This weekend’s do-it-yourself home improvement construction project was one that is very close to my heart. After becoming an expert in mounting doorknobs in my Florida condo in December, I now had a chance to return to another craft I know and love: putting together a new barbeque.
Here in Europe, everything is smaller than it is in North America. So a few years ago, we got a teeny little gas grill for our teeny little balcony. I put it together all by myself. It took 6 hours.
I loved our own personal barbecue out on the balcony. We used it rain or shine, snow or drought, night or day. Whenever we felt like we needed some very good seared flesh, we fired that baby up and enjoyed ourselves thoroughly. We felt like we were back home on the range.
Last week then, a tragic discovery. Rust had completely eaten through the bottom of our beloved little grill, leaving a gaping hole large enough to put a basketball through. This was bad, very bad. And reason enough to go out and get a new one right away.
And here it is.
A box.
You’ll notice what it says on the upper right hand corner of this box:
"Montage facile." Uh-huh. Yeah, right.
Then take a look inside.
Hm. Hope all the parts are in there.
Okay, so I started to unpack everything and spread all the pieces out evenly across the living room rug. With the expectation, of course, just like every item of Ikea furniture ever conceived, that you never know if you have enough screws until you are missing the very last one.
For everyone who thinks my husband took over command of the situation, here is proof that it was, indeed, my own personal project. That’s the igniter I am holding in my hand, by the way.
ES can read, too.
Just a few moments after this shot was taken, I discovered that I had screwed the tub onto the frame backwards, and had to take it all apart again. Harumph.
But putting together a spanking new barbeque is not really rocket science – if you follow the instructions carefully and can figure out all the diagrams. I cut my work time by two thirds and our grill was standing on the balcony just over two hours after I first slit open the box.
Ta-dah!
Mmmm…. Looking forward to dinner tonight. Bon ap!
Organic Swiss beef - the best of the best in this country.
Evelynn Starr 
Yum.
I know how hard it is to put a barbecue together from being a spectator. Even my brother-in-law, an engineer who is super handy, said it’s one of the harder tasks he’s undertaken.
Let’s just say it was a constructive way of spending my Sunday afternoon…. learned a lot, yadayadaya… And the steaks were definitely worth the effort, that’s for sure.
Hello, good to see your BBQ (braai as they say in South Africa) is working well! Our miniature braai sees the light of day perhaps twice a year in Scotland. My aunt lives in Lausanne and eats croissants and coffee on her balcony with a view of Lac Leman and the braes around Evian every morning. I dream of Swiss sunshine 🙂