A Foray Into Furniture Refinishing

Hello, old blog. Sorry for the radio silence. I guess we've been too busy living in our "finished" house to bother posting about it. That, and the baby... Well, excuses excuses..

So here is the story of how we "upcycled" this old console stereo into an entertainment center. How did you say "super cool" back in the 60s??


We started with a Craigslist console record player / radio, circa 1966. The electronics still mostly work but it had been very thoroughly painted white - How chic!


Next we stripped off the paint. We used the no-scent safe stuff so we could do it in the garage and not stink up the house. Next time I think we'll wait for warmer weather and use the heavy duty paint stripper.


The paint stripper stuff did work, it just took a lot of elbow grease. And underneath, lovely walnut.


At some point we realized that it would be a lot easier to disassemble and then strip. This turned out to be surprisingly easy. I guess in that era furniture construction involved a lot of screws and very little glue. We lucked out in that respect.


Here's a shot after we've applied some tung oil and started re-assembling. You can see the shelf August added over the amp electronics.


TADA! We really liked the tung oil finish. Its easy to apply, very forgiving, and doesn't smell too bad.


Originally the only access was from the top. At first we planned to take out all the old electronics and decommission this door.


But the old school stuff was just too cool. Check out the turntable and radio. That grid thing on the right is the radio tuner. Why its a grid, I don't know, but it adds a cool 60s space-ship sort of vibe.


Now we just need a record!!

For access to the DVD player we split the old front panel and made it into doors. There's room for the Wii and some other random stuff too. We used Blum 170-degree hinges. I cannot recommend Blum hardware highly enough. It is awesome. Pure Scandinavian design genius. They are NOT paying me to say that!


In order to make the new doors as incognito as possible, we used magnetic touch latches.



The END! I love it. It turned out way better than my original vision which had involved the use of a recip saw to get that front panel off. And I might be a tiny bit addicted to this idea of taking old vintage stuff and making into something new. Example: Typewriter Ipad Dock.

The Light

At the end of the tunnel! Its visible! The kitchen project that never ends is nearly over. The "TO DO" list would fit on one hand these days. I have a secret plan to be finished with ALL of it over the Thanksgiving holiday. That will be appropriate because we kicked off this project with a trip to the fancy lumber store over the Thanksgiving holiday in 2008. The remaining items:

1) Make a kick board for the peninsula.
2) Make a little spacer block for the crown molding. (5 min tops)
3) Route out the glass doors and assemble them.
4) Order the glass.
5) Trim, route, and assemble the remaining frames for drawer fronts.
6) Stain items 1,2,3, and 5.
7) Attach spacers to drawer fronts.
8) Install all that stuff.
9) A little caulk maybe.

Okay two hands.

The New Addition

He's here folks! I think he likes the house pretty well.

In fact, he's six weeks old now. Since his arrival, we have gotten *a little* bit of work done on the kitchen. All the doors are hung and operational now. All that's left is the drawer fronts. Anybody know where to get a 20mm forstner bit that doesn't cost $40?

Baby room - getting there!

The baby room is functional now... All major furniture purchased. Pictures on the wall. Now we just need the baby, and probably some diapers.

Here's the view from the hallway door.


Here's the glider we picked up off craigslist today. I'm still scoping for one that's "exactly what I'm looking for", but they are hard to come by. I've only seen a couple in the past 2 months and both were gone before I could get to them. This one looks good enough though.

These are some of August's baby clothes - too cute to hang in the closet.

And a close up of my bumper. Turned out pretty well!

0 to 60 in... a couple of days

Here's the "zero" - from before we moved in. Don't worry, those drapes left with the previous owner.


And here's the work of just 2 days. Ceiling retextured. Carpet out. Walls and trim painted. Ceiling fan installed. New sheets. Now all we need is maybe some curtains, and a couple of matching night stands.


I feel so grown up now!! A good thing, since we are expecting to become parents in the next few weeks! See next post!

Quick question

So, we have been slowly adding to our collection of framed stuff to hang on the walls.. Its an expensive venture but well worth it. I am planning to get some old family photos reprinted and framed as well, particularly these:



Aren't they cool? The girl sitting in the dirt with a gun is my grandmother...

So the question - to crop or not to crop? The shadows of the photographers are kinda cool on one hand, a part of the story. On the other hand, that's a lot of dirt...

Okay, one other question, would you frame them in the same frame or separate?

Here's one more that I love! May put this one in baby boy's room...

For love of a pin nailer.. (continued)

We've put that handy pin nailer to use on another issue - cabinet crown molding.

Why I insisted on included crown molding above the upper cabinets? I don't know. Having those cabinets go straight to the ceiling would've been just fine... but, you know, hindsight...

