Hurray, a chair!

I got that desk done just in time; I had two short papers due Sunday night that needed finishing but no time during the week to make any progress. So this weekend it was time to actually use the new office setup, only things weren't quite complete since my chair didn't get here until Friday night.

Yeah, there's a chair in there. I'm surprised too.

Putting together a chair after the kids went to bed seemed like the perfect way to put off working on the papers. It's not like I could use the desk without somewhere to sit after all.

Pieces all out, I think I can handle this. 

Box as workstand, viola.

I went with a sled bottom b/c I haven't had great experiences with wheeled chairs at home. The thought of all the damage we did to the floors in our place on Belmont still makes me feel bad when I think back. But the chair fits, so at least I could work at this point.

That works. 

And right to work

Things still aren't quite set up, as now I realize I should get some blinds on the window the desk faces. How we went two+ years w/o something on this window kind of mystifies me, but at least I was able to finish everything for school this week.

finishing pictures

So yeah, I managed to get the cooler out of the garage over the holiday weekend, giving me my shop space back just in time to figure out what to make next.

Sunny & ready for drinks. Just seeing this pic makes me thirsty.

I took the lid back off to get the lid and top trim as cleanly done as possible, and to make it light enough for me to carry the thing up to the deck myself. Woof.

Broke two sponge brushes getting the poly on too.

One of the lid boards was pretty far off, but is a lot closer now thanks
to a few passes with a blench plane.

Just the right size to finish on the bench vs on the cooler.

All in all it did a good job for a cookout Sunday night, but now that I'm sober and hung over I'm a little aggravated I didn't get the spigot right. We'll have to see how hard it is to pull it back apart and try something else.

But I think it's going to stay there; the bottom shelf is the perfect spot to stash the table cover while it's off so things are looking very summer-y on our deck right now. It makes long weekends that much more fun, now I just have to make it through the shorter weeks.

Here's the re-finished Poang

Speaking of finishing what you start, the poang is back in the basement looking sharp. Of course I couldn't get this project done without one more mistake; adding a lacquer coat after the poly left some pretty rough patches, leading to more sanding and re-applications of poly. But that was minor considering what this chair looked like at the start of this idea.

Now I can start putting things back together.

Color testing with the cushion back on; not terrible.

The chair was a lot easier to work with once it was broken down a little more. I could put it on the bench to wipe the poly on at least, which saved my back some trouble. The ottoman got one less coat, since it doesn't get handled as much and at this point I was pretty much done and just wanted it back in the basement. And hey, cheers to me for not losing any hardware while I worked on these so everything could go back together.

Yeah, that's actually halfway decent.

Even with all the mistakes, I think this was a project worth doing. Looks aren't the highest attribute on my list of what furniture needs to accomplish, but the chair is much more visually appealing now that the ottoman matches. And it's still comfortable as hell when I want to sit somewhere the kids can't come jump on me.  

Maybe not as messed up as I feared.

A darker stain seemed to do the trick for our poang, getting both the chair and ottoman slightly closer in overall color. Plus, it doesn't show the scuff marks quite as much and went on a little more even, so it might be worth getting a few coats of poly on to see if this chair is salvageable.

That's a little more like it.

Big sigh of relief at this point.

Might still have to spray some lacquer eventually.

Thank goodness this looks a little better, b/c I wasn't too jazzed about the idea of turning everything glossy black. Now I just need to find some time on a decent day to spay the lacquer outside so we're not dealing with fumes all day. Hopefully a decent finish matches up well with the black cushions and we're back to actual chair status in the near future. As long as I can put everything back together.

Workshops are controlled environments

Or at least more controlled than outside. Leaving the garden box in pieces made it easy to move out to the yard, sure. Even if my back was feeling slightly out of sorts. But putting it together in the yard turned out to be slightly more challenging than getting everything together in the shop with it's nice and level floor.

Placing them was deceptively simple...

But even with some challenge they came together okay.

With the help of some clamps to keep things together, the box eventually came together, albeit not quite as cleanly as it might have in the shop. It was too nice to work inside that day anyway.

Looks good, let's get some dirt. 20 cubic feet worth I guess.

