The Friendly Home

{backyard redo} Pouring the Patio

2013-05-06T10:17:00.000-07:00

Now that the weather is starting to improve (sort of) we've been spending weekends finishing up our new backyard space. To get up to speed, you might want to check out our other backyard redo posts, where we talk about the plan, the first phase of work, why we chose a natural gas fire pit instead of wood burning, and how we plan to protect our outdoor furniture.

The backyard before we started the redo.

Our patio went in last November before the weather got too cold, but then we pretty much abandoned the backyard until it was warm enough to work out there. I considered a few different options before deciding on an exposed aggregate concrete patio. Here were the factors in the decision:

We already have flagstone in the sideyard (with thyme growing between the stones), so if we went with a stone material, it would need to be the same. This eliminated pavers and other kinds of stone or masonry.
Our backyard is shallow, with a retaining wall about 18 feet from the house, so we wanted it to be ground level, not raised like our deck was. Scott and I called our deck "the raft" because that's what it looked like, except it was surrounded by grass instead of water.
It needed to be relatively smooth, so that patio furniture could slide across it without getting caught on seams.
We wanted the material to be virtually maintenance free, but we wanted it to looks semi-natural and varied.

That last requirement was what led us to exposed aggregate. Here is one photo of exposed aggregate concrete:

The exposed aggregate in this photo was small river rock. Looking back, I should have been more conscious of what kind of aggregate was in my concrete mixture. I expected it to be similar to this, only smaller (because our contractor told me it would be pea gravel). Our aggregate is not as round or smooth but it is just as colorful. And it's fine. I'll show you some photos of it after it is power washed and sealed at the end of May.

But for now, check out the pouring phase. Whew, this is one project I am SO glad we didn't try to DIY. I don't know how much it cost, because the cost was included in our overall bid from the contractor who did all of the backyard work (retaining wall, fountain, burying electrical, rerouting sprinklers, patio, and pergola), but the most recent estimate I got for a similar sized patio was around $6000. That was about 5 years ago -- the price tag definitely scared us off. Based on our whole backyard redo cost, I'm thinking this came in at a much smaller price, like closer to $3000 or $4000. And that, my friends, was worth it. Because this was a big patio and not good for a beginner concrete project.

The truck arrives.

That's my friend Emily's little guy checking out the concrete truck. Of course the patio was poured the same weekend as a big craft fair happened at my house, so all day while the cement truck was pouring there were women coming and going, setting up their wares. And the next day, during the fair, the concrete guy was out there removing the top layer of concrete to expose the rocks. Not the best timing, but nobody seemed to mind!

They pumped the concrete from the front, through the side yard,
and around to the back.

Our contractor dug out part of our retaining wall and hill to make room for
the firepit and fountain.

I asked for two wide steps so that kids would have a place to sit and eat. I love the
curves that our contractor added. It gives a bit of character to the very square
and flat backside of our house.

Now you can shake your finger at me for being a bad blogger, because I don't have an after photo of this stage of construction. Here's all I've got...a shot of part of the patio as our contractor started installing a flagstone edge to tie in the patio with the flagstone in our sideyard.

If you'd like to get a step ahead of the blog, check out the Backyard Redo album on my Facebook page. Lots more backyard redo photos there!

Reupholstered bench seat

2013-04-17T23:09:00.000-07:00

The transition from soft neutral family room to grey + brights is one step closer to completion.

Long overdue, the avocado corduroy bench cover (which I learned today that Scott has always hated) is gone.

before

after

The avocado has now been replaced with the same charcoal linen as is in the curtains (Ikea RITVA in gray). In fact, it is leftover fabric from the curtain project. This update took me less than one episode of Mad Men, leading me to wonder why, oh why, didn't I do it a long time ago? Like, maybe in November when I'd originally planned to?

before

after

Oh, wait, I know why it took me so long to get to this. It's because I needed two weeks of cold and snow to keep me inside working on house projects instead of out in the garage building furniture. So far, I've cleaned out and re-organized my pantry, cleaned out and actually cleaned my fridge, taken five bags of trash out of Callie's room, built the gallery ledges, AND washed and put away all of the clothes from our trip (usually unpacking is a never-ending chore for me). So, yeah, the weather's been crappy.

Speaking of which, here is one of the unlucky deer who was hanging out in my yard today getting attacked by a bird. The bird hopped from back to back as it made its way through the herd, pecking away at their ears, necks, backs, bottoms, and seemingly trying to eat them alive. Gross. The deer, just for the record, were not fans of the bird.

Back to the bench...the next step will be to throw together some bright, patterned pillows to liven up the wall of grey, black, and white. With more snow in the forecast (April 18th, December 18th, what's the difference), I've got high hopes for the pillows happening soon. It's exciting, I know, but please try to restrain yourselves.

For more on how I built and upholstered the bench, check out this post.

For the curtains, see this one.

Updated Gallery Wall

2013-04-16T13:31:00.000-07:00

After painting our great room/kitchen/loft last fall, the dismantled gallery wall stayed dismantled until last weekend.

(The gallery wall back in 2010 when I first put it up.)

So, yeah. It only took me six and a half months to put it back together.

There may have been some humming and hawing. There may have been some indecision and some dragging of the feet.

But eventually I decided that I wanted to base the gallery wall on three ledges similar to these. I thought it probably wouldn't be enough space for all of the photos, but I gave myself enough room between the ledges (36" -- we used a yardstick to space the ledges) to hang a few frames in the leftover space.

I built my ledges using 1x3s for the back and 1x2s for the front and bottom, all joined using just glue and nails. Once they were joined, I cut off the ends of the ledges using my miter saw, to give me perfectly smooth ends. (Believe it or not, this is the first time I've noticed that 8' lumber isn't all exactly 8'.) All of the lumber is pre-primed finger-joint pine, painted in our white trim paint. To put them on the wall, I just drilled through the 1x3 on the back into the studs and attached the ledges to the wall using 2 1/2" deck screws. The lumber cost me about $30 -- not bad for three 8' ledges.

Next up? It's time to recover the gigantic bench under the gallery! The avocado green belongs to our old, muted color scheme. Now I'm deciding between using the same grey fabric that's in the striped curtains or going with something bright and fun. I'm leaning toward plain grey and adding fun, funky, colorful pillows.

Traveling the world...with kids

2013-04-10T11:15:00.000-07:00

I just returned home from an adventure. We decided our kids were ready to travel. And when you're ready to travel (again) and feel like you've been chomping at the bit for a decade while waiting for a chance to get back out into the world, why start small?