We (I?) fretted about the process for months off and on. Remember what our crown molding motto is? "Cut close and caulk". Yeah, doesn't work so well on stained molding. Remember Franken-corner? Oh the horrors... Anyway, I'll spare you the drama and details but we made one hugely smart decision on this crown molding: to cut it out and assemble it on the ground, not in the air like we normally would. This way the corners look perfect.. Certainly there are gaps and imperfections in other places (small ones, August is still a perfectionist), but the corners are PERFECT.

And we of course used the pin nailer to attach the pieces, so you can't even see the little holes.

For love of a pin nailer

Alternately titled: Look at what we did in the month of June!

We have done some fun stuff these past few weeks, such as FINALLY getting started on those pesky cabinet doors. In retrospect, the process we selected to make our very simple doors is NOT very simple. Well, it kinda is simple but its VERY time consuming: cut out panels -> stain front (x3) -> stain back (x3) -> polyurethane front (x3) polyurethane back (x3) -> cut out frame pieces -> assemble -> stain (x3) -> poly (x3). Doesn't take a math whiz to know that all those "x3"s equals a very drawn-out process. Regardless, we have pushed about half of the doors through about half of that process... And here is where I mention the nifty tool we needed to "expedite" things - a pin nailer.


It literally nails with pins, headless pins at that. They are TINY. So, here's a shot of pin nail use in the cabinet doors:

This way, the pins hold the doors while the glue dries, no need for dozens of clamps. Here's the doors underway... Frames still need staining.

Not the greatest excuse for being late to work..

Here's a sad situation: 6am on a Tuesday morning in Colorado in March, no warm water AT ALL, and of course soggy 70s carpet in the basement. What does that spell? A busted hot water heater. First we tried to shop-vac all the water up. that was futile effort, plus you can imagine the nastiness that was under that carpet. (I know I know, it looks so nice from where you're sitting..) We ended up cutting all the wet part out and throwing it out the back door. And then we spent a day deliberating about what to do. And then, one semi-warm sponge bath later (I boiled water on the stove just like Ma Ingalls), we called a service guy. He got the new one installed in just a couple of hours and we've been back in business ever since. This set us back a cool $1k, which is about $400 more than it would have cost us to do it, but, like I said, it only took him a couple of hours.

Baby Room!!

One thing we did a few weeks ago: paint the baby room! My parents were here in April and were kind enough to basically knock this entire project out for us. At that time, we didn't know the gender, so we went with a nice taupe/gray color.. neutral... This is a-okay with me because I'm not thrilled with pink or blue or with the idea of repainting it for when we sell. So, gray it is.. Don't get too upset though, I promise to use a bunch of stimulating colors in the accessories. Well, I also want black furniture.. but aside from that.. :) Jail-cell chic?

Mom hard at work Getting there
Ta da! Check out that brand new overhead light.

UPDATE!!!!

So much for taking a week off, eh? I see its been over 2 months. I have excuses: At first we weren’t doing ANY work on the house, so there was nothing to blog about. And then we were doing so MUCH work on the house that I didn’t have the energy to blog about it. However, this week I am travelling on business – internationally! – so I plan to right the situation. Okay, its just Canada, not that exciting. Toronto, no less.

Now for a little ranting: This is an international flight. I did have to show my passport. And it is 3.5 hours long. But, it’s a tiny little plane. I’m on row 16 of 18 total, and there are only 2 seats on each side of the aisle. They aren’t even serving crackers. The over head bins aren’t big enough to hold carry-on suitcases. Thanks goodness for plane-side check! I feel like I’m on one of those regional jets from Dallas to JAN. If I have to fill out a customs form, I don’t believe I should still have to pay the $25 luggage fee. I do harbor a grudge against United, ever since I flew to Asia in 2003 on a plane that obviously hadn’t been renovated since the late 80s. They showed movies on a pull-down projector screen. So that, and the strips of glow-in-the-dark tape along either side of the aisle on this plane, is all the proof I need to conclude that United is the suckiest of all airlines. Too bad its hub is in Denver.

Anyway, back at the house, August has a list a mile long of odds-n-ends to tie up while I’m away. You should know that we *HAVE* started the cabinet doors, although very recently. Before that we renovated the two guest rooms from ceiling to floor. They look great. Now only our master bedroom remains in old-lady style.

Check back tomorrow for details on these and other exciting projects!

Taking the week off

Now that its Friday I think its time to admit it: there will be no significant blog posting this week. Nothing going on house-related, and plenty going on with the rest of our lives.... Oh, you thought we didn't have any other lives? Well..... that's generally true.

