When your youngest falls in love with bunk beds, he will be relentless for about a year, until he breaks you down. You can drag it out and use a potential bunk purchase as a disciplinary tool for awhile, but in the end, he will win.
Finding a bunk bed that’s;
- Made from wood in a colour that would match the rest of his furniture
- A twin bed over a double bed
- Upper twin able to be removed when he gets older, thus leaving a normal looking headboard/bed
- In our budget
is no small task, and involves hours and hours of store and internet shopping (which, fortunately, is what I do best).
Just because you order a bunk bed in “honey oak” from a local sleep shop doesn’t necessarily mean that it won’t show up in “cherry”. Which I assure you is very, very different. And if that should happen, and you refuse to accept said cherry bunk bed, your son will not like you very much for a few days.
A 6 year old’s tears can easily be soothed with ice cream and TV.
Just because you order a brand new, criteria meeting bunk off Craigslist, at a ridiculously low price does not necessarily mean that it might have “fallen off the back of a truck”. But the fact that it’s delivered at 8pm, by one young guy, out of the back of his decrepit mini van just might. And the fact that you pay in cash and he gives you no receipt may or may not confirm your theory.
A bunk bed takes approximately 2 evenings to assemble.
Willie and I totally rock at assembling furniture! We have assembled numerous pieces of furniture and backyard equipment during our 14 years together and although that simple act has been known to be the catalyst to divorce for many couples, we excel at it and even enjoy it. Seriously, we are at our married best when assembling furniture. I’m the details person who combs over instructions and sets up the next step, while Willie is the man’s man who uses tools and strength to get the job done. We work like a fine oiled machine, chatting and laughing all the while. We’re thinking about starting our own furniture assembling business.
(half done bunk bed – please notice new & very cool outer space wall mural in background)
Just because you call and visit the original local sleep shop numerous times over numerous days doesn’t necessarily mean that you will easily get a refund for the original, incorrect cherry bunk. And that you might have to shift into “persistent customer with some knowledge of the legal system that isn’t going to take no for an answer” mode in order to secure said refund.
That I now have a very, very happy 6 year old that is in love with his new bunk bed. And that’s really all I wanted.
Got any experience with bunk beds? Do you like assembling furniture? Love the space wall mural or no?
(be sure to check out the newest International Workspace Tour over at Cape Cod Awesome on my sidebar, and be sure to send me yours!)
16 Responses to “Things I’ve Learned In The Last 5 Days”
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April 21st, 2010 at 9:50 am
I bought bunk beds for my oldest about 20 years ago, bought them at a flea marcket I did, didnt shop around, didnt do any comparison shopping, and definatley didnt go on the internet (that wasnt around back then) just bought them on a whim one day when I was looking for some knock off handbags. I have to tell you, that was one of the best purchases I ever made, and the Pakistani salesman delivered them for free, free I tell ya!!! I just got rid of those beds about 2 years ago,they had seen better days and nights, and I only paid $375.00 for them. And oh yeah hardly any assembly required, only took about 15 minutes to put together, ah the good old days!!!
Cher
Replied:
April 21st, 2010 at 10:50 am
Yes, I think your bunk beds may have contributed to his desire for his own. Thanks for that.
April 21st, 2010 at 12:28 pm
Bunk bed in spaaaaaaace! I love that mural! That’s a very nice looking bed. You know, until today I didn’t know that they made them with a twin upper bed part and a double lower part. Amazing!
April 21st, 2010 at 12:34 pm
Love the bed and the mural. The 6 year old is a very lucky little boy!
I loooooooathe putting furniture together. But the husband is pretty darn good at it.
You should start a business! I’d hire ya!
April 21st, 2010 at 1:38 pm
omg i prayed and prayed for bunkbeds, but since I’m an only child my parents were kind of like…umm….for what?! So then we were going to loft the bed, but then I settled for an EXTREMELY high bed, so high in fact that I needed a stool to hop up on it….