I mean, why go someplace easy?

We didn't.

For our first big adventure with our girls, we decided to take them to Asia. It was meant to be a test. We figured that if they could handle this trip, they could handle just about anything and maybe we'd have more trips in our future.

We started with a few days in and around San Francisco (clearly, San Francisco is not in Asia...but it was a great jumping off point), then flew to Hong Kong where we spent about five days, took a ferry to Macau for a day, and then flew to Vietnam where we spent another four days. All together, the trip was 18 days and our girls, ages 10 and 8, managed the trip like champs.

For just a second, I want to talk about why we decided to travel with our kids, and why we chose Asia for their first big trip. Scott and I both believe it is important for our children to grow up knowing that there is more to the world than the little community in which we live. We believe that in order to understand that most of the world is not like America, our kids should see the world for themselves. We want their view of the world to be not an us-and-them view, but a we-are-all-in-this-together view. I know that it's possible to achieve these goals without travel (neither Scott nor I traveled as kids and we came out okay) but travel seems like the best way to ensure that our kids will end up with the perspective we want them to have.

Also, we recently realized that we've only got 8 years left with our oldest kid before she might be out of the house. That's not much time and we wanted to be intentional about spending focused, concentrated time with both of our kids, creating memories and bonding as a family. To us, travel is the best way to do that.

Most of the people who heard about our trip asked the same thing, "Why Asia?" And some, the more bold of our friends and acquaintances, asked, "Why aren't you going to Europe?"

There were a few reasons. First, a good friend from my childhood lives in Hong Kong. We've wanted to visit her there and haven't had a chance, so this seemed like a great opportunity. But also, Asia is very different from America. If you haven't spent much time there, Asia shocks you. It's crowded and noisy and looks different and smells different and tastes different. The language is impossible for us to understand. The food is completely foreign. The customs are unfamiliar.

And also, Europe? I've not been to more of Europe than London (which I realize doesn't even count in some people's eyes), but my impression is that Europe is relatively comfortable. From my experience traveling, I've found that the times I learned the most about myself and the world were the times I was uncomfortable. And the more uncomfortable I was (both physically and mentally), the more I learned.

While traveling in Asia we felt stupid several times and uncomfortable most of the time. We were laughed at more than once. Not in a judgmental, "You stupid Americans," way, but in a, "How silly that they don't know how to ask for more tea," way.

And that was good. Being laughed at in that way keeps a person humble. It reminds us that the world does not belong to us and that we represent, in fact, but one small bit of humanity.

Philosophy aside, traveling with kids is intimidating. No matter how rewarding it might be, it's a little scary.

Because my kids having tantrums in my house? Where I can send them to their rooms? I can handle that.

My kids having tantrums on a train in the middle of a totally foreign place? Not so easy to handle.

So, here are a few things we learned along the way. Hopefully these are ideas you can use, ideas you will use as you drag your children around the globe.

1. Keep them fed. Duh, right? But it's harder than it sounds. As an adult, you want to get from one place to another and you can fight through an empty stomach, knowing that your next meal is not that far away. We tried this with our kids -- not that we were intentionally trying to stretch them, we were just trying to pack in as many activities and sights and experiences as we could. Brynn (our older one) can handle being a little hungry. Callie, our younger one, cannot. Much like I've heard her father was at 8 years old, Callie falls apart before her stomach even growls. Grunting, groaning, shaking her body, pissed off at the world. And if we let her get to that place where she is falling apart, she won't eat because nothing "sounds good." So once we figured this out, even when it wasn't convenient, we made sure to keep her fed. This meant frequent stops for snacks and it also meant keeping water on hand. Sometimes water was all she needed, but she didn't recognize it. We had to remember to offer it to her regularly.

2. Build in downtime. During our first couple of days in Hong Kong, we had a lot of ground to cover and not a lot of time. We were staying in an apartment in a great location in the middle of Hong Kong, but it wasn't a place we wanted to hang out during the day. It was small and a bit cramped (as are most places in Hong Kong), it smelled a little mildewy, and it was a little warm. Between not having an ideal place to come back to for a rest and not wanting to sleep during the day for fear of never adjusting to the time difference, plus wanting to see as much as possible in a short amount of time, we may have worked too hard. Callie fell asleep at dinner the first three nights. Head on the table, carried out of restaurants. Meals she normally would have loved she totally missed out on.

Looking back, what could we have done differently during those first few days? We could have found a place for the kids to chill. Some kind of park or open space (not easy to find in Hong Kong, but I'm certain if we looked hard enough we could have found it) would have been a great place for the kids to let their brains rest while their bodies played. That brings me to #3.

3. Find other kids to play with. Our kids are 8 and 10. They're not toddlers. They don't need a LOT of playtime. But they need some. And, frankly, Scott and I are not ideal play companions. During this trip it occurred to me that playtime is to kids what sitting back and drinking a beer (or a glass of wine) is to adults. It helps us unwind, helps us chill out, helps us relax so that we are prepared for the next big thing.

We were lucky that in San Francisco we stayed with friends who have three kids. All three are younger than my kids, but I don't think it mattered. They had a ball playing together and their playtime each evening was enough to unwind the kids for another full day the next day. During the second part of our time in Hong Kong we stayed with friends who have two year old twins. Again, much younger than my kids and, again, it didn't matter. My kids engaged with them and through play were able to chill. In Vietnam we were hoping to have kids around for our kids to play with during the second half of our stay there. That didn't work out as planned, but the girls played really well with each other during the afternoon when we had nothing else to do. In a hot, sweaty, difficult situation, their opportunity to play together is what kept all of us sane.

4. Have realistic expectations. Traveling with kids is not the same as traveling with adults. We didn't see and do everything with our kids that we might have seen and done had it been just the two of us. For instance, in Macau we planned to spend our first afternoon/evening seeing the Las Vegas-ish side of Macau. Exploring the hotels and arcades and wandering past the expensive restaurants. The next day, before catching an evening ferry to the airport, we planned to wander the old side of Macau which was colonized by the Portuguese. Unfortunately, it was raining. And it rained all day long. Scott had a whole walking tour planned for us, with cool facts about everything we were going to see. He had a list of food we wanted to try. If we'd been there alone, we probably would have sucked it up and done the walk in the rain. But with kids? Forget it. We tried sitting in a coffee shop, waiting for the rain to die down. We tried wandering through the Wynn, hoping that eventually the rain would stop. The rain never stopped, so we cut our losses and headed back to the ferry terminal to try to catch an earlier ferry to the airport. At least there we knew the kids could sit back and read or write in their journals and rest. Of course the sun came out as soon as we got on the ferry.

