Doors Galore

Rick almost drove me crazy this morning anticipating a call from Alise that our doors for the laundry room were complete and ready for pick-up.  I finally let him call at about 11:00 a.m., and we learned that they were just finishing our order and that we could pick up the doors at 1:30 this afternoon.

This morning was filled with other chores.  We each had a "to do" list, and we completed everything on those lists by noon. After a quick lunch, we were off to finally get the doors.

Rick wanted to start with the doors above the laundry units,
but I convinced him to start with the lower door next to the
washing machine to become familiar with the hinges.

When we arrived, the receptionist said that our order of 20 doors and 3 drawer fronts was ready.  The trouble is, we ordered 5 drawer fronts. "Oh," she said, "He must have just written it incorrectly on my list." Yeah.  Right.  My heart sunk, as did Rick's.

We drove around to the loading dock to pick up the doors and drawer fronts.  Kudos to the person who packed them.  They were bundled into manageable packets and protected by foam between each one.  As we expected, though, a count revealed that we were short two drawer fronts.  They are promised to us by the first week in October, so we'll just have to wait for them.

Once we were home, we unpacked everything and laid them out.  I am disappointed that a couple of the doors have nicks in them, and one has a scratch that we are going to have to repair.  For what we paid for the doors, I really had hoped for perfection.  Silly me.  Nothing is perfect.  One of the large cabinet doors has an annoying black dot in the middle; however, closer inspection shows that it is just a small knot hole that they filled in. The filler took a darker stain, so there is nothing that we can do.  That is the nature of the wood.  I am sure in time I will not even see it anymore.

With the first door on, we were able to move to the
upper cabinets.  We chose to have the lower cabinet open
to the left so that the vacuum inside could be used in the
kitchen as well as the laundry room.

Since we did not get started on installing the doors until about 2:30, we were not able to finish them all today.  Rick probably would have tried if he hadn't been completely exhausted by dinner time, so we stopped for the evening.  He installed 10 of the 20 doors. We are about half done.

What a difference cabinet doors make!  The room looks finished
and the cabinets look like they have always been there.

I am pleased with the results.  With each door, the room looks more complete.  We will install most of the rest of the doors tomorrow.  Since we are missing the two lower cabinet drawer fronts, we may have to wait on installing the doors to those units until after we receive the door fronts.  We want the spacing to be correct.

Rick also installed the doors on the tall cabinet.
Now I can load it with all the things I want to store in there.

We brought in the rest of the doors and drawer fronts so we will be ready
to install everything that we can tomorrow.

Of course, once the doors and drawer fronts are installed, I will be itching to get the granite in place for the room to be complete.  The granite will not be installed until October 15, so once again, we will just have to be patient to complete this project.  In the meantime, though, maybe we can actually get a warp on the loom and start a little weaving.

Finished... Almost!

I have not written for almost two weeks because I have been too busy -- or too tired at night -- to do so.  Rick has almost killed himself in an effort to get all of the slide-outs and drawers built and installed in the cabinets.  He finished this monumental task today.

We took a little time out from our project to go to Stephanie's house to help her with a couple of her projects.  She wanted her basement work room drywalled, and Rick also installed a Vroom vacuum in that area so she would have an easier time of keeping the cat's litter boxes clean.  The work was tiring, but all went well... except that I managed to break my baby toe while trying to open her draperies on Friday morning.  (Stephanie's furniture hates me!  I hooked it on a chair this time.  Three years ago, while she was moving into her house, I broke the same toe when I caught it on the leg of the bed.)  I did not waste time going to the emergency room this time.  The foot is very colorful, but it seems to be healing as I anticipated it would.

Earlier this week, we put in the bank of drawers in the cabinet next to the desk.  It gave us a ton of trouble, so we were not thrilled about putting in all of the rest.  However, yesterday we discovered that the pantry slide-outs were easier to install, probably because Rick could crawl inside the cabinet and have space to screw in the drawer slides.

Rick really gets into his work as he
screws in the shelf slides for yet another slide-out.

Rick made a "template" for positioning the other drawers and slides, so the rest of the work went more quickly once we learned how to install everything we needed.  Today, while I went to lunch with a friend whom I have ignored most of the summer  (sorry, Bonnie!), Rick installed two drawers and four slide-outs.  He was finished by the time I got home from lunch.

Rick installs rails in the file drawer for a double
set of file glides.

The room is now to the point were we are finished, at least for now.  We have to wait for Showcase Kitchens to manufacture the doors.  We will pick them up on Monday, September 24.  Then we can install all of them.  I am sure that having doors on everything will really change the look of the room, but they also will hide what we don't want to display, and they will keep things more clean and dust free.

