A few weeks ago, I went on a shopping trip to HomeGoods (and posted about it HERE.)  It was an amazing opportunity.  I was armed with $1000 gift card furnished by HomeGoods to shop for my master bedroom.  I came home with a bunch of things, with the big splurge being this rug for $500.   

I loved the rug, but there was a nagging thought in the back of my head that was a little concerned that it might not really work.  It was the only one there that really fit my style and blue & white color scheme and I felt like I needed to jump on it, so I bought it.  In the weeks since I bought it, I have hunted for a fabric that would work well with the blue in the rug and have come up empty-handed.  I also got to buy my dream bed and that made the nagging thought nag me even more.  Would the bed and the rug work together?

Then I found this fabric and fell in love.  The nagging thought started to scream at me.  This rug might be okay, but it’s not the best and I knew I would be settling if I kept it.  So, I looked into HomeGoods’ return policy and learned that I can return things I bought over 30 days ago in exchange for store credit, which is what I wanted anyway.  Thursday morning, my husband and I rolled up the rug and drove to the HomeGoods in York, PA.  In addition to bringing the rug to exchange, I also brought some pillows, shams and curtains.  I basically returned almost everything I bought in the first shopping trip.  I liked it all and it all worked together, but I was hopeful that I could find things that I LOVED.

I went straight to the rugs and immediately saw this… 

It might look like a shaggy cream rug, but when you get close…  it’s a beautiful tufted wool rug with the most amazing, cushy texture.  My husband was with me, which I immediately thought might have been a mistake when he exclaimed that he didn’t like it and it looked like packing peanuts.  Okay…I flipped through the other rugs.  Nope.  I had my heart set on the cream-tufted-wool-packing-peanut rug.

“Well, if you really love it, let’s get it.  I don’t want to be returning it in a few weeks, though.”   Fair enough.  I love it.  Let’s get it.  I then had that irrational feeling I always get when shopping that everyone in the store is going to want what I want.  I resisted the urge to ask my husband to stand by it while I staked claim.  I just went to the register like a rational person and let them know I wanted to buy it, so they could take it down.  I may or may not have gone back to the rug section and informed a very sweet woman who wasn’t even touching “my” rug, but was close enough to it to make me nervous, that I was buying the rug.  (That was the paranoia talking.)

Now that the rug was secured, I went shopping for other things.  I found this flat-weave wool rug, which I bought (for only $40!)… 

…an antique-looking wooden basket…

…a basket with a blue painted stripe…

…and some preserved boxwood topiaries.

I was really excited about finding those.  I am not great with plants and I’m not a big fan of plastic plants, so preserved boxwood is the perfect thing for me.  It’s real, but I can’t kill it.  The price was great as well…better than I can buy wholesale.

When I went shopping at HomeGoods before, I was trying to make what I found work.  This time, I could see when I stepped back and looked at my cart that it was all “me.”

A couple of ladies even commented at how great the contents of my cart looked together.  This is a nice example that you never know what you’re going to find at a store like HomeGoods.  Last time, I struggled to find my style.  This time, it was a major score.

I had some things to return to TJ Maxx as well, so I stopped in there after lunch (my husband went to the tool section at Lowes.  He had experienced enough shopping with me for the day.)  This chair immediately caught my eye and I was wondering if someone nabbed my living room curtains and upholstered a wing chair with them while I was being paranoid over a rug and HomeGoods.

If  I was a furniture designer, though, I would put turned legs with castors on this piece.  The legs are too modern for the fabric.  Just giving my opinion.

Anyway, with my gift card from the returned items, I bought two of these x-back, bentwood chairs for my kitchen…

I’ve been eyeing this chair style for a long time, but haven’t found some at the price I want to pay.  Unfortunately, there were only two, so I’m crossing my fingers and calling every local TJMaxx to try to find two more.  (If you’re reasonably local to me and see them, please let me know!!)

I want to move my kitchen chairs to the dining room.  They’re about 100 years old and they need a bit of a break from everyday use.  These chairs are sturdy and give that Frenchy-farmy look I like.

I couldn’t wait to roll out the rug in the bedroom.  It looks amazing…

…and feels so comfy underfoot.

(Yes, I’m wearing plaid pajama pants in the afternoon.  I am my own boss, so I can do stuff like that.)  When my six-year-old got home, he ran in and exclaimed “Marshmallows!” and then licked the rug.  Of course, he got a mouth full of fuzz and realized that the floor was not covered in thousands of mini-marshmallows.  My cool mom stats got a huge spike and then leveled out again.  The boys tested out the rug with cartwheels and somersaults, though, and gave their approval.  It’s really a great wrestling/tumbling rug, which is important in a house full of boys.

I put the flat-weave wool rug in the living room.  It’s a little too small, so I layered it over the jute rug from the office.

I don’t know if it’s perfect, but I know two things…  1.) I’m keeping this rug and using it somewhere in the house.  2.) I really like a rug with more pop over the antique tapestry rug I had in there before that blended into the floor.

Once the rugs were in place, I cut the tags off the boxwood topiaries and tried them around the house.  These two came out of the wire basket and one went on each night stand.  I did NOT return the beautiful mirrors I bought on my last shopping trip.  I still love those.  I’m thinking I will only be able to use one, so maybe I’ll have a giveaway for the other…or try it in my guest room.  We’ll see.

I think this second buying trip taught me some lessons about shopping at a place like HomeGoods.

1.) It’s okay to buy something you like in the store to see if it works in your home and then return it if it doesn’t.  If you hang onto the receipt and return it within 30 days, you can get a full refund.  If not, you can get store credit.  (I will take a second here to say that everything I returned, except the rug and curtains, had the tags on and were still in the original packaging.  Everything was in brand new condition.)

2.) If you don’t find what you’re looking for in one shopping trip, try again or try a different HomeGoods/TJ Maxx.

In addition to the lessons learned, it was a very profitable (and fun) shopping trip.

My new bed is coming on Monday and my new fabric can’t come soon enough.  It’s all coming together now!

Disclosure: This is actually not a sponsored post, but a follow up on a sponsored post…if that makes sense!