As it turned out, there was a problem at the ferry terminal with our Vietnamese visas, so the extra time came in handy. But even if things had gone smoothly, downtime in the airport would have been better than going with our original plans.

5. Guide them in their learning. Both of my kids were asked by their teachers to keep journals of their trip. You want to know what those journals looked like at first? "I just got on the plane. Now the plane is in the air. The flight attendant brought us drinks. We watched a movie." Yeah, pretty much a play-by-play of everything we did. I encouraged them to choose one thing that they noticed that day to write about. A smell? A sound? A sight? This worked for Brynn. At 10 years old, she's learned how to write essays and can write well from a prompt. Callie still needed extra guidance, though, and by the time we got to Vietnam, she was done writing. She wanted nothing to do with it. At that point, I actually had to write for her. We would talk about what she wanted to say and then she'd dictate to me. And I had to be flexible enough to be okay with that. We never did get through the second half of our time in Vietnam, but at least now she has experience journaling and I hope that next time will be easier.

Before Brynn went back to school on Monday, I asked her, "When your teacher asks you what you learned, what are you going to say?" Her answer? "Ummmm, I learned about rice." Seriously? We just spent how many thousands of dollars and how much time and you learned about rice? I know she learned more than that and I know Brynn's teacher. I know that he wants his students to think critically and expects a lot out of them. That answer wasn't going to cut it. So I stopped her and reminded her that her answer didn't have to be so literal. Her answer needed to be something she couldn't learn from watching a movie or reading a book. It needed to be something that required her being in a new place. That helped move her in the right direction. Then she was coming up with answers like, "I learned that Asia is really different from America," and, "there is a lot more of the world that I want to see." Those were answers we could work with and expand on.

When I think back to my first experiences being in new and different places, I'm not sure that I could have done much better than Brynn, and I was a young adult. I know that the answers are inside her, that she internalized all she saw, but it's hard to make sense out of it. It takes maturity and experience to put into words what you see and feel and learn when you travel.

6. Pack lighter than you think is reasonable. We tried to pack light, but we could have done better. We each had a backpack and nothing else which seemed pretty good when we left the house, but the girls' packs were too heavy for them (especially for Callie -- Brynn did well). Our trip included some significant changes in weather that made packing difficult. We went from the Bay Area (which Scott says is the coldest place he's ever been) to the Mekong Delta (which was in the high nineties and humid while we were there). I don't mind carrying a heavy pack, and neither does Scott, but next time we'll make sure the girls' packs are as light as possible to make transiting from one place to another even easier.

7. Don't avoid the hard stuff. For me, the hardest part of the trip was the two days we spent in the Mekong Delta. It was hot. Like 99 degrees plus super humid. It was a long (3 1/2 hour) bus ride getting out there. Brynn left a backpack in the bathroom of a bus station and we had to go through a pretty drawn out process with the police to get it back while our bus was about to pull out of the parking lot. The place where we were staying was supposed to be a "homestay" but turned out to be more of a guest house. There was no air conditioning and no shower. We were dirty, sweaty, and stinky. It was hard and sometimes it was frustrating. I almost suggested that we cut it short and run back to the comfort of our air conditioned hotel in Saigon.

But I didn't.

And you know what? The kids didn't think it was hard. Or at least they didn't say so. They had fun. They played. They learned. They met a sweet woman from Japan and a great couple from the Netherlands who were staying at the guest house with us. The girls engaged with these strangers from other parts of the world and caught glimpses of cultures that they'd never seen before. They smiled and laughed and answered questions and were really great representatives of America. They made us proud.

Old Vietnamese women grabbed Callie's arms and smacked her behind and pointed at her and smiled toothless grins. (We can't figure out why, but old women and animals all love Callie.) Kids waved at us and yelled, "Hello!" through huge smiles. The girls chased minnows in the muddy water outside our cabin. They adjusted well to the heat and humidity.

As adults, the hard stuff is what makes us physically uncomfortable and makes us nervous because we don't know what to expect. But not for the kids. They took it all in stride and pushed us to be cheerful (or at least pretend to be cheerful) despite our discomfort. For kids, the hard stuff is walking through museums, reading guidebooks, being forced to sit at a table for long stretches of time. For them that isn't fun. Playing in the mud is fun. Meeting new people is fun.

That last part of the trip, the hardest part, reminded me of why I believe in traveling to challenging places. Sometimes it doesn't feel great. It isn't relaxing or luxurious or simple. You don't return home feeling recharged or revived or ready to take on the world. As I get older I see myself wanting to go someplace simple, someplace where I don't feel so challenged. I want to go lie on a beach or sit in a nice restaurant and drink wine. And we will. We need balance. But the stuff that's hard for Scott and me is great for the kids and so I have to remind myself not to avoid it but rather to seek it out and be intentional about including it in our travel plans.

I'll probably write a few more posts about our trip, but I'll do it over on our family blog. If you're interested in following along, feel free to check up on The Friendly Home on Facebook or follow me on Twitter. I'll publicize any other travel posts there. Also, we finally joined the Instagram family while we traveled. You can see all of our pics on Scott's Instagram page, here.

Have you traveled with kids? What would you add? I'm sure there's more to know!

Behind the scenes

2013-03-03T22:20:00.002-08:00

I went on a bit of a photo-uploading blitz tonight and created a new album over at The Friendly Home's Facebook page. If you're not a fan there already, you really should (really, seriously) like the page. Since I seem to be pretty decent at taking progress photos but not so good at posting and writing about them here, I've started an in-progress photo album over there.

Because, really, despite the inactivity and lack of finished project posts here? I am actually working. Have been working all winter long.

So, head on over and get a glimpse of what might be coming down the pipe in the next few weeks.

To get you over there, here's a little peak at what you should expect. This piece is a taller, narrower, and overall daintier version of the X End Table. Now go! Go see what else is in store for you over on Facebook!

Cookies without butter and eggs?

2013-02-24T21:37:00.000-08:00

Monster Cookies with no butter or eggs!

Maybe you're like me and you don't look forward to helping your kids with science fair projects. You know it's a valuable experience, but it's just not your thing. Maybe it sounds like a lot of work and mess and maybe you're not a scientist so you're not sure how you can guide your kid through a project that won't be judged harshly.

Or could I be the only person with those insecurities? Social science I'm pretty good at, but science science? Not so much.

