We bought Freyja a new bed.  It is a very fancy iron/brass affair that should last her until she is big enough to buy her own bed.

We bought it from Mark's boss, who is turning her grown up daughter's room into a study.

It came with a mattress more fancy and luxurious  than any mattress I have ever owned.

It is very thick and lush and tall.  It is a tall bed, and looks Alice and Wonderlandish in Freyja's attic room with it's sloped ceilings and funny angles. The boss threw in a very fancy Battenburg cutwork bedskirt  which thrilled me to my very core, as I am that big a fan of Battenburg lace. 

We moved Freyja's old bed into Maxwell's room, which is a slightly less sloped ceiling attic space.  Her mattress was quite nice, so now he has a quite nice mattress too, sitting upon a lovely pine futon frame I bought for Rolf''s daughter in 1992.

I am as mad for solid pine furniture as I am for Battenburg lace. 

He had been sleeping on a double bed that Mark had when we got married, since moved into his own digs at age two.

It was a fine bed and a fine arrangement for a long time, as it allowed us to have a guest bed, but lately Maxwell has become a giant and with all his giant stuff around needed more space. 

His room with the narrower bed, seems much more spacious and nice.  I bought some new sheets with a fun vintage stripe and I think the whole thing is a vast improvement. It took about three solid hours or my sorting and vacuuming but the whole room is outstanding now.  I removed three bags of recycling (he is more writerly than his mother!) and two hefty bags of Goodwill stuff.

Best of all was when my friend Rachael came over this morning at 10:30 on the dot and picked up the full mattress, box spring and frame and whisked it away for her niece to use.  It was a good bed and deserved a good home.

Rachael is the kind of person I admire.  The type that shows up with rope, and knows how to tie a decent knot.  The fact that she speaks three languages, parents two children like a pro, looks beautiful and dangerous all at the same time and teaches college, really pales in comparison to that roping of a box spring to the roof of her car.
WOW!

I was in shock that the bed was so easily and painlessly dispatched.  I always expect thing to be difficult and harrowing.  This was a breeze.

I was so emboldened by the bed that I made my way to Ikea this afternoon to find a storage unit for Maxwell's Legos and action figures.

For me, hell looks a great deal like an Ikea store.  The rat maze like layout gives me an instant anxiety attack and the lack of sales people creeps me out.  Oh, there are people who work there bustling around like flies, but if you ask for assistance you are treated like a leper.  It is as if they have been specifically forbidden from being helpful.
No matter what they ask, withhold information and be as dismissive and vague as possible!

In the end we paid a kings ransom for a white thing, to put shit in and I was just happy to out of there in one piece.