If someone had told me twenty years ago that I would happily devote a day of my precious holidays walking
around a home furnishing store, I would never have believed them. Yet, the new IKEA store in Dublin was the destination for my friend and myself this morning. We set off after dropping our kids at school and arrived early, too early in fact, and had to wait half an hour for the store to open. Once inside we made a beeline for the coffee shop and were immediately impressed with the price - I can't remember the last time I paid just €1 for a cup of coffee.
I was an IKEA newbie so I hadn't realised how vast the store is - or how affordable the whole range of products are.
We wandered around the roomsets, exclaiming when something particularly nice or particularly good value caught our eye, and eventually loaded our trolleys in the 'Market Hall'.
Good quality eye-catching design never looked so good - or so affordable. Although I'm more of a 'Laura Ashley' type person (in my defense we do live in an old farmhouse), there was plenty on offer to tempt me. After walking around for two hours, we realised it was time to head home and we didn't even have time to sample the famous Swedish meatballs.