So when my ten year old girl, Brynn, came up with a great idea for a science fair project that would actually answer some questions that our family had, and when it was clear that it was something she could do mostly on her own...I was pretty excited to find out what her results would be.

So, here's what she did. Brynn made two batches of Monster Cookies -- one using eggs and butter and one replacing the eggs and butter with ground flaxseed and water.

She wanted to find out whether the flaxseed cookies would come out looking appetizing and tasting okay. She wasn't so interested in getting the exact same flavor and texture, but would the flax cookies be good enough to want to eat?

That was her question. Would they be good enough to want to eat? That's my kind of scientific question. And I love how she sets the bar low. She makes success easily attainable.

The answer to her question? Heck yes. They were tasty and she actually found that the texture of the flax cookies was better than the texture of the conventional ones. They were moister and less crumbly than the conventional cookies and they tasted just as good.

Flax cookies on the left, conventional on the right.

Here's the recipe for you, because I know you're going to want to try out these cookies for yourself!

1 1/2 C ground flaxseed + 8 Tbsp water (to replace butter)
3/4 C brown sugar
1/2 C sugar
2 Tbsp ground flaxseed + 6 Tbsp water (to replace eggs)
2 t vanilla
3/4 C peanut butter (the real stuff, not with added oil or sugar)
3 1/2 C old fashioned oats
1/2 t salt
1 t baking powder
1 C chocolate chips
1/3 C chopped walnuts

Mix wet ingredients before adding dry ingredients. Bake at 350 for about 12 minutes, rotating the cookie sheet halfway through bake time.

Provence Table

2013-02-13T23:18:00.000-08:00

If you follow me on Pinterest, you may have noticed me pinning the Restoration Hardware Provence table and accompanying Ana White plans. I am not sure how this plan flew under my radar, but I'm totally in love with the look.

As soon as I saw it, I really wanted to dive right in and build one for myself. We've been eating at a 2'x3' table since before Christmas -- I sold our old table and haven't had a chance to build a new one. I'd like this design to be our next table but I really wanted a chance at a trial run before building my own.

This is why I'm SO happy to be working with Sweet Pea Interiors in Fountain. I knew that this table would sell easily in the shop, so I went ahead and built it as a test version.

And I LOVE it. Love, love, love it.

But, alas, it is too big for my dining room, so off to Sweet Pea it goes.

I made a few changes from Ana's plan in order to get closer to the Restoration Hardware look, and because I had several reclaimed 4x4 posts in my yard that I wanted to use.

Ana's plan calls for 2x4s and pocket hole construction. I did use 2x4s for the top part of the frame (under the table top) and also for the V supports, but for the legs, stretcher, and end supports I went with 4x4s. If I'd had enough of them, I would have used 4x4s for the V, too.

Since you can't use pocket holes to join 4x4s together, I used my (new!) table saw to cut lap joints. I'm in love with the joints where the end supports meet the legs -- I love the hefty, farmhouse look of them.

For the table top, I used 1x6s cut down to 4.75" on my table saw. I really like ripping off the curved edges of framing lumber to use in table tops. It is a pain in the rear to work with framing lumber, but its got a great, rustic vibe. And, it's cheap. Bonus. Having said that, I think when it comes time to build my own table, I'll build it out of higher quality lumber -- lumber that is straight, precisely milled, and nicely planed. I don't mind spending that kind of money on a table for myself. I've offered the same option to clients, but the price always scares them off. I can't blame them -- it usually doubles what I have to charge for a dining room table.

For the finish, I primed the table base with dark brown primer and then painted it with flat paint that I custom mixed from leftovers in my garage. The top is oxidized with strong black tea, vinegar, and steel wool. I think this is the first time that I've oxidized in sub-freezing temperatures. It adds a whole new element of unpredictability to the process, one I'll avoid in the future if I'm working on a client piece. The two photos above are probably the most accurate in terms of color. The top came out much darker and blotchier than I've experienced before. I don't know what to attribute it to besides the cold. The wood stayed wet much longer than usual, which I guess gave the tannins more time to react with the oxidizing solution.

It's funny...I don't mind if something doesn't come out exactly as planned as long as I'm building it for myself. But when I'm building for someone else and it doesn't go as planned? It worries me and I end up pouring unending hours into the piece. Whew. Working for myself is much less stressful.

{finishing} Using glaze to add depth and age

2013-02-10T20:24:00.000-08:00

This 52" farmhouse bench needed an aged, rustic finish. To get the look I was going for, I used a five step finishing process:

First I stained the bench with this alcohol-based stain in Dark Walnut.
Next I gave it one coat of flat paint (the color is Aged Mint by Ralph Lauren).
Then I distressed the bench using 180 grit sandpaper to reveal some of the brown stain under the paint.
Next came glazing, which I did using super diluted water-based stain in Black Cherry.
Lastly, I sealed the bench with a satin poly.

Here are a few things I've learned about this process. Your undercoat doesn't have to be perfect, so when you're staining, don't sweat it if it's not perfect. There's no sense in spending a lot of time on this step, because you're just going to cover it up!

After a coat of stain.

The distressing step is a lot easier if you use chalk paint instead of conventional paint. With CeCe Caldwell's chalk paint, all it takes for a good distressing is a damp sponge. The sponge takes off the paint, but not the stain underneath so there's no need to worry about revealing raw wood.

Glaze can get hairy if you don't work fast. Since I was using water-based stain instead of a product made for glazing, I had to work extra fast. Brush on one little section with my left hand, wipe like mad with my right. The depth and age that glaze adds is totally worth the work, though.

I actually wasn't originally planning to glaze this bench, but after I finished painting and distressing, it seemed like the contrast between the turquoise paint and the dark stain underneath was too much without a little something else to tone it down and add some age. Almost like the distressing looked contrived without some aging of the paint as well?

After paint, before distressing and glaze.

Finishes like this are probably 95% art and 5% science -- if you're working on something like this, I think you have to be willing to keep going and going until you like what you've got. Don't get frustrated. Just let your creativity flow. Or pretend to be creative. Fake it 'til you make it.

I promise, it works. ;)

Pssst...find the cut list for this bench here.

52" Farmhouse Bench

2013-02-08T22:04:00.001-08:00

After I built this 6' Farmhouse Table a few weeks ago, the same client who ordered the table requested a matching bench. I used these Ana White plans as a rough guide (except I used pocket holes) but had to adjust the cut list to get the bench down to a size that would slide under the table.