This was a bit of rush, I was trying to beat the rain that was on its way in. Rain that hasn't left yet, since it's been raining pretty steadily since then, delaying getting any grass out or weed barrier down.  Again, that's a positive of working in a controlled environment. Oh well. The list of plants and veggies planned is getting pretty long, so hopefully the weather breaks again soon.

Yeah, I like that much better.

And I'm going to have to keep telling myself that, b/c things are driving me nuts right now.

Comcast was able to get the basement cable working for about two weeks. I went downstairs hoping to watch some Supernatural while finishing up the caulking, and oops, no signal. Reset, guided set up, nothing's working. So instead I used up the rest of the caulk while I was trying to get this fixed over the phone. Nice try, no go. This will never end.

Of course, while I do this I just keep telling myself how much more I like the space now, and that helps calm me down.

Listing photo

Now

Yeah, that's more our speed. 

listing photo

now

Kind of a crappy, cloudy day to sit around and bother with comcast, which is coming through in my dark, fuzzy pictures compared to the listing. Still looks a lot more presentable though.

It makes me wish we had taken more pictures down here with the paneling up b/c it looks so much nicer now. There are definitely some rough spots but overall it's a big improvement. Hopefully we're not huddled together for warmth when we do anything downstairs this winter.

First times for everything

Holy schnikes that was a shit-ton of work. So close to being done though. So close.

Quick shot of a first coat. So many damn corners.

I didn’t follow my own advice on not going cheap on tools but I don’t think it hurt the final product. Or rather, I don’t think getting better tools would have made things much better. 

More first coat, more corners.

Walmart had a finishing kit with a mud trough, 10-inch blade, and a 6-inch blade all for $10, which made me feel better about getting a corner tool and fancier corner beads with paper from HD. I never thought I would be shopping at Walmart so regularly, but these things happen in the burbs I guess. Considering just a trough would have cost more at HD I feel like this was a win (well, a win in that anything involving a purchase at a store you’ve been increasingly dubious about due to statements/political affiliations of leadership…basically I feel like I can’t shop anywhere these days). 

Second coat done, looking alright.

Anyway, it’s a poor craftsman that blames his tools and I don’t think the quality of what I bought would have made much of a difference in the final product. The paper-covered corners seemed easier than normal tin corners at least. It’s not a perfect job, but I think it looks pretty good and it’s nearly ready for some primer. Things went surprisingly quickly too; taping everything made the initial coat go a little slower, but once that was dry the second coat basically took a day, and I’ve been getting third coats done in the evening so far. I keep seeing little things I need to fix too, but since we’re on a dead-line at some point I just have to accept it’s not going to be perfect and move on.

More second coat. Yes, I think that will do, minus the bit at the ceiling.

This is where my motivation starts to dip. So far, everything on this project has been a first. I’ve never hung drywall, never taped or mudded it. It was fun to try something new, especially with it seemingly going well and quickly. I’ve painted before, so I’m not really looking forward to the steps remaining. Add to that the sheer enormity of options available to finish a project with and I start to wish I was just done already. Pick a paint color, a trim, might as well pick a grain of sand from the beach. So many out there.

Well, maybe not so many. I’m hoping to use trim to hide the joints at the floor and ceiling, so that means pretty large pieces for the most part. I want to go simple and affordable, so that narrows it down more. There are some foam options that sound pretty good, we’ll see what we end up with.

Who knows, maybe using a bucket grid will be enough of a difference that priming goes okay. I might say I’m not looking forward to painting but I find myself antsy to get started as I sit here writing this. With so much work behind me on this why not get excited about starting a next step, even if it is something that I’m not always fond of.

Ice emergency, I hadn't refilled my big cubes!

This is usually when I say something about “let’s get to work” to try and stay motivated, but instead I’m going to say “let’s have a drink and savor reaching this point of the project” b/c that’s sure as shit what I did. I mixed a few mojitos with mint we’re growing on the deck, and when the rum was gone I moved on to old fashions with the fantastic rye the wife got me for my birthday. Throw in a wedge one of the oranges we constantly have on-hand and viola, cocktail time. Nice.