Angel Gets New IKEA Gear...

Over the weekend I went to IKEA and picked up a bed frame with drawers. Strapping it to the roof of Mom's car turned out to be the easy part. I had previewed the items that I was interested in on-line, so, my choices were between a twin-size and a full-size bed frame. After seeing the assembled beds at IKEA, it was decided to go with the twin-size bed frame with two drawers (BRIMNES). The bed frame came in three boxes. My nephew and I wrestled the three heavy boxes onto a flatbed and manged to stuff the two smaller boxes into the trunk of my Mom's car. The largest and heaviest box had to be strapped to the roof of my Mom's car. We made it home safely in the rain with this unwieldy box strapped to the roof. My nephew and I removed my existing bed and bed frame and moved the three boxes upstairs.

There were a lot of things that had to happen before I could even unpack the boxes. My comic book collection had to be moved. Some of my DVDs and the shelves they sat on had to also be moved. Once a sufficiently large space had be cleared to make room for assembly, the space had to be thoroughly cleaned and vacuumed as the opportunity to do so later would not be possible once the bed frame was assembled.

Then, I unpacked the boxes and laid out all the pieces. After laying everything out and making measurements, it soon became apparent that I had made two tactical errors. First, the bed frame that I had purchased was designed to expand from a twin-size to a full-size. Second, once the bed frame was assembled, it wouldn't fit in the space I had available. As it turned out, the space was an inch too short, so, I had to rearrange my dresser to make additional room. I unpacked the dresser, removed the drawers, moved the dresser, replaced the drawers and repacked the dresser.

After reviewing the assembly instructions, it appeared that I could deviate from the assembly instructions and assemble only one of the two beds. Which also meant that I didn't need to move the dresser in the first place. The assembly instructions call for bed "A" to be assembled first, then bed "B" and finally the drawers which fit into bed "B". So, I decided to begin with the bed "B" assembly. It took about eight hours to complete the basic bed "B" assembly. Since, I hadn't assembled bed "A", I had a lot of leftover pieces. I decided to use some of the extra pieces to strengthen bed "B". The assembly instructions call for using half of the wood slats for each bed, so, I used the extra wood slats to provide extra support for bed "B". The bed "A" slats are a little longer than the bed "B" slats, so, I used one of the the bed "A" L brackets to lock the long ends of the bed "A" slats in place. I used the remaining long metal bracket for bed "A" to provide additional support for the edge over the drawers. With all of the modifications, it took me another two hours to complete the assembly of my new bed.

Overall, the assembly went on with only a few minor hiccups. I installed the drawer brackets in the bed frame upside down, so, I had to flip the assembled bed on its side and switch the brackets. After fixing the drawer brackets and returning the bed to level, I found that some of the slats for bed "B" had fallen out. With the modifications I had made, it proved quite a challenge to get the pins for the slats to line up with the holes in the corresponding metal L brackets for bed "B" while maneuvering around the slats for bed "A". So, the moral of the story is -- don't turn the bed on its side once it is assembled.

By the way, the mattress I chose to use was not an IKEA mattress, but rather, one I picked up from my local furniture warehouse. Also, the drawers are fairly deep and provide enough storage for several DVDs.