I've Been A Little Busy

So...we went to Ikea.

Kyle, I, and our neighbors Keith and Flo rented a big red van to go to Ikea and get a few things. They needed some patio furniture and we needed, well, everything. Our big red van was a Benz (which is very common here) and came complete with a navigation system - which probably should have helped us.

We rented the van through a program called 'Mobility'. It's a really neat thing where you pay a yearly fee (like $100) and then you are able to rent several types of cars from them. You pick them up and your train station and then return them when you are done. You do have to pay for the mileage driven but over all it's a great deal when you don't have a car at your disposal.

Tuesday night after work we all pile into this van. The front seat is a bench seat an only holds three so Kyle was nominated to sit in the back:

After a long detour (for the record I knew exactly where we were going and where we needed to be, we even passed it and I said that was it) we finally arrived at Ikea. Kyle and I had been there the weekend before to pick out what we wanted and get the item numbers, etc. We got all of the items we could from the self service stock room and then made our way to the warehouse to pick up the items we couldn't get ourselves. This is what we bought:
And this is what it looked like once we got it home (there are several more things just to the right of the camera):
So I got to work. I put everything together by hand with a regular screwdriver (our power one was worthless and took more time then if I did it by hand). Remember everything came in flat boxes with a bag of screws. This dresser, each drawer had about 8 screws and you still had to put together the shell. (As you can see I've already filled it with our 2 year supply of toiletries.)
This table is about the heaviest thing ever - and it also has 2 leaves to make it about 6 feet long. (oh, and that's the loveseat/sofa that can't be laid on) We also got one chair for our table. We're in the process of staining and varnishing it before we go back and get 5 more. We're staining it with our can of $19 stain (don't forget the $6 foam brush for applying the stain) and varnishing it with our can of $30 spray varnish...
These are our wardrobes. We actually have one more that I made Kyle put together yesterday and they all have matching doors now. I'll get a better picture once we get some of our rental furniture out of the way.
This is our makeshift office/living room/dining room (because it's the only place we can get the borrowed internet to work...). The chairs are super comfy and the piece the computer monitor is on is our new tv stand.
All of this was basically done between the time Kyle left for work and the time he got home. I woke up the next morning and every single muscle in my body hurt like I had run a marathon. It was ridiculous! My right wrist felt like it had carpel tunnel from all the screwdriving. My thighs were on fire because I squatted to put just about everything together (I'd try to sit on the floor but the second I got into a grove I always needed something from over there...) and my back hurt from bending over all day. I walked around like a broken cowboy for 2 days.

Of course there are more things we need to get from Ikea but most are small and they definitely aren't as important...guess I'll just have to go back!!