The drawers and cabinet slide-outs are installed.

The tall cabinet holds my sewing machine and the laundry baskets.
It has room for larger items from the kitchen, too.

The laundry area is both easy to use and convenient!

Now if we can only find some time to start to use the looms!

The countertops are due in October, so we know that the room will not be completely finished until October 15.  Until then, I am enjoying having a first-floor laundry, and I cannot wait to take some time to actually USE the looms in the room.

Grass and Glue

Yesterday we actually took time from our house cleaning and room remodeling to tackle the grass.  We have had rain for so many days in a row that everyone's grass needed cutting, and I could hear a quartet of lawnmowers when I went outside to start our mower. I mowed the front and side yards since Rick said that he wanted to mow around the new grass in the back.

Our new grass has come in fairly well.  We have a couple
of bare spots where too much water puddled, but we hope
it will fill in eventually.

The next thing I knew, Rick was in the back cutting ALL of the grass.  He said that he saw that the grass was so high, so if he did not cut and bag it, it would be impossible to get through.  The grass in the front and side yards was dry, but some of the grass in the back was still soggy enough that at one point the mower got clogged with cut grass.  Rick filled a trio of bags that we will have to haul to the yard recycling center.  Lots of sunshine is predicted for the next week, so hopefully the yard will dry out before we have to mow the grass again.

Tonight after dinner we took a walk, as we usually do, around the neighborhood.  The wind was brisk and fall is definitely in the air.  I took a picture of one of the leaves I found to send to our neighbor in Florida.  She loves fall, so I thought I would share. I wish I were able to send some of the falling temperatures, too!

Preview of what awaits us...

Inside, our efforts have been on gluing together the nine slide-outs and five drawers for the cabinets.  We cut the bottoms for them and started the assembly.  Rick continued to work on them long after I quit for the day.

Lots of slide-outs and drawers still need varnish
and installation. 

The result is now 13 glued, clamped, unclamped, and sanded slide-outs and drawers.  We still have to glue the large file drawer because we had to take time today to cut the slits in the sides to hold the file rails.  Rick set up a jig and used his router to cut in the slots for the rails. Sometimes his creativity amazes me.  I will be able to get two sets of files side-by-side in the drawer, and that will give me more than enough space for everything I need to track and to store.

Exhaustion is becoming our new norm each evening.  Rick usually falls asleep in front of the TV, and I am so tired that I have not stayed awake for the 10:00 p.m. news in weeks.  Of course, that could not possibly be because we are getting old... could it?

Blizzard of Sawdust and Blinds

Rick worked very hard today cutting boards to size and setting up the dovetail jig so he could cut the dovetail joints for the slide-outs.  The router makes a tremendous amount of sawdust when cutting dovetails in 3/4 boards, so at times we seemed to have a light tan sawdust blizzard blowing through the garage.

Once we cut the bottoms out of the large piece of plywood
in the background, we can glue these slide-outs together
to complete them for the tall cabinet.

By noon, he had finished cutting the four slide-outs and the three top drawers for the base cabinets.  He cut the wood to length for the middle drawer and the large file drawer, but the jig set-up is giving him problems because the spacers he needs were not sold at the time he bought his Leigh jig.  Of course, the spacers are not sold by any retailer in America, so he had to order them from Canada.  Now we wait... five to seven days before they arrive.

The pieces of four slide-outs and three drawers
await a dado into which we will insert the bottoms.

In the meantime, we can clean the garage tomorrow (lots of vacuuming!) and stain the spacer/ installation bars for the slide-outs.  We also can cut the dados in the slide-out and drawers so they accept the bottoms.  We have the plywood for the bottoms, so we also can cut those, too.  Then, we can assemble the slide-outs and drawers and varnish them all.  While we wait to cut the dovetails in the last two drawers, we will not sit idly by.  There always is something to do.

Today we received a welcome delivery: our blinds for the laundry room.  We both were disappointed that the header bar was white instead of the "complementary color" that their Web site promised, but in reality, the white may be best.  The color of the blinds blends very well with the walls, and next to the white washer and dryer, the white header and bottom bar complements the overall decor.

The new blinds will give us the ability to filter light
and to have some privacy in this room.

I did not want any chains or cords on the blinds, so we chose a double waffle-weave that we can simply push up or pull down.  Since they probably only will be opened and closed once a day, they should last for a very long time.

I must admit that since we started this project in June, we have not had one day where we have woken up in the morning and wondered what we were going to do with the day!  Tomorrow will be busy indeed.

