Yesterday, Little B and I got back from a trip with my mom and sister to the fair city of Chicago. We had a blast shopping and seeing the sights (which I will post lots about later), but we ended our trip with a visit to the Ikea store in Bolingbrook, IL. I really can't believe all the stuff they managed to cram into that store and still make it shoppable, but they did and I commend them for it. The stuff was modern, clean-lined, and inventive to say the least, and moderately to cheaply priced at that. We picked up a few things before making our way home, and I was excited overall at the purchases we made.
This morning I woke up to a messy house as I had just set down most of our luggage and purchases when we got home late last night. Feeling inspired to get something done, I set out to put together the little Ikea table and stools my mom bought for Baylor. The guys at the store said EVERYTHING was easy to put together, so I thought getting this accomplished would be a great way to start the day. *sigh* I could not have been more wrong.
First, let's take a look at the instructions for the table, shall we?
Yup, that's it. Five legs, one table top, five leg caps, ten double-ended screws, and one set of instructions with NO words on them. Remembering that this would be totally easy, I set forth, doing exactly as the instructions illustrated.
Yup, that's as far as I could get the screw in with my hands. I couldn't figure out why until I looked in the other leg hole and one of the table holes and realized ...
Oh yeah, they aren't threaded! So doing this, as per the instructions ...
... was actually impossible. They should have little blood droplets coming from this guy's fingers to let you know what may be in store for you should you decide to follow the instructions to the T.
Feeling frustrated, I decided to try putting together the stools. They hadn't come with any hardware, so I felt pretty confident that this would be a "snap in" sort of situation. And while I was correct, I was far off base when I thought this would be simple. On my initial attempt, this is as far as I got:
I'm pretty sure even my son knows that you can't sit on a stool that only has one leg. I even put all the legs in, turned it right side up, knelt on it, and bounced as hard as I could and still this is all I got.
It took 132 pounds of pissed off pregnant lady to do it, but I got the first one completed. What a feeling of accomplishment. Until ...
I remembered there were three others to be put together. *sigh* 
I'm pretty sure even my son knows that you can't sit on a stool that only has one leg. I even put all the legs in, turned it right side up, knelt on it, and bounced as hard as I could and still this is all I got.
Exceedingly frustrated at this point, I decided to move my efforts to the kitchen where the tile floors would afford me a little more resistance than the carpet. Employing three silicone potholders as grippers, I was finally able to assemble the first stool!
It took 132 pounds of pissed off pregnant lady to do it, but I got the first one completed. What a feeling of accomplishment. Until ...I remembered there were three others to be put together. *sigh* Oh! And I figured out that, in spite of what the "instructions" tell you, you need to use actual tools (a simple wrench, if you ever buy this) to assemble the table. After I figured that out, it was actually pretty simple to put together and didn't require nearly the force or strength the stools took.
Baylor even got to help me!
Ta da!
So now we have one stool and a table for the little man to enjoy. I am bound and determined to conquer ... I mean, assemble ... those other three stools, though. Guess I should get to it!
So now we have one stool and a table for the little man to enjoy. I am bound and determined to conquer ... I mean, assemble ... those other three stools, though. Guess I should get to it!
Oh, and as for the "love" part of the post title ... I do love this little stool and table set! It seems really sturdy once you actually get it together. And it certainly isn't coming apart anytime soon! Ikea and I may just get along in this world yet!
2 comments:
That is a super cute set!! I've had some love/hate relationships with Ikea furniture as well. We have many Ikea pieces in the house for many of the positive reasons you describe. The swedish/wordless instructions do make for difficult assembly at times as well as their fondness for odd sized allen wrenches. All in all though... our tables and chairs are doing well, and the bed set was great... we still use 75% of it... scrapped the bed itself when we graduated to our "big kid" furniture as we like to call it.
Hope Baylor enjoys the set when it is all assembled.
I finally got it all assembled (with a little help from my mom), and he seems to like it well enough. Though I think he is a little too small for the stools just yet, he'll certainly grow into them. :o) Amazing how kids do that!
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