M-Fer

​Years ago, my mom gave me these wooden letters to hang on my bedroom wall; an M and a b. Because, as you all know, it’s Marybeth, NOT MaryBeth. The M has had a crack in it for a while, I mean, it has gone through a move or 2 recently. When I got around to hanging them up here, I used the easy way and bought sticky squares rather than using nails because I hate making holes in the wall. Turned out the M was too heavy and fell, breaking into 3 pieces. I decided to simply replace it since I had already tried fixing the crack and it didn’t really work.
Off to Hobby Lobby I went! I love craft stores! I’m pretty creative and artistic, well, somewhat creative and fairly artistic. The kids and I did a ridiculous number of craft projects when school and camps were not an option way back in 2020 and it renewed my joy in making things. There are not many memories I enjoy from high school, but I fondly recall all the different types of art classes I got to take in those 4 years.
I found my letter M with the help of an employee because HL is huge and it’s almost impossible to find anything in there without assistance. So now, here I am, wandering through this enormous craft store, making my way to the register when I passed by a display of the alphabet in letters that appeared as if they had been a part of a license plate. I thought to myself: I’ll make my boyfriend his birthday present this year! But I felt like he wouldn’t appreciate something that just said ‘MIKE’ on it…
When Mike, whose last name starts with F, and I first started dating and I lived with my brother (also named Mike) he started calling him M-Fer as a joke. I’m going to assume I don’t need to elaborate on that. He even got the kids doing it and it was actually pretty funny; rare for one of my brother’s jokes.
I selected the letters and now head off to find something on which to mount them. Found a small, cool, rustic looking desk top easel. I get home and mark where I thought I’d need to nail it in place; an easy, staggered, diagonal design. But I didn’t have the nails yet, so I left it at that until I could go to the hardware store. In the meantime, which was probably a month, I also decided one of these would be great for my nephew Jack!
Huzzah! Back to Hobby Lobby I go! Fortunately, I knew where everything was that I needed so it was a quick trip followed by a quick stop at the hardware store to get the nails.
When I got home, I made Jack’s first because all the material was right there, which came out awesome, if I don’t say so myself! I was so proud of my work. I get the pieces for Mike’s from the drawer and since it’s already marked, I get right to nailing them down. Here’s the thing…the arrangement I chose is the same upside down!! You see where I’m going with this? Yup, I nailed them to the board upside down!
I couldn’t believe it! I felt so dumb, and I couldn’t really take the nails out and do it again, plus I didn’t want to do all that…moral of the story: measure twice, cut once, as the saying goes.