Bargain Hunt

No, not this one

But this one

We had a specific reason for going up the M1 to IKEA on Monday morning – Liz’s planned Christmas present for Jon. This is an ongoing project and I shall leave Bob to blog about that. But as well as all the items needed for that, we splashed out on some sale bits. Bob spent £2.50 on a trolley load of wood and I bought a Christmas tree for Cornerstones. I had dithered before Christmas as to whether I should get one – and then today I saw they were selling off the trees from their Christmas display.

I got a fully decorated 6 foot high tree for just £8.

The problem was, I had to un-decorate and dismantle it in the shop before I could get it out to the car. I got some very funny looks from passers by!

I put all the baubles into my capacious French Market Shopping Bag. You can see how full it is!

Once we got home, I laid everything out on the carpet and counted exactly what I had acquired in my haul

There were more than 75 items altogether [including the tree] – various sizes of baubles in reds and silvers, 14 silver stars, 25m of tinsel chains, three little felt wreaths - and lodged inside the branches, a scarlet bauble which didn’t match at all, a heap of green hanging hooks …and a red straw reindeer

This seems like very good value to me. The baubles range from 5cm – 10cm in diameter. Now I just have to pack it all away neatly and it can go up into the Cornerstones loft on my next trip.

Bob’s £2.50 trolley-load wouldn’t all fit into the car, once we had everything else in! He selected all the best bits of wood [MDF, chipboard, hardboard] and then returned the rest to the store [for them to sell to someone else I suppose!] If you need wood for a project, this is a brilliant way to get it cheaply – providing your wife does not mind being squashed into the corner of the back seat like a contortionist for the journey home!