256 - Flippin the Bird

Ha! No bird pictures in this post! Consider it a moment of silence for the bird that Walter killed yesterday. It's a tossup... feel bad for the bird, or proud of our little hunter... maybe both.

Today we worked in the basement.

Mike hung his cabinets, built the base for a second work area with pallet wood (the stringers), and a rolling cart for his tool chest, also from reclaimed materials. Pretty cool I think.

Just needs a top and and it's done.

He also finished the shelves for the bathroom, so I was able to get more stuff put away.

And I continued to sand and stain the wood for the back of the pantry (the wall that faces the dining area). I find that if I just stain it one color it's either too jarring or too flat and lifeless. So I either layer the colors or dry brush one atop the other; it's working out nicely.

This is my favorite board. Naked, it didn't look like much but I could see the potential in it. I did a dry brush of Jacobean, a dark brown stain, and then I put a stain called Driftwood over the top and it's GORGEOUS. I wanted the cracks and knots to be dark like that, almost charred.

This is how the wood looks right after Mike takes it off the pallet. Some of it looks unsavable, sometimes that's the best wood. Then we sand it - not completely smooth because we want to leave some of the character, but just enough to get rid of the oxidized layer so it's "clean" and the stain can absorb into the wood.

This is kind of a mockup of how the wall might look, just a combo of different colors, sizes and textures. Even with the same stain, each piece starts out with a different tone that makes it look different from any other. I love that. It's a challenge to pick the right color for each slat. That said, I may tone the mahogany down a bit because it doesn't blend as well as the others. We'll see.

This is how it might look on the wall, but the seams would be staggered.

 

And this is a random picture. :)

Time for FaceOff. Love to see their creative process and hear the back story to the character.

255 - Forward

The last couple of days we have attacked the pallet part of the renovation project. Tom did stop by, just ahead of the scary, massive storm to help Mike get the header inside. It's been acclimating for a couple of days now, so hopefully soon we can get it into place and really start getting things built. For now Mike is disassembling the pallets, we're sanding the boards and I'm staining them. They look pretty good. I may need a light oak stain to add to the combo, not to stand alone, but to put over the reddish stain to bring out some golden highlights, and I'm using tung oil with a dry brushing of another color because the tung oil alone is sometimes too stark a contrast to the dark tones of the other stains.

Been meaning to post this so that you can see the vast difference between Bo when we first got him, and Bo now. We're pretty damned proud of his progress. He's still probably always going to be smaller than the average bird dog, but that's just Bo, and as long he's healthy it's alright.

So other than renovation stuff and job hunting, not much is going on. Tonight we're having carnitas with black beans and Mexican rice, and salsa, and margaritas. And The Walking Dead is on, which is always a big deal around here.

The ladybugs are pretty active lately, so I assume they will soon be flying the coop as it were. Gonna miss the little ladies.

My husband is boiling bunnies. Should I worry?

He wants to keep the skull so we picked a pot that we will dedicate to that sort of thing and went for it.

Birds... always birds...

Cool reflection of the sunset in the truck window. Always looks Dali-esque to me.

Even after having the leak fixed, it still leaks a little, so during the torrent Mike went up into the attic and gerryrigged this contraption. I helped a *little*, he told me what he needed and I suggested the downspot and aluminum pan. Teamwork!

Bo chews on his paws sometimes. It's funny to watch.

Cardinal to the right of the barn (helps if you enlarge the picture).

I made gumbo. It was pronounced a success.

Another picture of a blue bird.