The large tree in our backyard is turning yellow. It's one of my favorite sites in fall. I "staged" this picture a little bit with the Adirondack chairs and the fire pit...


I spent part of the weekend replacing the doors in our basement. They were the typical flat-slab 1970's doors. These six-panel doors are nothing special, but they were very cheap, and at least look more up-to-date. I did the work on the back porch, giving me a nice view.


These doors needed to be cut to size, drilled for the knobs and routed for the hinges. I basically took each old door and used it as a pattern for the new one. The picture shows the stop-blocks clamped in place for routing the hinge pockets.

Making a $10 Bench

I came up with a simple bench design that you can make from a 1x12 pine board that's 8' long - which costs $10 right now (in Oregon). You could also make this from a 2x12. Here is a picture of one that I distressed and stained...

It needs another coat of stain and then a couple applications of sealer.

Here is the simple "cut diagram":

- The top is on the left at 32"
- The legs in the center at 16"
- The apron and bottom stretcher are cut out of the right piece at 29 wide.

This design allows for a little bit of scrap, which I use to attach the top.

I made 4 of these today to go into our home theater:


Here they are with the first coat of stain.


These are obviously not fine furniture, but will be great for holding food, books, etc. They can also be used for sitting when we have a bunch of people over.

New Home Theater Furniture

They delivered the furniture for our home theater today. We bought a very large sectional and ottoman, plus two recliners. These, plus the existing couch and love seat, fill up the room.

This sectional seats 6 or 7 people:

Here are the matching recliners.


This picture shows them from the back of the theater room.


We bought all this from Pacific Lifestyle Furniture, and I have nothing but positive comments about them. I felt like we purchased very good quality furniture at a price on par with Costco (about 1/2 the expected cost), and the delivery was right on time. They are obviously a low overhead operation that keeps prices low. I found them on craigslist.


My disclaimer: I am not paid for advertising for this business. I am giving a positive review for people I was happy to do business with.

My new blog: Hammer and Saw

I recently started another blog: Hammer and Saw, focused on woodworking and furniture.



Up to this point, I have kept my furniture projects in with the remodeling stuff. After reviewing it, I think the content and audience will be somewhat different. Also, this allows me to use tags that are focussed on various woodworking topics.

Anyway, if you get the chance, take a look and comment.

TTF

Tip: Use contrasting filler on painted trim

Until recently, I always filled the nail holes in trim with filler that was close to the paint color (in our case, white). No matter how systematically I work when sanding, I seem to miss one now and then. Now I use a contrasting color, so there is no problem seeing every one...

Built-in Bookshelf for my Son's Room

The final thing we are adding to our son's room is a two-foot wide built in bookshelf, where his old closet used to be. It's 10" deep, which allows for an 18" deep linen closet backing up to it.


Here is the bookshelf unit before it was installed. This is a very simple design: 3/4" plywood sides and shelves; 3/8" bead board plywood for the back; MDF face frame pieces. I sanded, primed and painted all the pieces before assembly, saving a lot of effort.


Here is the unit installed in the wall, with side trim applied. It is shimmed solidly in place, with finish nails holding it.


This bookshelf matches the other ones we installed in our basement, to give continuity throughout the house.

Building a Windowseat #3 - Cabinetry Complete

I finished up the cabinetry portion of the window seat project. As shown in the picture, I installed the top, which has a lift up lid. I also put a small lip on the front, which is there to keep the cushion in place.


The underside of the lid has 3/4" x 1 1/2" support splines to make sure it stays flat over time.


We need to paint the front with our white trim paint. Hopefully my DW will get the cushion made in the next couple of weeks.

Finishing up My Son's Walk-in Closet

My son and I installed the closet organizer we built last week. The diagram below shows the layout...



As I stated in an earlier post, this is about as small as you can get for any sort of workable walk-in closet. That being said, there is actually a lot of room in there with the cabinetry installed.

We did a slightly larger one of these for my daughter (8' x 4'), and I am sold on this design. It seems so much more functional than the standard two feet deep closets. It also takes up significantly less wall space within the room. If I every design another house, there will be walk-ins, at least small ones, in every bedroom.

Here are the shelves on the left side, with the hanger bar below. We put the bar out 16" from the wall, instead of the normal 12". This allows for my son to store stuff along that back wall.


The right side now holds the dresser, and all the slides have been adjusted as needed. The next step is to affix the drawer fronts and hardware.


A tip for building your own drawers using drawer slides...

You want the drawers to slide in and out without any binding or slipping. Binding comes from the drawer being too tight or not aligned correctly, and slipping comes from the drawer bring too loose.

I make the drawer 1/16" to 1/8" narrower than the opening, minus the requirements for the slides. In this case, the openings are 34", and the slides take 1" - so the drawers are 32 7/8" wide. This extra little bit allows me to shim the rails to get them aligned and the correct width. I use washers between the rails and the cabinets for shims.