The title to this post is no joke...

Even though Chris and I are practicing Catholics, I feel like sacrificing a pure-white lamb to the Craigslist Gods on high.

But before I get into all that, I want to show you (so you can sympathize with me) the sorry state of our living room couch "situation".

 Yea.  It's pathetic.  But from a distance, it doesn't look TOO bad... here, let me zoom in for you...
I bought this couch/love seat set back in 2009 when I moved to Dallas with negative-money.  After I landed my job, my first pay check went straight to rent (made the deadline by 2 days) and part of my second check went to these guys that I picked up off Craigslist for $250.

To be completely honest with you, I don't know why we have kept them for so long (oh wait, that's right, we're poor) but it always seems like we've had a bigger project to tackle then spending the money on a new sofa. (ie. back deck, kitchen, that kid we're having, etc.)

However, I. cannot. take. their crappiness awfulness. any. more.

Even Chris, a manly-man dude, thinks they are completely "icky" and agreed we should really look into putting our "bathroom remodel money" into a "sofa fund" first.

As I'm sure you could see from the pictures above, the space is NOT big by any means, so sticking with lighter colors was a must to keep the room from feeling too heavy.

We have lusted over this light grey sofa from Macy's for a while...
...but even when its on sale for $899 (usually around holidays), plus an extra $100 for delivery, not to mention tax or a protection plan, we are looking at $1300+ which is a bit much for us, especially saving for a bathroom remodel and a kiddo.

So, where do I turn? Oh just the same place I turn to for everything, Craigslist.

I had been browsing for a couple of weeks (maybe months... if not years) and have had a couple of close "almosts" but nothing that I was too excited about.  Until I saw this sucker...
Ummmm .... hiiiiii....

Couple of things:
1.  I love the color and it would go PERFECTLY with our walls without being too matchy-matchy
2. I've honestly thought about camping out in Z Gallerie if security wasnt so strict but I seriously LOVE everything in that store know that they make great, quality stuff
3.  Take a look at the arm trim... Nail head detail and I are like two lost souls who hear dramatic violin music in the background whenever we find each other
4. It looks to be in awesome shape! (I later find out the girl got it but has spent the last year and a half at her boyfriends and hardly ever sat on it but she's moving into his place now.  She's not a smoker (score) and has no pets (check)
5. "OBO"... maybe my favorite words on Craigslist.  It means shes not attached to the price and I could usually save myself some serious cash-ola.

After nearly fainting out of sheer excitement, I sent the ad to Chris, who happily approved, and after a couple e-mails back and forth with the seller, we agreed on $400.

Counting down the minutes until Chris got home so we could go pick up our new beauty, I checked out the Z Gallerie site and were shocked that the exact same couch was still available for about $700 more than I was paying for it (even on sale!)
Even though they didn't have the same light blue color available, I did like how the set looked with a matching chair.
Alas, paying $899 for a matching chair in a different color wasn't really in our budget, but who knows... maybe someday down the line.

As the day continued and the clocked creeped slower to 5 o'clock, I continued working and browsing on Craigslist just for giggles...  Then... my heart stopped... Honestly, what I saw next, was pretty darn near close to the second-coming in terms of miracles...
 Yes, that IS... the matching chair.  Same style. Same discontinued, impossible-to-find-ever-again color.

(Cue the clouds opening and orchestra of angels singing in white)
Good to know there is always a plan B.
 "They see me rollin'... they hatin'..."
 "...Patrollin they tryin' to catch me ridin' durty"

(that song is about as thug as you can make a Subaru... and even then it's a bad attempt)

Thank God we lived only 10 min away on back streets... I was a nervous wreck and even had this awesome view when looking out the window...
 Have I mentioned we have awesome friends? Because we do.  Since I'm at that stage in pregnancy where I can't lift anything heavier than a cantaloupe, our good friend Bobby came over to help bring the sucker down and put it inside.

He's the pair of legs behind the post

 I tried to convince Chris that we should light bonfire in the backyard with our old couch set while dancing around its burning ashes, but after reminding me of the no burn-ban, we elected to give them to Chris's brother to take to down to College Station for his new apartment (college boys have no fear of the "gross" or the "icky")

We worked with a couple different set ups for the new couch:

Exhibit A

Exhibit B

 But we figured we might as well wait a day until we get the other chair in to make the final decision.

Next day, different car, same ghetto solution.
  "They see me rollin'... they hatin'..."... ok I'll stop.
To me, one of the WEIRDEST parts of this whole thing is that TWO different people were selling each part of this set separately and they only lived about a mile away from each other (People in Uptown Dallas: you need to meet your neighbors).  Isnt that weird?  And at the same time? Again, Thank You Craigslist Gods!

Once we got home, we had to wait for our buddy Blake to come over to help bring down the chair... ... ... sooooo our front driveway looked like this for a couple hours.

Welcome to the M-Streets... we're classy

I had the boys try the chair in a couple different spots...

I liked it in the corner but it stuck out a bit too far.

And eventually, we landed with THIS set up.
 Here's a bit better close up.

Rocky: the world's worst photo-bomber

Even though this works for now, this is NOT the way it is staying... once I start something, if I don't finish it exactly perfect, a little part of me dies inside.

Things to change:
- Location of the couch
- New rug
- New drapes
- Mounting the TV above the fireplace (its currently to the right of this shot above)
- Bringing those two wingbacks back into the living room
- Getting new pillows
- Making a statement wall
- ... a few other things I havent thought of yet

Luckily a lot of these are quick, inexpensive fixes so we won't have to dip into our "Bathroom Budget" money too much, but at least getting THIS done before the little one gets here will make me feel 10,000x better.

I'll have a better room lay out with plans for you all on Monday so you can kind of see what we are thinking.

All in all for the couches, we paid $675... ($565 if you want to count the 1 day flip I sold on Craigslist that I found at a garage sale)...  That's a savings of $1,133 if we would have just bought the set from Z Gallerie and $1,433 if we would have bough each piece separately.  Also that saving is before tax (add on an additional couple hundred) which we don't have to pay since we did cash through Craigslist.

Dear Craigslist Gods... I love you... I shall now name our first born son: Craigslist.

(not really mom, don't worry)