Here's the cut list I used:

4 4x4 @ 16.5" legs (I used reclaimed fence posts for these)
2 2x8 @ 38.5" seat (my 2x8s were ripped down to 6.75" to get rid of the rounded edges)
2 2x8 @ 13.5" breadboard ends of seat
2 2x4 @ 40" side aprons
2 2x4 @ 4" end aprons
2 2x4 @ 11" end supports

The finished dimensions of the bench are 18" high x 52" wide x 13.5" deep.

The only tricky part of building this bench was attaching the 4" side aprons. 4" doesn't leave you enough space to use pocket holes, so I ended up gluing and clamping the little aprons between the legs. Once I was ready to attach the seat to the apron and legs, I used pocket holes to screw the apron into the underside of the seat. I don't think that apron is required for structural support (since the end supports at the bottom of the legs provide support for the legs), but if they weren't there the bench would look pretty goofy.

The bench only took one day to build but, as usual, the finishing process took me a few days to complete. (Hence the frontloaders vs. paint sprayer question you might have seen from me on Facebook.) Don't you just love that aged turquoise finish? I've posted a finishing tutorial for you here.

{finishing} Using isopropyl alcohol-based stain

2013-02-04T11:30:00.001-08:00

If you google "isopropyl alcohol-based wood stain," it's entirely possible you won't find anything that resembles what you're looking for. There's probably a tutorial out there somewhere, but I haven't found it yet. And although the bottle of concentrated tint that I use for staining with alcohol says, "May be be mixed with water or alcohol to create a wood stain," I've been told that the manufacturer recommends using water as the base.

But, you know...I'm such a rebel. I haven't been totally pleased with water-based stain and using isopropyl alcohol (aka: "rubbing" alcohol) seemed like it would solve some of the problems I have with water-based stain.

Alcohol is known for (among other qualities) its quick-evaporation which is why I thought it might work better than water. If you remember from my water-based stain tutorial, I don't wipe off water-based stain like you're supposed to (again, such a rebel). A quick-drying base seemed like it would work better for me since I leave the stain on.

I also thought using alcohol would probably reduce blotchiness (I can't explain why I thought that...just a gut feeling and probably something to do with the stain drying quickly) and also thought it would limit the grain-raising of the wood, cutting out at least one step in the finishing process (no wetting the wood before hand and then sanding the raised grain back down before staining).

While isopropyl alcohol is not non-toxic, when using the 70% concentration with adequate ventilation I've noticed no harsh fumes. The final finish is not as perfect nor as easy to achieve as an oil-based finish, but the lack of fumes and easy cleanup totally has me sold. And probably, as the "woodworker," I'm a much harsher critic of my work than anyone else. I doubt that most people (my clients included) would see the difference between my alcohol-based finish and an oil-based finish.

There's a huge variety of woodworking dyes and tints available in a rainbow of colors (especially in specialty stores like Woodcraft) but the only ones I've worked with are from Vermont Natural Coatings. I've used their Early American tint and their Dark Walnut tint, both in a base of isopropyl alcohol, which I purchased at a drug store. The tints seem expensive at first glance (high price, small bottle) but they go a very, very long way. The alcohol, on the other hand, is super cheap, coming in at only a couple of bucks per pint.

So, here's how I do it. You know I'm all about trial and error and so if you try this, I hope you'll embrace your artistic side and experiment with scraps before you finish an actual piece of furniture.

I start with a measured amount of isopropyl alcohol in a jar that has a top. For this table, I started with one pint of alcohol. To it, I started by adding 10ml of concentrated tint. I put the top on the jar, shook it, and tested the tint on a scrap of wood from the table. I could tell immediately that I would need more tint, as the color was not dark enough and had sort of a purple hue to it. So, I added another 10ml of tint and tried again. I was keeping track of my ratios, so at this point I was up to 20ml to a pint of tint. Dark Walnut is meant to be a dark color (obviously) and getting the depth I needed was important. A color like Early American, on the other hand, is meant to be much lighter and for me it is easier to work with.

I used this 20ml to one pint ratio to stain the underside of the table so that I could be sure I was happy with the color. As it turns out, I ended up needing an additional coat to make the color work at this ratio. As much as I'd like staining to be a one-coat process, using an additional coat actually gives me some wiggle room in finishing. If the stain is a little too concentrated in one spot or a little bare in another, the second coat evens it out. It also gives me the opportunity to lightly sand a spot that might have come out too dark.

For stain application, I used a foam brush to apply a generous amount of stain (not so much that it drips or puddles, but close) following the grain of the wood and starting and ending my strokes at the wood joints. Since I know I can't go back and wipe off the stain, laying down the stain on the wood has to be done carefully and with some precision. (This is where oil-based stain has a clear advantage -- it's much more difficult to mess up than working with water or alcohol.)

On this table, the aprons needed three coats of stain while the rest of the table was fine with just two. The aprons were different species of wood and absorbed the stain differently.

For the sealer on this table, I used the new Heirloom Wipe-On PolyWhey. When you're using poly (any kind of poly) you have to lightly sand between coats in order to make the next coat adhere to the one before. Occasionally I'll sand with too much gusto and take off some of the stain. In order to deal with those little bare spots, on this table I added a few drops of tint to my final two coats of poly, replacing the color that I accidentally sanded out. Using 400 grit sandpaper and a really light hand can keep this from happening, but when I'm working I almost always end up with a little bare spot somewhere, so this trick saved me a lot of frustration!

If you're looking for a less-toxic, non-fumey stain that is easier to use than water-based stain, this might be your solution. Just keep track of how much tint you add to your alcohol so that it's easy to replicate later!

Square pedestal table -- a table of firsts

2013-01-29T07:30:00.001-08:00

A friend recently requested a small square table for her kitchen. She wanted a small version of the farmhouse table, preferably using reclaimed wood. I didn't happen to have the right reclaimed wood on hand, but I did have leftovers from an earlier table -- in fact, all I had to buy to build this table was one 2x6, some bolts and screws, and finishing supplies.

Besides being built from what were essentially scraps in my garage (which is always an exercise in creativity), it was also a good test of my skills in creating a piece of furniture without a plan to follow. I used Ana White's Triple Pedestal table as inspiration for the pedestal, but spent a lot of time standing in my garage with the table pieces upside down, trying to figure out the best way to put it all together.

For me, that's a fun process.

But then, on the day I delivered the table, Ana posted plans for a square pedestal table, also inspired by the Triple Pedestal table. Those plans use only one leg for a center pedestal instead of a trestle like the one I built. Maybe next time...