Dinosauers, Dovetails and Dados

Yesterday we went to Lindsay's house to give Owen his "good luck" gift as he starts kindergarten this week.  We bought his a triceratops bank that we thought he would enjoy.  He put his money in the bank which now sits in his bedroom.  We think he is really going to enjoy "regular" school.

Owen and "Dino" the bank.

Today started well with Rick and I in the garage cutting dovetail joints on the slide-outs that he had cut to length yesterday.  He would cut the dovetails while I sanded the ragged edges smooth and took time out to sweep up the mountains of sawdust that dovetails create.

I am happy that Rick gets to use some of the woodworking equipment that has sat idle for so long.  He finished all of the slide-outs for the tall cabinet in the laundry room by 9:00 a.m.

From there he tried to cut the dados in the slide-outs to accept the bottom boards.  As he did the first one, I could hear that the bit was having a hard time getting through the wood.

"Did you just see smoke?" asked Rick.  I had not, but when he tried to cut further in the wood, I certainly saw it wafting up from the router table.

"Is your router burning out, or is that smoke from burning wood?" I asked.  He replied that the router was fine, but the 1/4 inch router bit was too old, too dull, and too small to cut the dado all in one pass.  So we had two choices: he could adjust the table to cut the dados in two or three smaller passes, or we could quit for today until we could get to the store to purchase a new, sharp, 1/2 router bit that would complete the job in one smooth pass.  We decided that since today was a holiday, we would quit.

The wood for the base cabinet slide-outs rest in front of them.
We will finish building those later this week.

Yes, we could have changed gears and cut the rest of the wood for the five drawers that we need to build, but after working seven days a week for the past couple of months, we both deserve time off.  Tomorrow will come soon enough.

Soon the tall cabinet will have slide-out shelves.

The washer and dryer are working well.  I love not having to go
downstairs to complete this task!

The room really is starting to take shape.  We want to get the drawers and slide-outs mounted before Alise comes to measure for the doors, but then we are done until the doors are made and are ready to be mounted.

We have plenty of room for the looms.

I am starting to look at patterns and yarn again as I gaze at the empty looms.  I want to weave again before the weather changes to fall.  Hopefully our efforts will pay off, and we soon will be able to enjoy our new room.

Shelves and Slide-Outs

As I predicted in my last blog, the day after he injured himself, Rick was back in the garage working on the shelves for the new laundry room cabinets.  He used his new slot cutter bit on the router and cut a thin slot into the sides of the oak plywood shelves.  Then he inserted a plastic edging into the slot to cover and to protect the plywood side of the shelves.

The shelves dry in preparation for their installation in the upper cabinets.

The result are shelves that have a finished edge, and they cost substantially less than if we had used solid oak boards for all of the shelves.  Since most of the shelves will be behind cabinet doors anyway, this was a logical choice for us.  We have the same edging on the shelves in our kitchen, so I am happy with the look and result of his work.

He also finished the two solid oak shelves in the bookcase above my desk.  We don't have many weaving books, but what we have now will be accessible.  We also will have room for the many Handwoven magazines that we have collected over the years.  I am going to love all of the storage space in our new laundry/ weaving room.

Adding braces and sistered joists make for a more
stable floor under the washer and dryer.

Another task we completed was to reinforce the floor joists under the washer and dryer.  We sistered in 2 x 6 beams, and then Rick added braces to better stabilize the floor.  The Miele washing machine spins at such a high speed that it really does shake the whole room, so reinforcing the floors seems to help a bit.  I also stuffed foam pipe insulation between the washer and dryer, and that helps to minimize the vibrations, too.  I have to figure out a more permanent solution, but for now the insulation will do.

Lots of shelves means that we will have lots of storage opportunities.

Today we installed all of the shelves, and I brought up most of the books that we want to put on the bookshelves.  We are hesitant to load the other shelves since Alise -- who is coming to measure for the cabinet doors in a couple of weeks -- told us to make sure that the cabinets did not have anything in them.  We can't quite figure out why she cannot measure for doors if there is something on the shelves, but we will not overburden them at this point.

We also hung a picture in the room today and hung the warping board on the wall.  Now the room is starting to look lived in, and it is starting to resemble a weaving studio.

The one thing that we want to do is to complete the drawers and the slide outs before Alise comes.  That way, she will be able to mark where the drawer and slide-out hardware is located so the door manufacture can avoid those areas when he installs the hinges.

The slide-out lumber will make sturdy storage
for the base cabinets.

We purchased the lumber yesterday for the pull-outs.  Now Rick has to set up his dove-tail jig so he can cut the drawers and the slide-outs.  This week will be a week of building them so we could get everything in place before Alise arrives to measure for the doors.