DIY

I think I should begin my very first post of 2014 by saying that Heavenly Father loves me very, very much.

I know that He loves me very, very much because He did not allow the Arctic Vortex to settle anywhere near my cute little cow town this week, a week that I was assigned outside lunch duty.

Sure, we got a some snow, but it was soooooo much easier to warn the kids that throwing, kicking, or in any way propelling snow would result in four hours of Saturday school without chattering teeth and icicles forming in my nostrils.

And, even though I know the weather is not a contest, I would still like to point out the differences in temperature between my home and the towns where my niblets reside. And then I would like to point out that, if the weather WAS a contest, I totally would have kicked trash this week.

This first week back to school after the wondrous and beautiful two-week break, was kind-of-sort-of busy. Besides the start of ward conference season, it was also the week before semester tests (a.k.a The End of Course Assessments, or EOCAs).

The kidlets had two full weeks to forget everything they have ever learned about English, communications, and creative writing. Over the break, months worth of information leaked out their ears and into their pillows. So this week was my last chance to try to sneak some of that info back in before testing begins on Tuesday.

I have to admit that I was kind of looking forward to getting back in my classroom after so many days off. I was really hopping that, while I was gone, the tech people would have received and installed the new projector my awesome principal bought for me (I think he might have sold one of his kidneys to finance it...) 

When I walked into my classroom Monday morning, I thought that maybe my new projector would be waiting on the ceiling with a big red bow on it. But alas, when I turned on the light, the corpse of my late-projector was still decaying above me.

I have been able to use the library projector since mine bit the dust back in October, but the whole situation has made my life more difficult that it needed to be.

Having this expensive equipment perched precariously on an unstable cart from the late 80's, taking up a whole aisle in my classroom, and various cords stretched across the main thoroughfare was very dangerous. I mean, have you seen junior high kids try to move around a room? Watching them try to navigate their spazzy little bodies kind of makes you think uncoordinated aliens have taken them over and are trying to steer using their toes on an old computer joystick. It is a miracle we don't have more injuries every day even without the the cart of death in the middle of the room.

Things started to look up on Tuesday, however, when my principal hand delivered my new projector to my classroom. There was great joy and rejoicing in 1A English that day.

But now I am waiting for the tech folks to take the projector from down here...

... and put it up here. And let me tell you, waiting patiently has NEVER been one of my strong suits.

For Christmas, my awesome parents got me an adorable standy-uppy cupboard thingy from IKEA. I couldn't WAIT to put it together, so I broke into the boxes to sneak a peak at the instructions.

Upon opening the instructions, I was happy to learn that I can speak Swedish fluently (probably a pleasant side effect of eating so many Swedish fish over the years). and was quickly able to discern that I should not attempt to put the standy-uppy cupboard thingy together by myself.

I have very tool-centric home teachers who I knew would be more than willing to help me when I got the thing home, not to mention a best pal who is married to a retired tech center principal/current building supply store guru, so I wasn't worried about getting it put together. I just didn't want to WAIT. So my mother, a 20 year veteran of cub scout wood working projects, agreed to help me before I even left.

WARNING: THIS SECTION OF THE POST CONTAINS VERY SPECIFIC AND TECHNICAL FURNITURE-BUILDING TERMS. PEOPLE WITHOUT EXTENSIVE FURNITURE-BUILDING BACKGROUNDS MIGHT NEED TO ARRANGE TO READ THIS SECTION WITH A PROFESSIONAL NEARBY TO ANSWER QUESTIONS. 

We put together the big rectangularish part. Then we put together the base part with the cute little feet. That way, once I got it home, I would only have to attach the base feety part to the big retangularish part, slide in the shelves, slap on the doors, and I would be good to go.

I wanted to finish up the little project as soon as I got home, but between time consuming school stuff and spirit lifting Relief Society stuff, I didn't get time to work on it until this afternoon. Thanks to all the work we had done at my parents house, it didn't take very much time or effort to finish it up. 

I think it looks great in my guest room (Thanks Mom and Dad!). 

Putting it together went so smoothly that I started thinking that maybe I could take on another Do-It-Yourself project this week while the kids are silently (Ha ha!) taking their finals. I mean, how much more difficult could it be to take a projector from down here...

... and put it up here? I think I could do it.

As long as the instructions are in Swedish.