really cheap looking.

Unlike some of the other Target collaborations, they will be restocking items so if you missed out on something you love there is hope that it will soon be available again! As an added bonus, Target has free shipping for the holidays, so you can order what you like online instead of trying to chase it down in the stores.

Did you buy anything from the Toms and Target Collaboration when it launched? Was it everything that you hoped it would be?

Disclaimer: This was not a sponsored post. I just really like Toms… and Target.

Ikea Success: Finding a Chair for my Giant Toddler

So even though Jack was born prematurely, he’s pretty much a giant. He won’t be three until mid-February, but he is already 38” tall (the 93 percentile for height).

He’s a big kid. But with me at 5’7” and my husband at 6’4”… well, we kind of expected a giant child.

As most kids do, we started out with a highchair. This one to be exact. Here’s a picture from Jack’s 1 year birthday… wow, my hair is really dark. And I was 10 – 15 pounds heavier.

The highchair worked out well for the first year or two, but before long he was just too big for it. I had a booster seat sitting around the house that was actually from one of my sisters (from over 20 years ago), so we strapped it to a kitchen chair and called it a day.

That worked out pretty well until Jack hit a growth spurt over the summer. Now when we scoot the chair up to the table, Jack complains that his knees are being squished. He’s not quite ready for a full-sized chair though… which brings us to the wonderful world of junior chairs.

It doesn’t make sense to spend a ton of money on something that Jack will probably only use for a year (if that), so I went to my happy place… Ikea!

As luck would have it, they are having a sale through the end of the month and all the junior chairs are 20% off.

I narrowed down my choices to either the Agam chair or the Urban chair. The Agam chair is classic looking and would totally match our current kitchen table and chairs set. The Urban chair is nice because it’s all a matte plastic and easy to clean. I wish it was available in black, but right now it is only in white or green.

It’s hard to make a decision without actually seeing the chairs in person though, so earlier this week I made a trip to Ikea. It’s impossible to only go there for one thing, so I had a small list of stuff to look for – the two chair options, a belt hanger for my closet, a roll of paper for Mimi’s house, and a few more cheap picture frames for our kiddo art wall.

As planned, I went straight to the kid chairs display and I’m SO glad I did. In person, the Agam chair was TINY!

Even if Jack would fit in it now – which is debatable – he’d probably grow out of it by Christmastime. On the other hand, the Urban chair seemed quite sturdy and was awfully sassy in person. I debated between the white and green colors, but the white just seemed to attract dirt and scratches so easily. It will probably clash with my kitchen, but green it is!

I did a quick walk through the self-serve area and was totally tempted to grab a bunch of stuff not on my initial list…

The graphic rug is AMAZING and I’m still thinking about scooping it up for my kitchen. I love the cute animal pennant for a kid’s room, or even a birthday party celebration. I kind of want to hang an entire ceiling full of these decorations in Jack’s room. I also somehow resisted these super cute yarn wrapped reindeer… but probably only because it isn’t even HALLOWEEN YET.

I did end up picking up everything else on my list though. The Urban junior chair ($31.99), the Kompl multi use hanger for my belts ($7.99), a roll of drawing paper ($4.99), and four Ribba frames ($4.99 and $1.99 each). All in all, I spent a total of $63 and saved $8 just by signing up for the free Ikea Family card.

Funny story: I already had a card but the kiosk wasn’t recognizing my information so I kept hitting the submit button while cursing quietly. Well, I came home to SEVEN welcome emails from Ikea… so I guess the submit button WAS actually working!

When I got the chair home I was hopeful that it would solve all our giant toddler problems. We were rushing around like crazy to get groceries put away, dinner made/eaten, bath time and bedtime… but I did get a quick picture of Jack in the chair and it fits! Here he is mid-bite:

I was concerned that the bright green chair would totally clash with my kitchen, but it’s actually not really that noticeable. In fact, it looks a heck of a lot better than the red and blue booster seat that we had been using. I’m really happy with my purchase and I’m hoping that it will be that bridge that we needed between the booster seat and the grown up kitchen chairs.

