Assembling a New Old Desk
A long while back, Liz purchased a vintage/restored chemistry/lab table. Her goal was to use this as her sewing desk, with an eye to have it in our upstairs office area.
Posts Tagged "dining room"
Second Pocket Door: Hidden Mechanisms
Liz started to take out some of the pieces, for cleaning. And then realized someone had cut out part of the door to insert some fittings, and then patched it up again (a small square of wood). She got a few things cleaned up, but ultimately stepped back from taking the whole thing apart.
Holder Makes Holders
I was upstairs working on work work today (catching up a bit from the week), but she spent her time in the basement doing a ton of stuff: clearing away debris, reorganizing, and also building these bad boys. Which involved some angled cuts and a bit of table saw work.
Priming the Dining Room
Continued work tonight in the dining room. With the ceiling and walls patched with mud, sanded, and wiped clean (all by hand)… the actual priming of the walls was going a lot easier.
Mantle Dram
We covered over the space above the fireplace earlier this year, leaving the smallest hint of a mantle ledge. As it turns out, there’s just enough space to balance a small dram of scotch.
Prepping the Dining Room Walls and Ceiling
It may be hard to prove, but the room actually looks smoother and cleaner, after we worked on it. Things are definitely in a better state for primer, after us taking the time to wipe down the ceiling and walls.
Oil and Lock
What’s striking is what the wood looks like along the side (where she hasn’t gotten to apply the oil yet). Most of this is going to soak in over time, but it’s still a very surprising contrast.
Protecting the First Floor Floor, Continued
Put in time today in the dining room, also trying to get paper and Masonite down to protect our new floor.
Part of what I did was bring up the table saw, and to do some custom cuts of Masonite. I’m overlapping boards in a few places, but ultimately I’d like to just have a single, smooth surface.
First Floor: Varnish 2
It’s a challenge with these images, as we only end up coming downstairs well into the evening (we need to wait around 90+ minutes after Nick’s done to walk on the floor). We don’t really get to see the floor much in daylight, as it’s dark when we actually can walk around.
First Floor: Varnish 1
Nick and Milton came by today, to have another pass at the floor. After their normal, full day… they stopped by around 4PM to put down the first layer of varnish.
Similar to the stain, once the varnish is down… we need to stay off of the floor for a set amount of time (about an hour to an hour and a half, until it dries).
First Floor: Staining
We’re being really careful to watch gingerly along the floor. And I can’t help but feel like every step I take is going to somehow irreparably damage all the work that’s been done. It’s like the floor is some kind of delicate, beautiful lava, and I need to just stay off it at all costs.
First Floor: Sanding
Honestly? I was not expecting such a stark change, with the slight gaps between boards seemingly removed, and a continuity that stretched from room to room.
First Floor, Final Cleanup
I got the last bit of primer on the living room done. And Liz moved her stain tests to the actual floor. In addition to the standard stains, she tried out a few custom blend variations of her own.
Dining Room, Fireplace Discovery
We’ve taken down so many walls, pulled up so many floors… there’s precious little left in this house that we haven’t touched or removed, in some way. And yet, somehow. Magically. This house still surprises us, even now.
Dining Room Fireplace, Tile Removal
Liz has taken on the challenging and stressful task of removing all the tile in our dining room fireplace. They’re all pretty loose, and need to get re-installed.