I woke up early (well, for a weekend day) on Saturday and filled my suitcase and large IKEA bag of more stuff (some strategic, some less so) and headed across London to my new house. I now had a kettle, mugs, tea, a vacuum cleaner, wine, and a random assortment of easily-transportable-by-Tube-not needed-everyday stuff from my flat.
”A random assortment of easily-transportable-by-Tube-not needed-everyday stuff”
My parents were coming up and bringing some things I had left at their house as well as taking me to IKEA with me with their conveniently large estate car.
I got on with cleaning the kitchen while I was waiting for them to arrive – I wasn’t far off being done with that when I heard a knock at the door. I showed my parents around and then we headed off to IKEA.
My parents had only ever been to IKEA once before and that was over 15 years ago when I was a student needing to buy some basics for my first flat. They were amazed by it and got quite excited by the prices – it was quite entertaining, although it did make for a slower trip than I’d have done on my own.
”The meatballs and the salmon with the delicious sauce”
I had a list of things I needed to buy (mattress, TV stand, full-length mirror, pots and pans, etc), but there was no way of being efficient when every few minutes while they exclaimed over some piece of furniture that was exactly what they needed. I might have made them into IKEA converts! I even took them to the cafeteria and fed them the meatballs and the salmon with the delicious sauce (my mother actually bought some of that sauce from the shop!).
”I put my brother in charge of buying the tools”
While we were in IKEA, my brother phoned. He, my sister-in-law and my niece had been visiting someone close to London and said they could come up if I needed a hand. The more the merrier, said I! I put my brother in charge of buying the tools and told him he could buy whatever he thought I’d need. I think I made his day – he happily went off to Wicks to spend my money!
We all arrived back at the house at the same time and started to build IKEA furniture. Although my niece is 19 months and there was a fair bit of distracting her too – she’s in that wanting to help phase so we just continuously gave her random things close to hand to take to different people.
”I made everyone a cup of fruit tea (no fridge, no milk)”
Then suddenly it was early evening and everyone was talking about leaving. Most of the furniture was assembled (with the exception of the chest of drawers which was missing a vital part – I guess that means another trip to IKEA).
I made everyone a cup of fruit tea (no fridge, no milk) before they left and then I was alone in my house surrounded my half built furniture. I was supposed to be going to a friend’s birthday drinks but I bailed – I was exhausted.
The First Time Buy 