Well, the past few days have been ... I'm trying to find the right words ... intense, stressful, exhausting, painful, but ultimately rewarding.
We had a new bed delivered on Monday, our old one had definitely seen better days. Deciding to treat ourselves we went for one a fair bit bigger. It is a divan style bed with drawers in the base and they always come in two halves. Our old one went up and down the stairs without a problem so we didn't think anything of going large.
You can tell where this is going.
New bed delivered. Old bed taken away. New bed won't go round the corner at the top of the stairs!
I took off the handrails and a decorative piece at the top of the wooden support pillar. Nope! No amount of twisting, turning or applied geometry was going to make the two halves of the base go round that corner. Frustratingly, it was only a few inches out.
So, what were the options:
- send it back and have no bed,
- try lifting it up through the faux-balcony in the spare room,
- take it apart and move it in bits
I'm not entirely sure it would have gone through the doors of the faux-balcony and, besides, we don't have any straps or lifting gear.
So that's how, come Monday evening, I was sat on the floor of the lounge, against all better judgement, taking half of the bed apart! 😊
Anyone who has seen inside a divan bed base knows that (despite the extortionate price charged) they're put together pretty cheaply: wood and cardboard all held together with what are essentially long staples. Monday night ended with me exposing the innards and panicking about what to do next.
To say I was on the verge of a nervous breakdown wouldn't be too far from the truth. My wife eventually sent me to bed (in the spare room) before I lost it.
On Tuesday I got an end off – time to try the stairs. So close, about another inch or so needed. Off came the other end ... success! Rinse and repeat with the other half. Now I had 6 bits of bed in the right room but needing to be reassembled and the covering fabric all stapled back into place.
Once the bed was apart, the 'staples' were of no use so I opted for nails. Reassembly complete I bought a heavy duty stapler (ideal for upholstery, so it said on the pack) and set about re-covering the exposed insides.
It got too late so reconstruction carried over to today. I woke with my left shoulder having seized and sending shooting pains down my arm and up my neck, but the bed wasn't going to finish itself.
Around two and a half days after delivery we now have a complete bed and can actually sleep in it tonight. \o/ Seeing it back in one piece (well, two) with a pretty neat job on the upholstery has made me so proud of what I've done. But if anyone hears me say "let's get a big one" again just slap me!
