I carved out some time and asked for help.
I get by with a little help from my friends
...as the song goes. No shame in admitting there are some things that are not in my wheelhouse and furniture construction is one of them...
or so I believed.
My friend, Suzette, to the rescue!
I made tea, she brought her cheaters and we got to work.
This Besta media storage unit is from
. I knew it was perfect for this and future houses because there are so many different configurations that can be added on to it. I liked how narrow and sleek it looked in the store and since there are up to 6 shelves, I was assured that there would be space for our old school 1992 Technics stereo and all of it's components. I chose the 3 drawer model to hold all of the CDs, DVDs and various cords to the TV as well.
The first step was to unpack all the boxes.
We marveled at how amazingly organized the contents were. Then to lay everything out. There were a lot of instructions! It was a little intimidating.
But then we got going and it was surprisingly easy! It only took us an hour to build the frame!
It's important to spend time looking very carefully at each picture. All the hints are there. And it's a very good idea to separate out all the little screws, plates, etc. before starting - it's easy to lose these little things in the carpet. We ended up using plastic containers to sort everything
but didn't get a picture.
We moved the frame into position before adding the drawers and shelves.
Building the drawers was easy.
I thought installing the sliding hardware for the drawers was going to be the most difficult, but as you can tell, it was a cinch!
Except when I installed the drawers into the frame, this happened.
The left drawer is 1 inch lower than the other 2 drawers!
We took a break for lunch (
thanks to
for quick delivery!
) and pondered what to do. While we were thinking, I placed a vase of tulips on top. Flowers just make things better.
Just at this moment, one of my engineering sons came in the door and suggested I swap out the left drawer with the center drawer.
Who knows why but EUREKA, it worked!
Maybe it was the tulips?
When installing the shelves, it was important to measure and place the components as I went along. I had to keep adjusting the shelf brackets to get them all to fit correctly. This took the most time.
Then it was time to install these totes into their respective drawers. They fit perfectly!
BEFORE
AFTER
I'm not a fan of having a TV in the living room, but won't it look wonderful up on there?!
Truth be told, I have to purchase longer power and connection cords to hook up all the stereo components, but for now the radio works!
I have to say, Ikea ROCKS! I'm inspired to recommend their furniture to my clients and who knows? Maybe I'll even build it for them!
A big shout out to my intrepid friend, Suzette. Thank you!
What's on your Ikea shopping list?
Have you ever put together a piece of furniture? How did it go?