If nothing else, the instruction booklet is right on top; Rosie takes it out and sets it aside, along with the small bag of assorted screws and tiny wooden dowels. With Neil's help, she lifts the various pieces of the bookshelf out of the box and lays them out side by side on the floor, Beau nosing gently at each as they're set down.

"Well, it all looks like it should be a bookshelf when we're finished," she says, opening the instructions to the first page. "That's a good sign." She looks from the illustration to the pieces on the floor and back again a few times. "Okay, I think we start with this long flat piece here, and...seven? I think seven, of the fiddly-looking screws."