This is the very first episode of Holly’s Animated Life (April 2008). I took my camera to Ikea, but it malfunctioned and then had soooo much to say I ended up drawing it out with markers.
Just a little update: The road from hell is now a toll-way.
My closest IKEA is located at the intersection of the daisy-strewn tollway and the road from hell soon to be a tollway. I took the road from hell soon to be a tollway
because I am stupid.
After much traffic on the road from hell soon to be a tollway, we finally arrived at the big blue happy box, IKEA.
The big blue happy box, IKEA opens at 10. BUT the big blue happy box, IKEA serves breakfast to hungry travelers starting at 9:30.
Unload the minivan…
time for snacks!
The big blue happy box, IKEA serves a full breakfast and many snacks. The big blue happy box, IKEA serves all this and a bag of chips for mere peanuts.
Mmmmm. After a good breakfast we felt like
shiny, happy people shopping at the big blue happy box, IKEA.
Let’s get a cart!
Oh, the carts at the big blue happy box, IKEA have special, magical shopping cart powers.
They may be pushed in ANY direction.
Wow.
Cool.
Super neat.
ANY direction
except forward.
Wow.
Cool.
Super neat.
After about 10 feet…
Wow. *
What the?*
Cool. *
Who designed these?*
Super neat. *
If any IKEA design team personnel steps in my way, I am going to push them over with my cart. They probably have encountered this before and will step directly in front of the cart rendering me helpless. They are so evil and crafty.*
Let’s tour the big blue happy box, IKEA while pushing our magical carts in a sideways direction.
Wow.
Cool.
Super neat.
The big blue happy box, IKEA designers have made the store into a giant maze.
Yeah!
Over the loud speaker IKEA plays big blue happy box music and announces that “the average IKEA customer spends 3 hours in the store” I think that the average IKEA customer is insane and not chasing a collective 4 children.
Let’s run sideways fast so we can get to the place I need to go…
Yeah!
I found things I need. I will just pop them into my magical sideways cart.
Here is what will fit into the magical sideways cart:
This is what I try to fit into the magical sideways cart:
Legend:
circled in purple: things that I fit into my cart pushing really hard
crossed out in purple: things that kept falling out of my cart
circled in green: things I put in my friend’s cart
circled in orange: things I couldn’t fit in either cart and carried
crossed out in orange: things I couldn’t fit in either cart and carried and dropped repeatedly
*angel choir sings*
Look.
Look.
Look at this:
It is an amazing light fixture that looks like a clear bucket. You can fill the bucket up with ANYTHING (except water…
they say specifically no water). You can fill the bucket up with things that coordinate with your room. See how nice it looks in my pretend room?
I just love the big blue happy box, IKEA.
Let’s go check out!
If I can get these magical sideways carts to line up in the narrow aisles…I can go home and stare at my new bucket light.
Push. Push. Push.
Whew!
Now the challenge of unloading my 362 large boxes onto a check-out conveyor belt 1/6 the boxes’ size.
I pushed the magical sideways carts to the minivan, loaded the car and we were off.
Bye. Bye. Big blue happy box, IKEA.
We were out of there in less then 2 hours because
we are WAY below the average IKEA customer…
That was so much better than actual pictures would have been. Seriously.
“They probably have encountered this before and will step directly in front of the cart rendering me helpless.”
That line completely cracked me up! I am expecting pictures of the bucket light fixture in an upcoming post…no *demanding* pictures!
I loved your drawings! I’m very impressed that you guys were in and out in two hours. We can spend a whole day there and at the huge shopping center attached to it… I’ve got pictures (no drawings!) from two weekends ago that haven’t made it into my blog yet about our last visit… I also took some pics yesterday that were shoe-focused after reading your ode to DSW… I’ll let you know when I upload. 🙂 I didn’t see that bucket light in our store; add pictures of it! Are you filling it with legos, tee hee?
I really love your blog–I have to try to remember to remember to come visit her more often. I have found the best blogs by coming here and linking (and linking and linking and linking).
Your Ikea visit is so damned funny. LOVED it.
And I wonder if you should admit that you saw the movie What About Bob. That was filmed near my house, BTW.
Hey–I wanted to thank you for your fabulous barnyard waffles. My kids now love me, since I fed them cow waffles last night. Thank goodness for Amazon because I didn’t even have to pay shipping and I got it in time for Easter (but then didn’t have to time to make them till last night b/c I’m such a slacker).
i was just in ikea a few days ago and i saw that very light you speak of!!!
i did not purchase it though.
but i did have the swedish meatballs.
my husband steve says those arrows lead one deeper into he**.
like you, i did not drag the man with me.
Your’re tagged, visit my blog…Christina
LOL!
I still haven’t been to IKEA. I have lived within driving distance of an IKEA for 6 years, and have never been. They built an IKEA 10 miles from my house, and I still haven’t visited.
I may just go there for breakfast.
Those prices are amazing!
Wow you nailed it. The drawings really add to the ambiance of a trip to the Swedesh mecca. Including the intersection. I always love that the Welcome to Xtown with the flags & fountain is RIGHT in front of the Ikea. We went recently, too. And, only bought 1 thing.
And drawing, coloring and scanning the pics probably took less time than loading them, editing them and uploading them into blogger, anyway.
KEEP BELIEVING
Oh do I need to make the IKEA pilgrimage…Way to illustrate it. Maybe we should illustrate your blog;)