Just Doing What I Can.

While Aaron was busily painting the entry, and the kids were busily playing in the exact same location, I retreated to the basement.

To my cubby-hole craft room in the basement, to be exact. Did I take the opportunity to start organizing the boxes of supplies? Of COURSE not! I started decorating!

First to go up was my READING poster. You know, the ones they have in libraries...and only the best English classrooms. Mine says: Reading. It becomes you.

Maybe I should explain something here. Some you may be surprised by my choice of theme, thinking I would have something maybe more classically related - Austen or Dickens maybe, or even Lord of the Rings themed. WHY a chameleon?

Because it's as close to a lizard as I could get. And lizards are kind of my thing. Not REAL ones, of course - but toys, jewelry, pens, pictures...just about anything else. At Cottey (my first college) it was a pet name from my suitemates, and after that, many of my friends. By the time I graduated from UND, I had quite the little collection of the critters. My friend Dawn even gave me a photo of her puckering up for a huge lizard sculpture!

But where to put them? Aaron was NOT interested in having them in our house...anywhere. Finally I got my own classroom, and the lizards were firmly embraced by my students. They made their home on the top of bookshelves and behind my desk, and were our unofficial class mascots.

They have been in a box since my teaching days. Until now. When Aaron left me to my own devices.

Remember how I mentioned the plywood walls made the painting difficult? Well, they also make thumbtacks IMPOSSIBLE. Unless you hammer those suckers in, which is what I did.

Next up was a bulletin board, which I repossessed from Leah. Kind of. It had been in her old bedroom, but has since been in the closet along with all the other wall hangings without a home yet. For this thing, I found the laser level and did things somewhat professionally, and with few issues, other than the fact that the stupid nail WOULD. NOT. go into the wall. Aaron came down to help and recommended that I use a "real" hammer, not the small one with the nesting-egg style screwdrivers in the handle. Huh.

Real hammer in hand, it still took me at least 6 tries to get that last nail in. It would go fine for about a quarter inch, then stop. Whack, whack, whack, and...Whoops! There is goes, I heard it hit the floor.

Finally, I felt confident enough to put up a couple of little white shelves, also formerly located in Leah's old bedroom. I got out the laser level again, but despite my absolute precision, still had to move one nail over about an eighth of an inch. Three nails went in fine, but the last one for the second shelf proved to be my undoing. That thing would NOT go in, no matter how many times I whacked at that thing.

Aaron was again sought for consultation. I headed upstairs to placate a child, and soon after he followed. "What made you think that NAILS were the best way to hang those shelves? They're already pulling away from the wall - they'll fall off and hit you in the head!"

"Well, what else would you use?"

"SCREWS."

"Oh."

I got the drill, he got screws of the appropriate size off his workbench, and we headed down once again. I put in the first two, and again, it was so tight that it actually took Aaron pulling on the shelf to get it to fit right.

As I was getting the second set of screws ready to go, Aaron says, "Didn't you even center these over each other?"

"Yes! I took the laser level and made sure that this end was exactly over the other."

"Well, Liz, this shelf is way bigger than the other!" He then demonstrated that the top shelf is an inch longer. Which I now vaguely remembered from Leah's room.

"Oh...well, I didn't notice, and I don't really care."

"Geez, you're making me look like a master craftsman or something..."

That's it, dear! That was my whole intention. I hope you feel more confident in your abilities, since it is becoming painfully obvious that despite my dad's best efforts to the opposite, I should not be left alone with a hammer and nails.

Or screws.

Whatever.