Mission Accomplished!!
After 2 trips to the boutique and much consideration, I brought home this beautiful creation, small, black, double flap in lamb w silver hardware. It turned out there were others ahead of me in the queue for the small in GHW. With the minis not anywhere in sight, I was kinda back to square one. I brought my daughter with me yesterday to the boutique to just see the difference b/t SHW and GHW on the medium flaps which are in stock. We both ended up loving the SHW, who knew! My daughter, who is taller, was leaning towards the medium for bigger carrying capacity. At that point, we have settled on SHW and lamb skin for sure. Just before I was ready to go through with the purchase, I asked the SA to bring out a small lambskin one more time for a final side by side look. That was when my daughter and I both absolutely fell in love with the luster and shine of the small. The medium lamb was already shinier and softer to the touch than the caviar. But this small lamb was just stunning under the boutique lighting. We couldn't take our eyes off that luscious shine and how dark the black lambskin was. The leather on the small was also much softer and felt "thicker" (this part could just be totally off the mark as we were so in love with it). In an instance we knew she would be coming home with us.
It was quite an amazing experience, shopping with my son on the first trip and my daughter on the second. We had a blast and the SA was super patient with our constant shifting of "priorities". She entertained them all. Although this is part of her role to help clients explore and find their love, I appreciate her effort nevertheless.
Thanks to all of the wonderful advice and for letting me share my first Chanel experience.
I am adding the side by side of the small vs. medium leather. I would love to hear from the more experienced Chanel owners on whether this is just due to different bags (small vs medium) being made in different batches or even different locations.
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