After we had our downstairs floors replaced and we got our spiffy new faucet, there was something in the kitchen sticking out like a sore thumb.

Cue the undersized and overused kitchen rug. I took this picture in the morning before work, see how I strategically did not include the sink? That’s because it was full of crap. A little blogger secret 😉

We wanted something bigger for this area mostly to protect our new floors. We often ‘dribble’ water around the dishwasher area while transferring dishes and we wanted to make sure these floors stay as moisture free as possible.

Another reason why we started thinking about a new rug is because this round of floors is slightly more cherry than our previous ones. I know you guys (or anyone for that matter) would not notice, since they are the exact brand and color of our previous floors. But due to natural variations and different lots of wood, this time we seemed to get less of the dark brown pieces, especially in the kitchen. There are a couple you can spot in this picture…

If I could have hand picked the boards that went down, believe me I would have. I basically had the variations in our previous floors memorized, and my favorite piece of wood was in our dining room. It had this pretty mix of colors and it stood out. When we did our pre-closing inspection, I mentioned how much I loved the variation to the builder representative and he said that most people complain about those pieces. Not me my friend, not me!

So to get a little more brown tones in the room, I started looking for a brown rug, a runner to be exact. Thankfully my friend Robin (Hi Robin!) emailed me a link to a rug sale, with our office in mind. That’s the great thing about having a blog, all of your friends send you things that are your style 🙂 She sent me a link to Garnet Hill’s Bogart Flat-Weave Wool Rug…

Loving the cocoa color! It’s a nice way to bring some more pattern into the kitchen (we have our linear backsplash and our leafy Ikea curtains), as well as a little more brown (we currently have brown in our backsplash, pendant lights and window treatment). I measured it out and it will come out a foot further than our current mat, and will be 5 feet longer. It covers a good amount of the “busy zone” of the kitchen.

I decided that this is going to be my Valentine’s Day gift. Mike and I aren’t big holiday gift exchangers, since I kinda wear the same jewelry everyday and the pieces I change up are $2 bracelets. Plus Macky eats flowers so Mike saves money on those! We’re the type of people that say that we’d rather pick out things we really want and not feel guilty buying them than overspend on each other a few days a year. Though we’re all about spontaneous, thoughtful gifts, we’re never aiming to spend x amount on each other because we feel like we have to. Mike once bought me just a mini-muffin pan for Christmas… and I loved it. Then I came home one random day a few years ago to a new MacBook on my desk… and I loved that too 🙂 Such a keeper.

Happy First Valentine’s Day house, I got you a runner! Please don’t return it for booze. I’m not giving you a gift receipt….

Tags: bogart rug, brown, garnet hill, hardwood floors, kitchen sink, runner