The Southeastern Furniture Expedition

Trey and I have been married for a little over 2 1/2 years.  In that time, we have only lived in apartments.  Going from college to an apartment, we had just enough furniture to make it in a 2 bedroom apt.  Two and a half years later, still using our stuff from college, we decided it was time for an upgrade!  For various reasons (health, job, etc.), we had decided while living in an apartment to not purchase any new furniture until we bought a house with the exception of a breakfast nook table (our first piece of furniture together)...

and a coffee table. 

We constantly said we would wait until we got a house because it literally felt like we were on the verge of getting a house several times over the past few years.  Needless to say, until this summer, we were still using furniture we used in college.

Trey's sister, Kristin, told us about this amazing furniture store in Ft. Payne, AL.  Atkins Furniture (lovingly referred to as Dogtown) is 150,000 sq. ft of wholesale furniture.  We had purchased our breakfast nook and coffee tables at their sister store, Alabama Furniture Market, in Calera.  AFM's prices are a lot better than generic furniture stores, but Dogtown's prices are even better, so Trey and I made the drive up one Saturday morning to take a look. 

Oh. My. Goodness.  We found a sofa and loveseat,

leather chair and ottoman,

and the highly elusive corner TV armoire

all for a really great price...like we got the TV cabinet 60% off its list price.  The only downside of buying furniture in Ft. Payne is that you have to pick it up yourself, they don't deliver to Montgomery.

Enter Trey and a 27' U-HAUL.  The day after Labor Day (he had been in Virginia Beach Labor Day weekend for a half-marathon) he went to Nashville to pick up a dining room table and hutch (left background in first picture) we purchased from a family friend,

then to Dogtown to pick up all the furniture mentioned above, before finishing up in Arab, AL, at my grandparents' house to pick up my piano!  He got back to Montgomery at like 10:30 PM where he and my dad unloaded furniture until about 1:30 AM.  Obviously, Wednesday morning neither one of us were at our finest.

Fortunately, Dad and I had been able to move all the rest of the furniture in our apartment over to the house over Labor Day weekend so that was a relief for Trey I'm sure! 

Images courtesy of Ashley Furniture: Showroom,  Ashley Furniture: Showroom, and TheFurniture.com.