Mothering Along: All done... probably...

I have been waiting and waiting to write this post. I wanted to write it only when the building work was absolutely, completely finished and we'd put all the furniture back into the room, with all the finishing touches in place, and everything looking perfect.

You can stop laughing now.

Once reality had dawned again, and I'd realised there will never be "perfection" as long as I have a cat, a child and a husband, I also realised that I might as well post some pictures of the new room being mostly done.

LittleBear and I got the important stuff done last weekend - we put all the books in the bookcases. Then we moved his toy cupboards into place, and had a major purge of toys and games as we shifted the contents of the toy cupboards into the room as well. Then we moved BigBear's desk and chair in. And then BigBear himself moved in and has been working from home in the room for the past week. Which means my beautiful, tidy room has an explosion of cables and odds and ends all over it, as we're still negotiating on the correct choice of shelves/cupboards to go into the study area of the room.

When I say "negotiating", I'm not sure which of us is currently occupying the home-furnishing equivalent position of the ERG and who is Mrs May, but there will be indicative votes later tonight, and I may need to enforce the sovereignty of The Wife soon.

We have some interesting criteria for our selection of shelves. Firstly, and we are in agreement on this, the shelves should be no higher than the existing toy cupboards (96cm) and ideally a similar width (140-150cm). After that, our priorities are slightly different.

I require that they are adequate to house the various language-reference books still piled up on the bedroom floor (dictionaries and their friends), and I also want to be able to put all the home-computer related detritus away somewhere. The printer paper, the spare USB cables, the backup external hard-disk, the random CDs and DVDs of driver software and other-people's-photos. Seems fair doesn't it? Because I am nothing if not fair and reasonable. BigBear however, has a requirement to house not one, not two, but six vintage computers - three Ataris, a Commodore, an Amiga and a Spectrum. Each must be stored flat, at a stable temperature and with nothing else on top of it. This therefore requires a minimum shelf depth of 30cm.

As with the current shower who are occupying the Palace of Westminster, I am capable of offering multiple solutions to the above conundrum, any of which satisfy two or three of the requirements, but not all of them. One solution houses everything perfectly, except it has drawers that wouldn't open as they'd hit the desk legs. Another solution allows access to the vintage computers but has no space for the books. Another solution is almost perfect except the vintage computers wouldn't fit. Something has to give, and if I wait until we reach a decision, install it, and tidy up I think half my readership will have forgotten who I am.

Herewith therefore, some before and after photos, with very little in the way of furniture featuring yet...