Creative Problem Solving

Problem: Giant crack in the sheetrock on the ceiling. HUGE!

Solution: Faux beam. Ta da!

Just kiddin'. We didn't stop there... I watch HGTV. Now we have space separation, transition, and blah blah blah... best of all, no *visible* crack in the ceiling.

Evolution of a Staircase

Continuing in our efforts to NOT work on cabinets anymore, we have reworked both of the staircases. They have been the only bad surprise yet in the process of removing the carpet. They were pine, so they had a zillion carpet staples and dents. Some of them were even hacked off on the side where they added the lovely rounded section off to the side.

So, now they're all new. Half new really. We patched and painted the risers, but the treads are all new. They're oak and they kinda match the color of the oak flooring. Not perfect but I had no interest in mixing and matching and all that. This was a one-coat-and-done project. Regardless they look a lot better than the pine ones.

The Final Cabinets

After much ado, the last two cabinets are in their final resting places. Getting them done was a challenge b/c the insides had to be stained, and the outsides, and the bottoms, etc etc. Plus they had to have special alder shelves built, stained, etc. All because I wanted to have some of those fancy glass doors. Its the special details like this that really make a project drag on... and on...

But, we persevered. And getting them mounted meant we could finish several other things: the backsplash, and the undercabinet lighting, which means I can use my garbage disposal again. Yipee!

So what remains? Oh mainly just the doors - all 39 of them. Crown molding... and... ya know that's about it. Maybe we will finish this project one day.

Abby the Painter

Abby's a great helper.

Looking sweet and obedient.

I like this one because she has that wild look in her eyes - that's her true personality, don't be fooled.

Valentine's/President's Day Celebration

Blog post commitment update: I'm counting today as part of the weekend, since its a holiday, and therefore this is the second post of the week, last week I mean. Even though its technically monday of the following week. Its my blog, I make the rules.

This weekend we did do a lot of house work, but we also took a break and went up to Estes Park to do something we've always said we should - spend a night at the historic Stanley Hotel. Staying there in February was perfect because Estes is nearly empty. We practically had the place to ourselves, a stark contrast to conditions when the weather is warmer. This place inspired Stephen King to write "The Shining", but the most famous version wasn't filmed there. A later version, directed by the King himself, was filmed at the Stanley but we once Netflix'd that one and it is a major stinker. Still, its a very cool building, built in 1909. Lots of ghost tours take place each day. Silly tourists... Check out this pic though: Its the ghost of Lord Dunraven. Okay, it may have been the maintenance man. Check out these moldings. They were like 6 layers deep. *sigh* Today we went showshoeing in Rocky Mtn National Park. Just a quick trip up to Emerald Lake, 3.6 mi round trip or so. Still, I'm beat. The views were incredible. Great weather. Couldn't ask for a better President's Day.

Things You Can Use an Iron For

There are two major functions in cabinet making that require the use of your iron.

#1) Edge banding

This is how you turn a piece of plywood into a faux slab of solid hardwood. The lumber yard here sells pre-made rolls of edging material. It almost looks like wood tape, conveniently coated with heat activated glue on the back side. So, lay the strip down where you want it, cut it to size, apply the iron, press hard, that's about it. Then you have to trim the edges a bit to get the look of perfection, but they sell tools for that (the yellow thing). In this pic I think we've edged the sides of the cabinet but not the back.

#2) Dent removal

This trick is the coolest if you've managed to bang up, scratch, or dent your nice expensive raw wood. Set the iron on the highest steam setting. After its warm and steamy, let the steam from the iron soak into the dented part of the wood but don't press the iron directly on the wood. If the wood is just dented, then the damage will magically disappear before your eyes. MAGIC. With scratches, there will also be a major improvement but probably not perfection. This whole process takes just a few seconds. Its a no-brainer on solid wood, and while the internet advises against this for plywood, I've done it several times with great results. I haven't tried this on finished wood, also not recommended by most, but I will one day, just to see what happens.

Another brush with reality TV

What could be more exciting to an avid HGTV watcher like me than getting to spend a weekend in a suite designed as part of the HGTV DesignStar competition? Well, several things.. but I digress.

This is the suite. Its at the insane Gaylord Opryland Hotel in Nashville. Sara Evans was the celebrity style influence or something like that...

And here's moi sitting right there.


Have you ever watch those HGTV design shows where they give tips like "Just take an ordinary throw pillow and hot glue a fancy trim on the edges!"? Don't you ever wonder if that really looks as bad as it sounds? Hot glue? Well folks, the answer is yes, it does look bad... as bad as an 8th grade OM project. And it holds up about as well as can be expected too:



That reference to OM is a great segway into the real reason I got to stay in the lovely suite: