The English Maximalista

Okay, I confess. This title is totally my attempt at click-bait. (It worked, didn’t it?) But before I start receiving complaints, I am exaggerating about the blood. There was only a little splash of it. Due to the wallpaper turning homicidal — I had somehow managed to slash my own wrist when putting it up, not once but TWICE.

*****

It is Saturday afternoon over here at the love shack, and Mr M and I are back in the peacock bedroom, doing what married people do in bedrooms. Screwing. Banging. Nailing wood. Yep, you guessed it: we are putting up shelves in the closet.

You may have seen my recent posts on Facebook  and  Instagram documenting in fascinating depth of the upheaval in the peacock bedroom, whereby I pulled out every single item I had previously stored in the closet, bunging it all on the bed… and when the surface of the bed was full, I bunged the overflow on the floor. 

It was carnage, dear reader. Carnage. 

More carnage ensued this morning. Mr Maximalista and I had set aside today to install shelves in the closet, and over our leisurely Saturday breakfast discussed our plan of attack.

With a vapid smile on my face, I patiently pretended to listen while he mansplained how shelves worked, and which brackets worked best; he had completely lost me by the time he started talking about the benefits of the different alloys used on blah-blah-blah.

Meanwhile, my head was in the clouds, pondering on what kind of wedding dress Taylor Swift would be wearing in her upcoming nuptials to that dream-boat Travis Kelce.

I only snapped out of this reverie when Mr M stopped droning on about machine screws [EDIT: Mr Maximalista just indignantly informed me he had been talking about WOOD screws. Well. Excuse me. I stand corrected!] and mentioned something about wallpaper, which is my safe word: it was just what I needed to hear in order to start seriously thinking about the project at hand.

Since I had already put up the wallpaper in the closet last week, this narrow space was primed for shelf installation. Mr Maximalista’s strategy for today was that I would sort out the boxes of children’s books while he cut the shelves. Good plan!

That is exactly what I started doing: emptying boxes, then lining the contents on the bed and floor in an organized manner. It was the beginning of a pleasant little trip down memory lane, as I pulled my daughter’s books out of storage boxes, smiling fondly at the different titles as I reminisced about when she would curl up next to me while I read to her.

[Point of reference: the Top Banana is now a 23-year old independent young woman.]

Ten minutes later, Mr Maximalista came into the peacock bedroom with his toolbox, asking what I was doing. I could tell from his tone that he was surprised to see me there. Turns out, he was intending to cut shelves on site, but would not have room to maneuver with my stuff everywhere. (Except he didn’t say “stuff”…)

Still nursing my wounds from my tussles with the wallpaper, I was feeling fragile. I suspected the ensuing conversation wasn’t going to end well for Mr Maximalista, which began thus. 

Sir, I have only two reasonable questions. First, did he expect me to carry these fifteen heavy boxes of books out of this room… then carry piles of books back, once the shelves are built? Second, did he really want to create sawdust mayhem in this beautiful, CLEAN guest room?

The answer hung heavily in the air, as Mr Maximalista stomped back upstairs to sulk in his workshop. (Hello? Isn’t that the ideal place for shelf cutting to be done?) Half hour later, he returned with a dozen shelves, which he proceeded to install. 

Long story short, after a couple of hours of industry (Mr M and I actually work very well together, especially when he follows direction), the books were on their new shelves, and we stood back to admire our hard work.

It turned out even better than I imagined — what do you think?

Now, Mr Maximalista had better be taking me out for a jolly nice meal, tonight. I’d best go pick out a pretty frock.

Lots of love,

M xo

PS I used the leftover wallpaper to line the drawers — gorgeous finishing touch! Click on the link below to watch my quick YouTube video tour of the closet xo