Furniture — Blog — AaronEmery.net

I'll start with a little bit about myself. I'm 32 years old, married my high school sweetheart almost 11 years ago, and we have 2 daughters, 3 and a half, and 8 weeks.

One thing that my 3-year-old has taught me is to not expect validation from her. Just when I think I have nailed it with something for her, she'll respond with, "Ok, can I go watch Barbie?"

Doesn't she know that I spent hours, days, or weeks working on it???

One of the best examples of this was when we found out that our youngest was going to be a baby sister. For weeks, our oldest (Devin) was adamant that she wanted a baby sister. I have told my wife (Abbie) for years that I am going to end up in a house full of girls, but we still had to set the expectation that she might end up with a baby brother. On the day we found out she was in fact a girl, I pulled out my phone to record Devin's reaction when we told her she was going to have a baby sister. When I asked, "Devin, do you want a baby sister or baby brother?"

"Ummmm...brother."

That's what I get for expecting a particular reaction from a 3-year old.

But then sometimes she gives the reaction that we hope for.

In the 8 weeks that we've been home with our youngest (Danica), and a little while before, we've been preparing an extra bedroom in the house for Devin to be her own, brand-new "big girl room."

We scraped the popcorn off of the ceiling and finished it smooth. Side note here - if you have previously covered ceiling popcorn with something like Kilz primer, it becomes immensely more difficult to remove. It was still worth it, but far more work than I had initially expected.

We replaced the cheap "boob light" we had installed when we bought the house with a flush-mount light with some dangling crystals. We painted the walls pink and purple, and put up base trim and crown moulding.

It wasn't a complete surprise, as she had snuck into the room previously and already knew about the light, but needless to say, she loved it. I know this because she started running circles around the room shouting, "I LOVE IT I LOVE IT I LOVE IT!!!!"

In addition to all of the work we did on the actual room itself, I am also in the process of building her a farmhouse-style bed, a chest for blankets, and a bookcase (perhaps more to come on those projects in the future). I also made a stuffed-animal zoo, which I think contributed to the "I LOVE IT" reaction.

So, generally speaking, seeking the validation of a 3-year-old will often leave you disappointed; but, those times that they truly appreciate something you've done are hard to beat.

Seemingly countless days/hours fixing the ceiling and installing crown moulding...couldn't care less

I sold my first piece of furniture yesterday. It was a bittersweet moment.

Not only was this the first piece I had ever sold, but it was the first piece I had ever made. I sold my poker table.

Part of me was sad, because of the nostalgia with the table. I mean, I built it over seven years ago, and have had many great games played at it. Kind of like moving the TV from the basement to the living room upstairs was an acknowledgement that the basement was just no longer going to be used as my man-cave, selling the poker table was an acknowledgement that our former, every-Thursday-night poker game is a thing of the past. It had been taken apart and stored for quite a long time, and I honestly do not even know the last time it was used. That's the bitter part.

But it was sweet, too. Something I had built, with all sorts of flaws that only I would notice, had caught somebody's eye enough that they wanted to give me money for it. When I factor in the price of materials to make a new poker table (which I will at some point in the future), I have already come out ahead. When I think about the experience I had building the table, the lessons I learned, and the things I will do differently next time, I have come out way ahead. And on top of that, I had seven years of use on that table.

It also provides me with an opportunity to build a new, better table, which I would never do if I still had that table stored

Seeking Validation

First...