A Trip to Ikea-Adventures in Wuunderlaand

Tess' dresser has been slowly disintegrating into a pile of wood chips for a while now and after noticing the other day that there is not even one drawer that can withstand the stress of being opened and closed without falling off the tracks and creating a potentially finger-severing situation it was decided that a new dresser was in order.

After a false start at Babies R Us we ended up at Ikea. Now as a general rule I am ok with Ikea, even knowing that a trip there means that

A. You will be the only person there that can speak and understand English
B. You will be forced to walk through the Ikea Maze which, when laid in a straight line stretches roughly sixteen miles.
C. You will purchase a large item that will be packaged in a box that is smaller than your head...and it will weight seven thousand pounds.

The packaging is actually a bonus because I have a tiny car and I really was not looking forward to driving with a huge box taking up half my seat. Once, and this is a true story, Brandon and I fit a full size couch, six coffee tables and two living room chairs from Ikea in his mom's two-door Acura hatchback.

So Tess, my mother and I were roaming around this huge store, looking for the Ungermaaster (or equivalent) that would solve all of our dresser woes. We finally found what we were looking for (in this case, the four drawer Malm), picked up a pack of Glimma tealights for good measure and headed off to the "Self Serve Furniture Area" where I proceeded to herniate my entire body trying to lift old Malm onto the wheely cart. We checked out and ended up in the "Loading Area" because God forbid anyone should load in the parking lot. This meant I had to go and fetch my car, but not before Tess announced that she Really Had To Go, which was my cue to run because the travel potty was also in the car and she refuses to use public toilets as a general rule.

I sped back the the loading area, got Tess on the toilet where she peed like, three drops, and then began the tedious task of loading Malm into the back of my car. As expected, this box was about as big as something a printer would come in except that it weighed seven hundred metric tons. I maneuvered it to the back of the car and then hefted one end into the trunk while trying to slide the whole thing back with my knees. I immediately notice a metallic sort of taste in my throat which either meant that I was going into anaphylactic shock from some previously unknown cardboard allergy or my already herniated body had begun to kill me for this abuse by releasing toxic fluids into my saliva. Whatever the case, I had begun to hate Malm and all that it stood for.

FInally triumphant we drove home and now the next task will be assembling Malm which could take anywhere from six hours to twelve days. It's too soon to tell. Fortunately that task shall fall squarely to my husband who is thus far the unherniated partner in our pairing and that is just not fair.

Should his assembling prove humerous, I will post pictures! In any case, here are a few of our summery weather: