Tuesday, January 8, 2008

mucho assembly required

I'm in the middle of a four day weekend. Since Christmas Eve and NYE both fell on Monday-my usual day off- I get to take two other days off instead. I picked this Tuesday and Wednesday so I can get some stuff done around the house while the kids are in school.

My parents watched the kids on Sunday so Gene and I could go to Ikea. Logan has a tiny bedroom and I've been wanting to get him a low loft bed. It's not too close to the ceiling heat vent but there's still room for him to play underneath. I showed Logan a picture of the bed online and Kaylin LOVED it and wanted one too. Hmmm, well, they are pretty cheap and it would be fun for both kids to have the same bed. Right? Right?

Oh. My. Stupid. At the time I said "Yes" to Kaylin I was naturally assuming GENE would be the one to assemble the beds. After all, he's the one who enjoys using tools and building and fixing things.

Anyway, Gene and I had a wonderful shopping day. We went to both Chicagoland Ikea stores and bought two beds, a new desk for Kaylin's room, a new kiddie table and some stools, other various crap and some cheap clearance crap for zoo animal enrichment. Grand total? Just over $500. I Heart Ikea!!! ONE similar bed at the stores around Peoria was over $600. (Yes, I'm sure it's much better quality, but I really don't care if my great-grandchildren use it and it will be much easier to donate the Ikea beds to Goodwill when the kids outgrow them...)

The kids were literally bouncing off the walls with excitement over all the new stuff! It was almost bedtime so Gene quickly assembled the kiddie table and stools. Kaylin happily informed me that the new table has room for FIVE stools so we'll need to buy one more for Baby Neighbor Kid before next summer when he'll be old enough to join his brother and sister at our house. Wow. Perfect buy. (Sob)

Caught up in the excitement, I promised the kids that "I" would assemble their new beds so they could sleep in them the following night. Yep, I'm crazy-stupid. Monday morning I dropped Logan off at school and did my usual grocery trip. I returned home, put everything away and was ready to start my assembly project at 10am. I opened the first box of a billion pieces and got to work, matching various pieces of wood to the illustrations. I finished Logan's bed around 3pm. Other than taking short breaks to eat and one 20 minute sanity break on the computer, I worked continuously on the beds until I finished Kaylin's around 7pm. Gene and the kids were only home an hour of that time (at which time I COULD see the end) or else I probably would have screamed at them nonstop.

I HATE assembling things! This isn't something new I learned about myself yesterday. I know perfectly well I don't have the patience or attention span to sit and put things together! Wow. I was FOUL upon completion of those beds :) Fortunately, the kids were sooooo happy and excited to have their new beds they instantly changed my bad attitude. They spent their hour before bedtime running back and forth to both bedrooms, climbing on and under both beds. I guess it was worth it... They do love those beds!

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