I consider myself a do-it-yourselfer. I haven't mastered every power tool yet, but I like fixing up old furniture with a sander and some fresh paint, finding old kitchen cabinets at the Habitat for Humanity ReStore and making it into a bathroom storage piece, and general handiness around the house. So I thought it would be fun to add crown molding to the list.
The good news is that I feel fairly confident that I could hang our crown molding. The bad news is that I certainly didn't learn anything from the class.
I showed up right on time - 1:00pm on a rainy Sunday afternoon. I stopped at the customer service desk to ask where the class would be held, imagining an industrial-looking classroom with sawdust on the floor somewhere. They directed me to Doors. I arrived at Doors to find a single 6x3 folding table with some pieces of crown molding, a miter saw, and a regular saw - but no signage or instructor. Well, no signage other than the table cloth that clearly opposed the message of do-it-yourself.
I looked around and saw another woman looking confused. We connected and starting chit-chatting about home improvement while waiting for the instructor.
Around 1:15pm, a stressed-out gentleman appeared, reading through a stack of notes that had to be at least 25 pages long - and by reading through I mean that he was on the first page. He asked if we were there for the class, and when we nodded, nervously chuckled and said, "It'll be just a minute while I look over the content, they kind of threw this on me last minute..." Not a great sign.
We chatted more, and another eager student arrived. All of us seemed to have done some work on our house ourselves. Finally, around 1:25, Nervous Teacher asked us what our objectives were for the class. We all said, "Um, learn the basics of crown molding." He nodded, and went back to his notes.
1:30 rolled around and he started speaking, startling me from my deep thought about if my blog post was worth this much time with no educational gains. He said, "The first step in crown molding installation is to measure. Measuring is very important. There is a saying, 'Measure twice, cut once.'" Dramatic pause where he looks at each of us proudly, really letting that one sink in. "Let's practice measuring."
I look at one of the other women, the most DIY-accomplished sounding one, and see her jawline is set. I really want to bolt - and she beats me too it! She dismisses herself with a friendly wave.
Nervous teacher has now gone off to get some boards for us to practice measuring. He returns; it is 1:40pm (class is scheduled to end at 2:30). He starts to speak again, and is interrupted by someone from his department, asking where a customer can find something. They chat for a few minutes. He looks back at us. "So it is important to measure. Measuring is the first step. I will set this up for us to measure."
That's as far as I got before I could not stand it and left. I KNOW, I should have stayed for the story. But I guarantee you that after quickly glancing at the pieces and then some consulting the interwebs after I got home - I know more already than I possibly could have learned in the remaining 45 minutes, at the rate we were going. Wait a minute...was the table cloth a hint that they are trying to keep us ignorant, so we pay for their services?
Learn more:
- Web: http://www.thisoldhouse.com/toh/how-to/intro/0,,214981,00.html
- Classes: http://workshops.homedepot.com/workshops/home (Nationwide)
Your experience sounds ridiculous! Thanks for sharing. I couldn't help but laugh when I read the tablecloth "Get it Installed" - ha! Once, when my dad came for a visit, he and I installed crown moulding in our dining room. We rented a mitre saw for the day for a modest fee. Yes, we did a ton of measuring before we cut, but the thing I found most helpful during the process is that we created two different examples of the cut of the molds. When it comes to the corners, that was the most confusing to me (which angle do I cut?) so we would look at our two examples and decide which angle to cut with the mitre saw. Hope that is helpful. I am in love with our crown moulding in the DR and wish I was confident enough to do it myself in other rooms! Hey, maybe once you get the hang of crown moulding, you could be instructing those classes at Home Depot? Or elsewhere! Thanks for sharing!
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