Oh, and here is our kid art wall with two of the new Ikea frames. I’m totally LOVING it!

Are you an Ikea lover? What is your favorite thing to buy there?

Making over 2 Thrift Store Lamps

The better title for this post would have been: Making over 2 Thrift Store Lamps, Googling “Why doesn’t my lampshade fit my lamp”, “How do I make my lampshade fit my lamp”, “What the heck is a Slip Uno Adapter” and “How do I know what kind of fitter is on my lampshade”… then finally finding something at Home Depot to MAKE IT WORK Tim Gunn-style.

That might have been a teensy bit of overkill though…

It all started with these:

These two little crystal lamps were calling my name at the thrift store. They were marked at just $3.00 each and one was even on sale for half off! After I bought them, they just kind of sat around in my office while I did some online lamp shade shopping. I saw a few okay options at Target, but nothing that really seemed like the right design.

Then, on a trip to World Market I found these:

I didn’t have the bases with me, so I was just kind of crossing my fingers that they would work. Both of the shades were marked as $14.99; however the navy design one had a mark on it so I asked the manager for a discount. {Remember, the secret is to ask super nicely.} She was happy to reduce the price to $11.99 and then I used a coupon to get an extra 15% off of everything. So, the total for both shades was just under $23.00.

I was pretty excited when I got home and plopped the shades on the lamp bases… until:

Well, crap. The lamp socket was too small for the lamp shade. Instead of the shade fitting snugly, it flopped around on top of the on/off switch… this won’t do at all!

At this point I did A LOT of googling around. I found this post on how to determine what fitter you need to be quite helpful. I also found this thing on Amazon, that SEEMED like it might fix the problem: Slip Uno Adapter Harp Converter Lamp Shade Uno Euro Fitter 1 7/16 I.D. Almost $8 each for a fitter seemed a bit steep though, so I did what I always do… I went to Home Depot and looked around.

The nice lady at the lamp section had no idea what I was talking about. Even when I pulled a full-sized lamp from my purse to show her.

{ I mean, why WOULDN’T I walk around with a lamp in my purse? It goes well with the blue crayon, 3 monster trucks and 2 baggies of snacks.}

I decided to just keep walking around to see if I could find anything circular that might fit on top of the lamp socket… and found this:

It’s a plumbing part called a PVC Bushing that seemed like it would fit nicely. I tried it on the base that I had with me and it seemed to do the job. Since they were only $1.26 each, I got a few of them to try at home with the shades.

Look, they’re like little lamp top hats!

They fit perfectly on the socket, leaving the on/off switch clear. They also allow the lampshade to balance on top, without flopping around. All you need to do is screw a bulb in and it holds everything together. The only drawback is that you can’t use a fancy energy-saving twirly bulb because the base is too thick to screw in through the bushing. Luckily a regular bulb works fine.

Check them out. Sassy, right?!

I already found the perfect space for my favorite one. I love the way the crystal looks with the rougher straw-like shade.

I think the other crystal lamp will end up on my bedside table. I don’t really NEED it there, because we have a remote control for our overhead fan/light. But it looks super cute, right?!

Here’s what I spent:

Two lamps (Goodwill): $4.50
Two lampshades (World Market): $23.00
Two bushings (Home Depot): $2.52
Total: $30.02

I certainly could have found cheaper lamp shades at Walmart or the Dollar Store, but I think that the snazzy shades totally MAKE the lamps. It’s like a hard/soft thing going on that works in well with my home decor. They were definitely cheaper than this version of a crystal lamp/rough shade from Pottery Barn for $249 or this mini table lamp version from West Elm for $69. I’m pretty darn happy with my Cheapo-nista versions!

Have you gotten any cool stuff from the thrift store lately? Do you also have issues with lampshades fitting on your lamps? Which one is your favorite – the one with the woven shade or the blue patterned one?