This was also my first time using alcohol-based stain on a table (I've used it on chairs once before). I'll post a tutorial this week for working with it. I think it's easier than water-based but it doesn't stink like oil-based. For this table, I used Vermont Natural Coatings' Dark Walnut tint in isopropyl alcohol followed by Vermont Natural Coatings Heirloom Wipe-On PolyWhey in satin.

That wipe-on poly is the best sealer I've used yet. Not kidding. I'll do a post on it, too. Promise.

In addition to all the other firsts, this was my first time using hex bolts to attach a table top to the base. Actually, it was my first time using them for anything other than decoration (on the X Tables). For me, it's fun working on a project that stretches me, that forces me to learn something new.

What about you? Have you been learning anything new lately?

{backyard redo} Protecting our Outdoor Furniture

2013-01-24T23:50:00.000-08:00

It seems that our backyard redo series has been interrupted by...well...winter. Bleh.

But even in the dregs of winter, there is still work that can be done to move things along.

Do you remember these chairs? The bright red tabouret chairs I bought after Thanksgiving? I know I told you they'd end up outside, but things move slowly sometimes around here, and so they're still inside.

They will go outside. Eventually.

But, the instructions that came with the chairs very clearly stated that they are not intended for outdoor use.

Ha. We'll see about that.

We live at high elevation (around 6500 feet, I think) and the sun here is intense. To keep it from fading the bright red paint on our chairs, I decided I should make some slipcovers to protect them.

Luckily, these chairs stack easily, as many as four high. I've got eight chairs so I only need two covers to protect them. The chairs won't be covered all the time, but probably from November through April all eight of them will wear their covers, and during the summer I imagine that at least four of them will be covered most of the time since we won't be hosting parties every night of the week.

At least that's not the plan.

To keep the chairs covered, I headed to Lowe's and bought a 12ft x 9ft canvas drop cloth. It was bigger than I needed, but it was a better value than the small drop cloths. I know I'll use the leftover fabric to make covers for the backyard furniture I'll be building (like maybe a table to go with these chairs?) but using a cloth this big was a bit unwieldy. I think next time I'll sacrifice a few bucks and buy a couple of smaller cloths.

Also, I bought the heaviest cloth (10oz) in order to get the best protection from the elements.

Would a fabric made for outdoor use probably hold up longer? Like Sunbrella fabric, with UV protection built in? Yeah, probably. But have you looked at the prices on it?

The drop cloth I bought cost about $27. For that much Sunbrella fabric I'd probably have spent a good $100. So drop cloth it was.

The first thing I did was wash the drop cloth in hot water to maximize shrinkage. Once it was good and dry, I draped it over my stack of chairs and started pinning.

It took a bit of trial and error to get the pinning right. That might be because my only experience with slipcovers comes from watching Trading Spaces (faithfully) about ten years ago. But I think all that time I put in with Hildy and Laurie and Paige must have paid off, because for a first try these covers actually came out okay.

Meaning, they fit. And probably won't blow away when the wind kicks up. I'll count that as success.

I pinned the sides first using the factory edges of the drop cloths, then I pinned the tops. Once I was happy with the shape, I trimmed off the excess and then sewed up the seams. After that, I put the slipcovers on inside out and folded up the hem.

I pressed the crease for the hem before trimming off the excess fabric and turning the hem under (this is how my mom taught me to hem curtains and it works like a charm). I actually only had to hem the back of the cover -- when I pinned it all together, I used the factory hem for the front, making sure it was parallel (or almost parallel) to the floor as I pinned.

Once the hem was stitched, I pressed out a couple of seams. (Not all of them because, really? It's going to sit outside in the snow.) Then I flipped the cover right side out, and tried it on the chairs.

Much to my surprise, it fit! Those of you who follow me on Facebook already know this, though...I couldn't help but post a status update about rocking my first slipcover. I'm not even sure you can call it a slipcover, actually.

This stack of chairs is now sitting out on our new (unusable because it's too dang cold) patio. I'm so looking forward to ~~spring~~ summer when we can finish up out there. In the meantime, I'll keep finding ways to make progress, even if it's just pinning the furniture I'm going to build so that maybe by July I'll have a place to drink a beer in the sun.

Ahhhh...summer.

psst...for more about our backyard redo, check out these posts.

{finishing} Water-Based Stain

2013-01-17T23:50:00.000-08:00

You all know how I try to use the "friendliest" materials when I'm working around the house, right? Oil-based stains and conventional finishes give me headaches and I know they're not good for the environment.

But, as much as it hurts to say this, it seems that most "friendly" finishes have a ways to go before they achieve the look, durability, and ease of application of more traditional finishes.

I'm always experimenting with finishes, trying new things to figure out if there is something I've missed, something that works well and looks great and won't make me (or my kids or the earth) sick. That's how I ended up trying water-based stains.

Here are the drawbacks that I've found with water-based stains:

They raise the grain
They have less "open" time (not easily wiped off)
They seem more opaque than traditional stains (this could also be a benefit)
Not widely available
Hard to predict the color when you dilute the stain

And the benefits:

Easy to dilute using water (rather than having to keep mineral spirits on hand)
Super easy to clean up (you can wash applicators in the sink rather than worrying about how to dispose of them "appropriately")
Have very little, if any, odor. Most of what I smell is just the smell of wet lumber
Available at specialty stores with employees who *might* be able to give you good finishing tips (or they might not have tried water-based stains and will tell you to try something else)
Environmentally-friendly

Through lots of experimenting, I've managed to find ways to get around a few of the drawbacks with water-based stains. If you're used to working with oil-based stains, the transition to water-based takes some practice but it's worth it.

First, when I'm using water-based stains, I do two things before I start staining. I always rub or paint water onto the raw wood before the final sanding. This raises the grain in the wood. Once it's been raised and dried, if you sand lightly the grain-raising will be minimized when you stain. If you sand too hard, you'll get down to wood that wasn't touched by the water the first time around, and your grain will end up raising later.

Second, I usually use wood conditioner. I really don't know whether the wood conditioner helps after I've already done the water step, and it probably depends on how dark I want the stain. If I'm going to let the stain be pretty opaque, then I might not need wood conditioner. If I want to see lots of grain, then I absolutely will use wood conditioner in order to prevent blotchiness. When you buy wood conditioner, be sure to look for one that is meant for water-based stain. Minwax has one, and so does General Finishes.

