Cursing At The Furniture

For the past several evenings I have been able to get out of the office at a normal time and head straight home without having any other obligations in the evening. There was also a few free hours the past couple of weeks. This “free” time was quickly cashed in so that we could finally get everything put together and moved into place in the baby’s room. By the end of the day I was really wishing that Babies R Us had offered assembly when we ordered online. 

All of the furniture arrived earlier this month and has been sitting in pieces in the middle of the room. It is not that putting together the functional jigsaw puzzles was complicated it really just came down to finding the time to read the directions and putting them together. The first attempt to do so came last Saturday when hutch pieces were strewn across the floor and I started screwing the pieces together. Ten minutes later the initial project was put on hold as the pot metal hardware bent and broke thanks to a few holes that were drilled too deep. This was only the beginning of the cursing at inanimate objects portion of the day.

After a quick trip to Home Depot for some replacements and spares, we got back on track putting things together. I built the furniture and my wife supervised… our son isn’t old enough to help lift things yet. It is a model that has worked in the past so why mess with it. An hour in and the hutch was put together and attached to the dresser. I could see my wife’s eyes light up as the first piece was put into place (and then put into a new place when we reconsidered the layout.

The crib and changing table was next. It is safe to say that directions are not the company’s strong suit as there were numerous instances of putting together, taking apart, and reassembling parts where the instructions were clearly left to interpretation. However, with the sun slowly setting and the lamp we found on clearance prolonging the work day, everything finally came together leaving only the glider still in its box.

The glider and ottoman proved to be, by far, the easiest items to build and within 20 minutes of putting the crib in the corner, the room was complete. My wife, both tired and eager, soon followed by letting me know of her plans of where she wanted to place the pile of things that we received at the baby shower. By the time we went to bed that night, some of those things were already in place.

Now we are down to the details. Getting the clothes cleaned, organizing the shelves, decorating the walls (thanks to the clearance sections at Babies R Us), and stocking the room with many of the things that we will need for our son. It is all coming together and while many of the things are in place and ready, I am sure that there are even more things that we are forgetting about and will only remember once we need them. Until then, we will get everything else together and wait for baby.

Some Assembly Required

It really is that simple!

These days, unless you are buying high end furniture, there is going to be some assembly required whenever you purchase larger items for your home. Over the past week, I have been putting together all kinds of items for the new place and while time consuming, it might be the most relaxing part of the move. There is something that seems to be lost on some people when it comes to using your hands and building something.

I have always been this way even though my career doesn’t require physical labor I still enjoy the actual act of creating and watching something take shape. This is part of what drives the writing process for me because whether I am typing of actually writing, it is still using my hands to shape my creation. And although I do so without an instruction manual, the results have been decent thus far.

But that doesn’t satiate that urge completely. There are times when I look forward to really working with my hands and building something or putting something together. I can, most of the time, turn my brain off for just a little while, follow the instructions, and watch the desk, couch, table, chairs, bookcases, etc. take shape. It is the simple process that relaxes me while also rewarding me with something useful in the end.

These are the moments when I can take my time and make sure things are done right. There really is no debate on how something so simple is put together. The odd thing is that whenever I say something like this I usually get weird looks from people especially the ones that firmly believe that anything that you have to put together your self will fall apart before you get any good use out of it. This is definitely untrue.

Like many projects, if you take the time to put things together correctly, tightening every screw and fastening all the joints, these pieces of furniture will last for years. While I cannot dispute the superiority of solid wood furniture over particle board, the basic fact of the matter is that if you ensure that the structure is solid, they will last. I have seen many instances where things fall apart regardless of material because of shortcomings of the constructor not the structure.

Some boxes remain in our home waiting for me to set aside the time to put them together. Others have already been emptied and the items built. So there has been some assembly required over the past week but nothing that I haven’t done before as many of the pieces that we had moved I put together years ago and they are still just as sturdy as when I first constructed them. That might be the most satisfying aspect of the whole thing.