I've been to Mecca

My sister and I made a pilgramage to the storage and organization center of the universe. Ikea. Madge called last week and said she needed a new bookcase and that she picked one out at the Ikea website. She needed help hauling and building so I was her gal. So, off we went on Saturday morning. Amazingly enough, when we got there at about 10:15am it was pretty quiet and parking was a snap. Can't say that was still true when we left two hours later.

If this hippo wasn't so expensive I might have bought one 'cause it reminded me of one of my favorite Christmas songs -- I want a Hippopotamus for Christmas.

We hit the top floor first. I needed some bars from the kitchen section (kinda like towel bars). I'm going to organize my punches. Then, we wanted to look at the bookcase that Madge had picked out. We then had to stop at the cafeteria. Problem was it was 10:45am and they weren't serving lunch yet and we were hungry. So, we ate dessert.


I'm not sure what this is called but it was yummy!


See? I told you it was yummy.

We then headed down to the main floor and did a little wandering, but not a ton. Although, we did get turned around as we were trying to take some of the shortcuts to skip some of the sections. Can you say maze? (When we first got there, Madge did ask the greeter if they rent out GPS systems. Honestly, I think people would pay for them. Ikea is missing the boat.)

We found her bookcase on display in the "pick up" area. She changed her mind on the color. That's the nice thing about seeing them in person. It took some hefting to get the boxes on the cart. Not lightweight furniture, which is a good thing.

Then back to the house. The heavy box attacked Madge as we were trying to get it down the stairs into the basement. She said to let it slide down the stairs 'cause it was heavy and I warned her I couldn't hold on any more. She's slow. I believe she'll have marks on her shins for a week or two. Ooops!

And then the fun began!


I've built other particalboard furniture in the past, but I must say Ikea's rocks! The instructions were clear (even without words). It was simple to assemble. It didn't feel like it was going to fall apart or tip over the minute you stood it up. Sweet! The only tool we needed, that wasn't included, was a hammer. Well, and a heavy book, so that we wouldn't damage the furniture as we were hammering the side and bottom in in the end.


Done in about 70 minutes. Woo hooo!! (Madge is trying to show some love to the bookcase, but it kinda looks like she's trying to dance with it. Hee hee)

Project 365 - January 24th