A Picture is Worth a Thousand Nails in the Table

I've lived in my house for three years now. Three years. And guess how many pictures I have on my walls. Go ahead, take a guess. If you guessed zero, you're correct. I have thousands upon thousands of photos, several of them framed and ready to go. I have an entire cedar chest filled with framed pictures that graced the walls of my old house. So why aren't they on the walls of this house, you ask? Good question. I could blame it on the fact that I'm a single mom with 6 kids and I'm just too busy. I could blame it on the fact that I'm just too lazy to get up and put forth the effort. I could blame it on the fact that the only time I think of things like hanging pictures on the walls is when I'm lying in bed, with my mind racing, making mental to-do lists instead of sleeping. (And it's not a great idea to get up at 2:00AM and start pounding nails into the wall. Believe me, I know.) But the plain, simple truth is that I am completely inept at hanging things on walls.

Yesterday Savannah walked downstairs to find me in the kitchen, picture frame on the table, hammer in hand. I was swinging at the frame until Savannah asked, "What are you doing???"

"The frame is a little bit broken. The wood is separating on the corners so I thought I'd hammer this nail into it to hold it together." I grabbed the frame so I could lift it up and show Savannah. But it was stuck. To the table. With the nail I'd just pounded into it.

"What did you do, Mom? You hammered the frame to the kitchen table!" Savannah wasn't sure whether she should laugh or just shake her head. She shook her head.

"Well, I tried to hammer it on an angle."

Savannah gave me another incredulous look. I turned the hammer around and tried to pry the nail out of the table. After a minute of working at it, she grabbed the hammer out of my hand and pulled it out herself.

She grabbed a new nail and hammered it into the corner of the frame like Bob Stinkin' Villa. Pound, pound, pound, and that was it. Voila! Frame was fixed. She flipped the frame over to inspect the backside and saw the colorful, plaid duct tape plastered to it. She held it up and looked to me, eyebrows raised, for explanation.

I shrugged. "I thought I could tape it together." 

At this point, she started laughing. At me.

"What is this?" She ran her finger along the duct tape, feeling sharp little bumps underneath.

"Well, um, before I taped it I thought maybe I could um, staple it."

At this point, she doubled over, laughing at me. "You stapled it with a regular paper stapler? Then you put duct tape on it? Then you hammered it to the kitchen table? Bwaaaa haaaaa haaaaa!"

I joined her laughter because as she said it, I realized it did sound pretty stupid. What can I say? I don't always have the most brilliant ideas. I took the fixed frame and walked to the hallway where I'd put some marks on the wall. Savannah followed me (probably because she was looking for another good laugh.)

"You put marks on the wall with pen? Why didn't you use pencil, Mom? Then you could erase it."

"Pen shows up better."

Savannah did some more head shaking. "Did you measure it?"

"No, but it looks pretty even." I tilted my head to the side and squinted a little, approving my scientific method.

"Ugh Mom." She walked away, collected a ruler, a level, and a pencil, then snatched the frame from me. "I've got this. Just go . . ." she paused, "Just go."

Guess who is going to be put to work hanging the rest of the pictures?