Bed success

It's a day of achievement. The bunk beds are in place. They arrived four hours late thanks to the old lady behind the sales desk in the Charity Shop writing the wrong town on the delivery label and sending the van drivers up the M1. I hope I get to do things like that when I'm aged 82.

The construction of these single beds into stacking beds was astonishingly easy. It took about two hours, an alan key, a screwdriver, a roll of sticky tape, some chalk, a torch, and Shark, hopping and jumping about, asking at high volume if she could help. I'd expected much worse. There's usually a lot of gnashing of teeth, tearing at clothing, groaning and sighing and disappearing down B&Q for four hours before declaring the entire project hopeless. At that point I'd have expected to leave bed bits scattered on the landing for six months until someone complained.

But for the moment, we're all very pleased with the result. The new inhabitants of Middle Flat 1 didn't complain, even though we barricaded them in for two hours while we crashed about with wooden planks outside their door. Mr Pod in Middle Flat 2 didn't complain, even though we woke him up. Squirrel says she's happy with the bottom bunk if I put up some proper princess curtains. Shark's happy so long as she can dominate the top bunk. And Tiger can't wait to install herself in the bedroom next door well away from her two sisters. I think even Dig might be satisfied with the result, just for the moment. I'm ignoring his declaration that they're the wrong bunk beds that only take metric mattresses and not standard mattresses. That's just Dig, enjoying himself. And I'm resourceful.

But I have my misgivings, secretly. About more than mattresses. At the moment Squirrel sleeps in a room with a high wooden ceiling, like a chapel roof, sparkling with fairy lights. When she moves to that bottom bunk in the top flat she'll get a view of the underside of Shark's mattress. So I have my thinking cap on for her, if only to delay the moment when we have to undo all our successful work, and put those bunk beds back to singles.