Projects
These are posts related to woodworking projects that I am currently undertaking, and I hope to inspire you to tackle similar projects on your own. Perhaps you might learn something from my methods, or perhaps even learn something NOT to do!
After finishing the sanding of the three hearts on the 5th anniversary present I intend to give to my wife, I was ready to layout the hearts on a mounting board and frame them. Didn't catch my earlier posts on this anniversary present? Click on the 5th anniversary tag to the right to see all the posts in this series. I laid out the hearts in a pattern that I thought was pleasing (representing myself, my wife, and our daughter) on the corner of my router table and "framed" it using a block plane and a measuring tape....
Well, my wife has been reluctant to let me work in the workshop these last few weeks, with the weather being beautiful on the weekends and my 23-month-old daughter itching to play outside with her daddy :) But I finally had to tell her that if she wanted an anniversary present this year she would have to let me spend a few hours in the shop! This is only the second or third time I've had the time to work on my 5th anniversary gift, and if you missed it you can start at the beginning of the adventure.The...
Well, it's quickly approaching that time of year again: my wedding anniversary! This year will be my 5th wedding anniversary which, as a woodworker, gave me something special to look forward to. The traditional gift for a 5th wedding anniversary is wood. I have always tried to stay away from "practical" gifts for anniversary gifts. For me, I try to give something with some emotional connection, something personal. So this year I decided to give something with a little bit of heart (pun intended). Since our daughter will turn two less than a month after our anniversary, and since...
There you have it: The left and right side of the tub freshly grouted. And of course, the toilet needs to be installed. In this case, we chose an American Standard Cadet 3 model with elongated bowl. This is a very nice toilet, even if all we do is treat it like crap :) And next came the shower curtain rod. For this we chose a curved rod that offers more "room" inside the shower. When standing in the shower, there really does seem to be more room, much more than...
My next task was to tile the bathroom floor. For this, I wanted to use the uncoupling membrane called Ditra by Schluter. I started by doing a thorough cleaning in the room, then rolling out the membrane and cutting it to length. The second length of the sheet needed some fancy shaping around the tub and plumbing-wall, however that was relatively easy to tackle with a fresh blade in the utility knife. Just remember to install the product mesh-side down :) The directions ask for a modified mortar under the membrane and the normal mortar on top of...
Since my troubles with the glass tiles the first day, I wanted to postpone my pain as long as I could, and simply installed support bars to help me with all the upper rows, leaving a gap for my glass tiles to be installed later. But now I had to tackle it. So I applied mortar to the band on the wall, back-buttered the glass tiles with a thin layer, laid the tiles on the wall, and used green tape to hold the tiles at the correct level. A trick I used is to use a thin wedge on the...
I will preface my entry by stating very clearly that this was my first attempt at tiling. Therefore take all my tiling wisdom with a grain of salt. To mangle an overused quote: Damn-it, Jim! I'm a woodworker, not a bricklayer! I setup my wet tile saw on the bathroom floor and surrounded it by a dark-coloured towel. Cutting bisque/clay tiles leaves them covered with red dust and small tile chips, and if you do not wipe the tile off after cutting the dust may affect adhesion. Of course, keep a close eye...
So my 15-month old daughter woke up in a foul mood from her afternoon nap today, and I entered her bedroom to the sight of a slightly less-than-safe crib! She had somehow managed to push hard enough on one spindle to break it at a narrow point, leaving the lower half pointing dangerously upwards, and the top half was half way across the bedroom. Lacking a lathe (note to wife...), I headed for the next best thing: the drill press. I happen to have some 1/4" dowel stock on hand, so I drilled a one inch deep hole...
Ask anyone who knows me, and they will confirm that I am "Mister Safety". Goggles, NOISH filter mask, earmuff-type hearing protection...
But for some weird reason, today I was wearing my mask, and my hearing protection while I was doing some soldering, but I neglected to put on my safety goggles. Big mistake...
I was soldering the pipes for the shower controller together, torch in the left hand, solder in the right with maybe 12 inches sticking out off the reel, and I was kneeling in front of the wall and looking slightly up. I finished soldering the joint, lowered the torch,...
So at this stage of my renovation, I am floating on air... well, suspended on a couple of 40 year old pieces of lumber. It wouldn't have been so bad had it not been for the fact that it was 3/8" plywood, partially rotted through, on 24" joists! The 2x4s you see on the left are for cutting up for some additional horizontal supports between the floor joists, to further reduce the bending of the plywood as we step on it. Any bowing of the flooring will result in cracked tiling, so I want to reduce it as much...
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