Third, if I want to see the grain at all, I dilute my stain even more than the can says is appropriate. I don't follow any of the other directions on the can, so why follow that one? The can says not to add more than 10-20% water, but I find that 20% just isn't enough. Sometimes I add as much as 50% water or even more. The problem is that sometimes a diluted color can look very different from the full strength color. With the colors I've worked with (usually darker, less yellow-based tones), the stains tend to get cooler as they're diluted, so I test it on scrap and then mix in warmer tones as needed. If I need to warm it up, I actually really like mixing in a tiny bit of General Finishes Yellow Ochre glaze. I'm sure it's against every rule in the book, but it seems to work for me and I only need a touch to get the warmth I'm looking for. I've considered mixing in some honey-toned stain to add warmth, but I never seem to have any around, so I go for the next best thing -- yellow glaze.

In the image below you'll see some photos of different pieces I've done using General Finishes Espresso stain. The top two are full strength (100% stain) and super opaque. The bottom two let some grain show through. One is 60% stain/40% water, and the last one is around 15% stain/85% water The last one, where I used mostly water with a touch of stain...that was kind of a mistake. I was nearly out of stain so I thinned it enough to get through the project. I was finishing some closet shelves and just needed to get them done.

I'm sure nothing like that has ever happened to you, right?

But I'm actually happy with the rustic-ness of it and it was a great lesson in how much water I could add to the stain and still get some color out of it.

I think it's also important to remember that you can always go back and add more color to your stain for a second coat, but if you start out too opaque and you're not happy with it, you pretty much have to sand the whole finish off and start over.

That, my friends, is a total drag.

Lastly, I try to avoid wiping off water-based stain. The directions say to put the stain on, wait a few minutes, and then wipe it off, but I haven't found a way to wipe it off evenly. That's what started me diluting the stain, so that I could just lay it down and leave it. You have to be more careful with your brush strokes when using this method (the fuller strength the stain, the more the brushstrokes show), but it seems to work for me.

If you're curious about trying water-based stain but you don't want to go buy a whole can, grab some leftover paint and water it waaaaay down. Now you've got water-based stain. I know, it's crazy simple but it works. This is a great way to get colors and greys or whitewashes. For traditional wood colors, I buy a can of stain. But for fun and funky colors? Just grab some paint and start mixing!

6' Farmhouse Table

2013-01-14T09:26:00.003-08:00

Recently I built another beautiful farmhouse table for a client, but made a few modifications from the original Ana White plan and I thought I'd share them with you here, as well as the modified cut list and shopping list, in case you need a scaled-down version of the 7' table.

Plus, if I write it all here then the next time I build a 6' farmhouse table I won't have to lose my mind doing addition and subtraction with fractions.

I started with 2x8 and 2x10 stock for the top, but in order to make the top flat (no grooves from the rounded edges of framing lumber), Scott and I ran all of the lumber for the top through the table saw and ripped off a little over a quarter inch from each edge. It wasn't a super precise process, but it did the job.

So, for the top, we ended up with 2x8s that were actually about 2x6 3/8 and 2x10s that were about 2x8 3/8.

The top was made of 3 ripped 2x8s and 2 ripped 2x10s, giving it an overall width of about 36 1/2". When I placed the planks, I alternated them 2x8-2x10-2x8-2x10-2x8.

Another modification I made was to use one of the ripped 2x10s on the breadboard, to give a little more depth for a person sitting at the end. I also flipped the legs around so that the end support, which holds up the stretcher, is on the inside of the table instead of the outside. That gives the person sitting at the end an extra inch and a half for their legs. I know it doesn't sound like much, but with the wider breadboard, it totals about ten inches of space for that end of the table versus about six inches of space in the original plan, making the head and foot more comfortable seats at the table.

Here's my cut list for the 72"x36 1/2" farmhouse table (keep in mind that my 2x10s and 2x8s are ripped down to narrower sizes):

2 - 2x10 @ 55" (top)
3 - 2x8 @ 55" (top)
1 - 2x10 @ 36 1/2" (breadboard ends -- build your top first, then measure and cut this to get a precise fit.)
2 - 2x4 @ 53 1/2" (side aprons)
2 - 2x4 @ 24" (end aprons)
2 - 24 @ 31" (lower supports)
1 2x4 @ 56 1/2" (stretcher)
4 4x4 @ 29 1/2" (legs)

And here's the shopping list:

4 - 2x4 @ 8ft
1 - 4x4 @ 10ft if you can find a straight one, or 2 4x4 @ 8ft if your ten footers are as twisted as ours.
3 - 2x8 @ 8ft
3 - 2x10 @ 8ft
1 - pack of 50 2 1/2" pocket hole screws
1 - pack of wood plugs (you'll need 12 wood plugs to fill your countersunk holes)

This plan will leave you with quite a bit of leftover wood; maybe even enough to build a second, smaller table. I've got plans for my leftovers -- as soon as the weather here warms up, I'll let you see what I'm creating!

Here are a few more photos of the 6' Farmhouse Table.

Pssst...check out the cut list for a matching Farmhouse Bench. It slides right under this table!

Little grey side tables

2013-01-10T22:25:00.000-08:00

They're kind of like your favorite little black dress, only more fun.

Little grey side tables finished in CeCe Caldwell's Pittsburgh Gray paint and clear wax.

I wish I had before photos. What is wrong with me? Laziness? They were so hideous. For more on their before, check out this post.

Now they're done! The center panel of fabric is super cute, covered by a 16x20 pane of 1/8" glass and trimmed out in 1/4"x 2" wood painted to match the tables.

I don't think I told you this...my original vision for these tables was to turn them into little ottomans. But after I got the center panels upholstered with foam underneath I wasn't happy with the result, so I took the tables apart and kind of started over.

I also considered using burlap for the fabric in the center. It probably would have made selling them easier, but the fabric that's in there now is so unique and textural, I just couldn't pass it up.

It's funny how a simple Goodwill purchase like these tables can take on a life of its own.

These two tables will be for sale at the Sweet Pea Boutique in Fountain, beginning at their grand opening on January 26th!

An Eat To Live secret for cutting calories

2013-01-07T08:49:00.000-08:00

It's not really a secret, not if you've read Eat to Live or Engine 2. But it might be new to you.

This is something I want to share with you because I've heard of so many friends making resolutions to lose weight and get healthier, and it's something that has been a really simple change for me and a change that I think played a huge part in my weight loss last year.

What is it?

Use less olive oil. Or any kind of oil, really.

I've never been the type to eat much fried food, but I do eat sauteed food, like almost every night. When I'm cooking now, I sautee my veggies in low sodium veggie broth instead of olive oil. And when I make salad dressings, I'm more inclined to puree an apple and some vinegar and spices in my blender rather than throwing together olive oil and vinegar.

