Home Office, Part 2

Before I share pictures of how the home office looks like now, I'd like to write about and post some pictures about our experience so we don't have to go through that again =)

When assembly instructions call for a carpet / mat underneath the pieces, there is a reason.

Other than the carpet thing, we followed all other steps faithfully and carefully.

Eventually, we got to the point where we had a fully assembled shelf on the floor and that was where it hit us. The shelf - all 137 lbs of it - was so heavy and slippery, we couldn't get a grip and couldn't lift it up!

For about 10 minutes, we did consider just leaving it on the floor as it does make a nice maze / play area for Swe-cha but we soon realized that this was just the crazies talking...

At this point, I wanted to cry. We did all the hard stuff - the choosing, shopping, heavy lifting from the Ikea shelves to the car, from the car to our home and eventually, assembling it in the yellow room, it frustrated me to think that THIS was where we had to admit defeat ?

We took a few minutes to rest and get our brains going and realized that between the two us, we can easily handle the weight (it was at an angle anyway,.. this is where you Physics fanatics can start calculating the force). We just needed to have a grip and be able to lift it off the floor.

As soon as we felt we had the strength for a burst of energy, we both worked on lifting a corner of the shelf with our hands while I slide a piece of cardboard underneath it with my foot. After we had the cardboard underneath both corners, it was easy to lift the cabinet off the floor.

I am liking how our home office is shaping up, now we only need to unpack / clean up the moving boxes currently stored there and get one or two desk chairs.

The original plan called for placing the table in front of the shelves just as if it was part of the same system. We'd place the shelf in the middle of the wall and we'd each sit on one side so we'd each have our own desk areas.

Since we still have boxes stored in the yellow room and since hubby really had claimed the built-in computer desk in the library, he suggested this layout instead and said that he doesn't really need an office space. And, really, I work more times from home compared to him.

I'm also glad that hubby suggested that we get the shelves anyway during our Ikea trip. We had gone there to check out the Expedit system (shelves + table) and after we found the Melltorp table and I liked it more, I was under the impression that the table was it. It wasn't until much later, when we were in the self-help area and were picking up the actual boxes when hubby remarked - but where will you file stuff if we don't have shelves ? That was also when we picked up the drawer inserts (the black cubes) and I think they look awesome. Note that the drawer inserts aren't great and I don't think you're supposed to put heavy stuff but they fit nicely into the cubbies and they do look cute.