They say that a man who works with his mind will Sabbath with his hands; if this is true, I’m making my request for a Sabbatical. I’ve had the woodworking DT’s, and I’m grinding my teeth in anticipation of some new projects! So after getting to spend some good shop time this week, I’m pumped to share some developments on some projects and hint at some upcoming ideas.
After finishing the vanity top and doors and drawers in our bathroom, Patty and I have reached a lull in our bathroom remodel while we are waiting for some back-ordered tile from a big box store. The vanity has turned out well, and Patty’s ideas have proven, once again, to come together wonderfully (with the aid of a handsome handyman whose handiness is bested only by his handsomeness). It also afforded me a wonderful lesson in design and marital communication: I spent two weeks prepping, finishing and painting them, and Patty said, “Don’t worry too much about them – I want to distress them.” If I’d have had a visceral understanding of “distressing,” this would have been a two-day project, because when I brought out the flawless, seamless doors, Patty took sandpaper, hammer, and stains and instantly undid 14 days of blood, sweat, and tears. I am happy to say that they look amazing and her motif for the bathroom is fleshing out beautifully, but I learned two important things:
1. dis•tress[dih-stres] adj form “distressed” – indicitave of distress or hardship (i.e. having the crap beat out of it)
2. Always, always, always ask, “Can you explain that a little more, honey?”
But after mounting them with hidden cup hinges, they match and function beautifully. Now it’s a waiting game for the backsplash before moving on to the tub.
In the meantime, I’ve been trying to finish the oven-side cabinet that Patty and I decided to build to increase our kitchen storage that Kensli received as an instant inheritance. For the non-parents reading, babies are awesome, and I highly recommend marriage and parenthood, and in 60 years when Kensli is old enough to date and get married, I’m sure I’ll be pro-grandparenthood as well. But be prepared: they come with a house-full of accessories. So take every single hand-me-down you can get your hands on, because they outgrow each item in about 45 minutes, and then hand them down to the next friend or family member blessed enough to embark on this epic fiasco of love, beauty, and exhaustion!
In the last post, this cabinet had been put on hold, but when the bathroom remodel came to a standstill, I pounced on the chance to wipe the plumbing putty off my hands and head to the shop again. I cut the maple and walnut boards on the table saw into ¾” strips, then glued them together. At 25” long and 17” wide, I had no easy way of flattening the top to final smoothness, so I had to come up with a manual recipe: one hand plane, two bulging biceps, and three gallons of sweat. When it was done and cut to final dimensions, here’s what it looked like:
A few coats of BLO (boiled linseed oil) later, it really started to pop! The maple that I used had a lot of ripple in it, and you can see a little of the wavy tiger-striped pattern in this picture; so I applied some oil, let it dry, then sanded it all again, only to add another coat of oil. This is called “popping the grain,” and it makes a dramatic difference in coloration on the maple as the oil is pulled down into deeper layers or wavy grain. Here’s the oiled close-up (please ignore the leopard print table top...my sister has her salon cabinets in the way of my woodshop; so as her punishment, she gets a sprinkling of glue and oil!):
I then glued it down to the top of the cabinet, and with a jigsaw and pattern bit on my router, traced the curved shape of the cabinet top. The curve made a really cool effect as it made the profile seem to have differing widths of the two species (seen in the photo below). After rounding over the top edge and finishing with about five coats of a homemade wipe-on finish, this is what we’ve got so far:
I’ve got one more coat of paint to apply to the cabinet and some final touch-ups before I bring it home, and hopefully next week we can add some pics of it in place in the kitchen! I'd love to hear some thoughts, suggestions, and ideas on this project!
Looking forward, I’d like to post some photos and updates of the bathroom vanity, mention a little shop project or two, maybe even some baby pics. At the risk of spoiling a super secret surprise, Patty and I have our second anniversary next month, and I’ve been racking my brain for a couple of months on what I can do, and I’ve settled on a project and drawn out some models on Google Sketchup. Maybe we’ll talk about that next week…maybe.
Stay posted! Find the glory in the mundane, and the beauty of the Creator in the created.
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