DIY and its (dis)advantages

Most pieces of furniture bought in this country come flat-packed and needs to be self- assembled. Honestly, I am not a particular fan of DIY. The first few pieces of items we had to assemble on our own were Aditi's travel system and her crib. By the end of it, we were not so happy. Prashanth would crib over the lack of instructions on the single sheet of paper provided and it would be a mess by the time we finished it. Imagine doing DIY with a naughty baby around, trying to grab every tool and screw she could place and preventing us from completing the challenging task of assembling the furniture. Over the years, although our DIY skills have improved and we have a bigger tool box - electric drill, different types of hammers, various sizes of alan keys, screw driver set, spanner set and what not, yet I am not fond of self-assembly. So when it came to buying furniture for the new home, I desperately tried to avoid DIY stuf. Unfortunately for me, I could not avoid it completely.

We managed to find living room and dining room furniture and wardrobes that came ready assembled. But the bedroom and study ones came flat-packed. We decided to assemble the bed frame after Aditi slept. It took well over 2 hours to put up the frame and we were exhausted at the end of it. Little did we realize that we would have so many pieces to put together. I particularly hate screwing up the pieces together.

When it came to putting up the stair gates, we decided to do it when Aditi was around. She in turn banged the gate and happily scratched the walls. She still keeps testing the gate on the top of the stairs to see if its really sturdy. It was extremely difficult to keep a baby at bay and help Prashanth with putting up the gate.


In India, we would not even dream of trying to assemble furniture on our own. It was left to the carpenters. I understand that it is due to the availability of cheap labour. But in the western world, I am surprised to find that people even build houses on their own without much professional help, something that is unheard of in our country. With all its disad(in my opinion), DIY is still a passion amongst people here. But I'm sure we'll never be fond of the 'assembling' art and will seek professional help as much as possible. Feel free to express your views on DIY.