We haven’t been posting much, mostly because we’ve been busy nesting.
That’s the technical term for pregnant mothers who start taking on home improvement projects in their last trimester, in a vain attempt to be as busy as possible and to not think about their heart burn and the increasingly difficult time they have getting out of bed. (I have been sworn to say no more on the subject… but let us say there is a possibility of a videotape of the spectacle at some point. After all, a guy has to have some leverage!)
Anyway, not to be indelicate, but we’ve been nesting like the proverbial rabbits. In the past four weeks I have put together from kits a Crate and Barrel Hutch, a Crate and Barrel Buffet, an Ikea cabinet, a Joann Fabrics sewing table, an Ikea desk with four telescoping legs, 6 or 7 Ikea book shelf units, an Ikea sofa desk, and probably some other stuff that I’ve simply forgotten about. Some of these things I’ve even put together twice! (I got it wrong the first time!)
All in all, best directions go HANDS DOWN to Ikea, whose illustrations are always very clear. Sometimes they don’t make sense, or are in the wrong order, but once I’ve put something together, and have three left over parts, I usually can look at the drawing and figure out what I messed up. Worst go to Joann’s, whose illustrations missed several key points, and it wasn’t until I re-assembled the piece a second time did it become clear what goes where– and then I had to re-jigger it so that the little pneumatic gizmo had enough clearance on all sides to go up and down.
I’ve also had to lug and lug and lug this stuff out of the car, up the stairs, and in the case of the ikea book cases all the way up to the third floor. Not easy! And a lot of this stuff said “must be assembled by two people” and of course that means two people that can lift stuff, not one pregnant person who definitely should not be lifting heavy objects. Suffice to say that Stephanie helped as much as she could, and I did a little engineering to allow the very heavy awkward objects to be placed on top of one another (specifically the hutch on top of the buffet– the hutch weighed 120 lbs, the buffet 140 lbs, and I had to put them into place together. Aside from the windows being slightly mishung– it looks very good.
Today I’ve spent most of the day trying to clean out the second floor office (soon to be the nursery) and move that stuff up to the third floor. I’ve been up and down the stairs probably 20 times today. (The gym’s not open today, anyway.) I’ve moved a whole set of bookcases down to the floor level to either be free-cycled, or more likely put in the garage for a rainy day.
Now it’s hamburger time, followed by a potential fireworks show
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