April 21st, 2010 at 1:56 pm
I LOVE the wall mural? How did you do that?
I considered bunk beds for my boys. Then Monty turned 13 and all of a sudden he wa almost 6 feet tall so I had to rethink that idea.
I hope the boy loves his bunkbed. It will make having friends over alot easier!
Cher
Replied:
April 21st, 2010 at 3:05 pm
I bought it from Sears and it went on kind of like wallpaper, but in smaller sections. Slightly tricky, but my Mom’s the Queen of Wallpaper and she helped me. Willie has no patience for fiddly things like that.
April 21st, 2010 at 2:33 pm
Wow – that mural is super cool! I bet he loves it, huh? Almost as much as the bed itself??
Excellent job all around, my finely tuned researching machine of a friend!
April 21st, 2010 at 3:26 pm
Mural is awesome!
Bunk beds are awesome!
Happy 6 year olds are awesome!
I put together furniture alone. Me and JT don’t always work well together on stuff like that. I’m a directions kind of girl and he’s more of a “I think this goes here.” and “What are these extra parts for?” kind of guy.
April 21st, 2010 at 5:08 pm
1. wall mural looks amazing holy crap! who did it??!
2. bunk bed looks awesome. i’m so glad to see you and willie in utter marital bliss for at least two evenings straight.
3. my little brother had a bunk bed growing up, but it was bright red metal. double bed on bottom, twin bed on top. you can build so many cool forts with bunk beds.
4. have you ever tried to assemble something from ikea that has 23458963240597 pieces? please do that and let me know how that marital bonding works out for you.
April 21st, 2010 at 5:11 pm
do you have ikea in canada? you do have electricity there, right? i kid, i kid. (i say this because i dated a colombian guy in college and this REALLY DUMB girl on my soccer team asked him if they had cell phones and computers in colombia. his family is political ambassadors and investment bankers, so he was a little irritated at the girl. he was like, do you learn world geography in school??)
Cher
Replied:
April 21st, 2010 at 9:28 pm
Yes we do – I went there last weekend actually! And seriously, Willie and I have yet to meet an assembly project that we can’t tackle. We’re masters. We deserve awards. Seriously.
April 21st, 2010 at 5:11 pm
okay, i just read now where you got the mural from. ignore that question.
April 21st, 2010 at 6:55 pm
We have bunkbeds for our boys…I wish the bottom was a double. Wanna hear something lameballs though? They can be separate so you have two twin beds…and that’s the way they are. I haven’t stacked em. I’m afraid the top one will roll off and crack his head. They’re sads. They want them to be stacked.
April 22nd, 2010 at 5:56 am
When I was growing up we had these bunk beds that later became two regular beds. They were black metal type things.
Glad you managed to get your refund in the end. Sometimes all it takes is to throw in a few legal terms and they cave.
April 25th, 2010 at 4:59 am
I spent ages looking for nice bunks for my girls that were in my price range. We get catalogues on the doorstep for gorgeous but expensive furniture, all of which would look lovely, but are simply too expensive. And the local furniture shops stocked chunky pine bunks that were nasty and cheap looking.
When I found the ones that my girls have now I was really pleased. And when they arrived I started to put them together straight away – by myself. The clincher was when I had to lift on bed onto the top of the other and slot the feet onto the notches on the bottom bunk.
I was standing in their room, in the middle of a heavy wooden bed frame with no slats as yet, wondering how on earth I could lift the bed and get all four legs down onto the notches at the same time. I couldn’t do the top end first then the bottom end, as it wouldn’t stay. And I couldn’t lift it up over my head, as the outer edges were too far apart, and I couldn’t bend my elbows enough to lift.
I ended up getting the bathroom stool out and climbing it on it while the bed dangled from my arms and finally got it together. I was a lather of sweat and smelt like a hyena on heat! But I managed to finish the slats and wrestle the bunk matteresses on, make up the beds and throw all the packaging out the window. My girls were delighted when they arrived home to see the bunks had appeared in their room.