Hanging a Shelf
Posted on Dec 31, 2008 - 11:04pm by Diane Sontag in Lifestyle
Hanging the Bathroom Shelf – a true story
I am very proud of myself. I completed a new task just last week. I hung a small wooden shelf on the bathroom wall. It only took eighteen months to accomplish.
Why did it take this fifty-two year old woman a year and a half to hang a small wooden shelf on the bathroom wall? Grab a cup of coffee and put your feet up and give a listen.
If you have never done anything like that before you know what a daunting task it is. If you are a ‘do-it-yourself-to-save-money-on-home-improvement’ type of person, then you probably have been doing tasks like those for so long you cannot remember how involved this task is for a rank beginner.
Oh, you think you were a rank beginner when you first hung something on a wall and still are shaking your head that I did not accomplish this task in a day? Well let me ask you this: did you already have the tools you needed and the knowledge to complete the task even if the shelf bracket drill holes did not align with the studs? Aha! I thought so!
So here are the directions for hanging a shelf – for the true novice
1. Have a shelf given to you and have your daughter fall in love with its pink and green paint job. Do not roll eyes, just smile and promise to hang the shelf. Put the shelf in the garage and forget about it for a while as you realize you have no idea how to hang a shelf, or anything for that matter, on a wall. The only reason there are paintings on the walls of your house right now is because the previous owners had driven nails into the walls and they looked handy.
2. When your father asks you what you want for your birthday, tell him a cordless drill that is not too heavy. You have some vague notion that an electric drill will enable you to accomplish the shelf hanging task. You decide to put off the whole project until the arrival of the drill. The pink and green shelf gets buried deeper in garage clutter and your daughter has stopped asking.
3. Receive a heavy electric drill with a cord from Dad for your birthday. Do not roll eyes, just smile and say thank you. Listen politely as he rambles on and on about how a drill with a cord is much better. Put the drill in the garage and forget about it for a while.
4. A few weeks later dig the drill out of the garage clutter and drive to Sears to exchange the heavy drill with a cord for a lighter cordless drill. You discover you have to spend twenty dollars to make this happen. A small price to pay for success.
5. At home, unpack the drill and discover drills do not automatically come with drill bits nor do cordless drills work until their batteries are charged up. Put the drill and receipt together in a bag and put it in the garage and forget about it for a while.
6. Clean out the garage and refind pink and green shelf and drill. Put everything in the car and head out on the mission to get everything needed to hang a shelf. Go back to Sears and buy drill bits. Head over to Home Depot and buy shelf brackets and screws.
7. At home, admire shiny new drill bits and look at shelf brackets and screws and wonder, hmmm….what size drill bit to use? Put everything in a box in the garage and forget about it for a while.
8. Daughter remembers shelf is not up yet. Retrieve box from garage and put drill battery into charging station. Take box and toolbox into bathroom. Choose spot for shelf and borrow giant magnet from the homeschool science lab to find studs. Cannot find any studs.
9. Go to local hardware store and buy the most expensive new-fangled stud finder they carry. Take it home and follow the directions. Practice finding studs all over the house. Feel proud. Nervously enter bathroom with studfinder and use perfected method on chosen wall. Conclusion: there are no studs anywhere near where the shelf is to be hung. Throw everything back in the box and put it all in the garage and forget about it for a while.
10. Daughter asks when shelf is going to get hung. Put box with shelf, brackets, screws in car and head back to local hardware store. Check drill to see if battery still has power. Amazingly it does! Get advice on which anchoring screw system to buy and ask what size drill bit to use and write everything down the hardware store employee says to do.
11. Back in the bathroom attach the shelf brackets to the shelf and drill the recommended hole size. Pick up anchor screw casing and realize there is no way in heck that will ever fit that size hole. Change drill bit to next size up and try again. Hole is still not large enough. Change drill bit to next size up and drill out hole. Failure again. Repeat this process six times. Finally the anchor casing goes into hole, but it is not tight. Decide to ignore sinking feeling in stomach. Note to self: do not ever put anything heavy on this shelf.
12. Successfully attach shelf to wall and call daughter in to see the marvelous shelf installation. She smiles. Think back to last year when the shelf was given and marvel that the shelf is hanging at all.
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Diane – we need photos, please.
It certainly is a sad state of affairs, isn’t it, to realize that I have not yet gone digital. Santa did not bring me a digital camera. But that is my fault, isn’t it, as I did not write to him, so how would he know?