I still use some olive oil or coconut oil or grapeseed oil, depending on what I'm making, but where I used to sautee in two tablespoons of oil and then add another two as my veggies started to dry out (I never cook in nonstick pans so moisture is a must), now I might use one tablespoon or less, and then I add veggie broth a little at a time until I'm ready for the next step of my recipe.

When I started subbing low sodium veggie broth, I did some mental math to figure out how many calories I was saving by leaving out the oil. The numbers were too big, really, when you consider there are 119 calories in one tablespoon of olive oil (as opposed to 15 calories per CUP of veggie broth), and I was using at least four in each meal I made, not to mention the salad dressing. Over the course of a week, those really add up and they are, essentially, empty calories. Yes, you need some fat in your diet but, according to Dr. Fuhrman of Eat to Live fame, you're better off getting your fat from nuts that you incorporate into your meals (not snacks by the handful) rather than added oil in salads, main courses, and sides.

Veggie broth is not expensive and it comes in really easy to use cartons. I buy my organic low-sodium broth from Whole Foods, where the regular price is $2 per carton. Our Costco just started carrying organic veggie broth too, but it's not low-sodium, six cartons for about $9, I think.

I used to kind of laugh at baking recipes that gave you the option to replace oil with apple sauce. It seemed silly -- let dessert be dessert, right? And that is still my attitude, mostly because we don't eat much dessert-y food here. But cutting out oil in food I eat every day? To me that makes sense, and I wish I'd known sooner about the veggie broth option. Here's hoping a few of you can save some calories, too!

Pieces in progress

2013-01-03T09:36:00.000-08:00

Despite the inactivity here on The Friendly Home blog, I've actually been pretty busy during Christmas break. Here are a few of the projects I've been working on.

I wish I had some before photos I could show you of these tables. They were atrocious. Whitewashed plasticky oak, only $10 each at Goodwill (which is how you know they were really trashy...my Goodwill is usually pricey). The center panel was damaged beyond repair, so I knocked it out with my mallet, wrapped it in this cool black, grey, and white fabric that I found in the remnants area at Hancock Fabrics, and then screwed it back in using pocket holes. Now I'm working on cutting some matching trim and then I'll drop in glass to cover the fabric. I think the tables are turning out super cute.

Here's the 411 on their finish: primed with dark brown tinted VOC-free primer from Sherwin-Williams, painted with Pittsburgh Gray CeCe Caldwell paint, waxed with clear Staples wax. I'll get some better shots of the tables when they're totally done, so you can get a better idea of what the finish looks like. These babies will be up for sale at the new Sweet Pea Boutique in Fountain, Colorado. The store is set to open on January 19th!

The next project I've been working on is this Hunt trestle table and benches.

These pieces have been in my garage waiting for some love for a good two months now. They were in reasonably good shape, but the top of the table was pretty beat up and cracked and needed to be filled, so it wasn't a project worth stripping and re-staining.

Scott is disappointed (that's an understatement) that I painted them yellow, but we can always go back over them with a different color. I was tired of being indecisive and I had the yellow paint lying around, so I just went for it. These, like the tables above, also got a coat of dark brown primer first. The paint I used is a VOC-free oops paint from Sherwin-Williams, so I'm not sure of the color. In order to make it distress more easily, I added some watered-down drywall compound to the paint before working with it. I wanted to see how it would compare to using CeCe Caldwell Chalk Paint.

The verdict? Meh. It does sand better than latex paint, but it doesn't rub off with a wet sponge like CeCe's paint. It also doesn't cover as well as her paint -- this took three coats, although I probably should have just done two so that I could see more of the brown underneath. It does sand down to a super smooth finish, but only on a super smooth surface.

This table will go in my kitchen for a while...until I have time to build myself a new dining table. Then we may replace the top with something bigger and put it outside on our new patio.

Lastly...a free drop-leaf table that a friend passed on to me.

This is a beautiful table with great lines, but the top was pretty beat up and not refinish-able. At least, not without hours and hours of time that I don't have. So it got the same brown primer and yellow paint treatment as the Hunt table and benches above. I love the metal feet on this table -- I need to grab some Brasso today to bring them back to life.

Like the end tables up top, this table will also be for sale at the new Sweet Pea boutique in Fountain!

Not Quite Right

2012-12-31T10:21:00.000-08:00

What do I do when a piece I'm working on comes out not-quite-right?

Sometimes I fuss and fuss and fuss with it until I get it right. Sometimes I throw up my hands and sigh and think, "Oh well." This time? I'm selling it.

So this table? It was supposed to come out weathered gray, like the last farmhouse table. But I bought the wood for it at Home Depot this time instead of Lowe's, because my HD usually has straighter lumber. Apparently it's also a different species. (Douglas Fir instead of Hem Fir or Whitewood?) And the species makes a difference in the color of the finish.

A huge difference.

So what was supposed to be a mellow yellowy-gray turned out orangey-brown. And don't get me wrong, orangey-brown will work fine in someone's house.

But not mine.

And this table, this 4-6 person extending to 10-person table, was supposed to be for my house. And we kind of needed it, like, yesterday. Right now we're eating on a card table. And apparently we will be for the foreseeable future.

Up on Craigslist the table went, along with an explanation for they way-too-cheap price for a table this huge and sturdy. My loss is someone else's gain.

I offered it for a price high enough to cover my supplies and an hour or two of my time, but not nearly enough to cover all the time I spent working on it.

Because it just needed to go. I'm down to not much room in my garage and I can't work on the driveway while it's snowing (it's snowing AGAIN!) so I needed to sell the table.

In the meantime, I got this new table saw for Christmas which should make my next farmhouse tables much easier to build (and there are at least three more tables coming up the pipeline -- one for me and two custom orders).

So, what happens when you finish a piece of furniture and it comes out not quite right? Do you shrug and move on? Throw a hammer at the wall? Put it out on the curb and start over again? Building with inexpensive framing lumber definitely makes the not-quite-right pieces a lot less stressful! But sometimes I think that maybe building with more expensive, higher-quality lumber would result in fewer not-quite-rights. Hmmm...

Merry Christmas!

2012-12-25T08:57:00.002-08:00

Media Center Bridge

2012-12-18T22:46:00.000-08:00

Some of you may remember the media center I built for Ana's book, The Handbuilt Home. It's been in our house for about 15 months now and we absolutely love it. Other than the fact that it doesn't photograph well (black finishes are SO hard to shoot!), we think it is perfect.

Almost perfect.

We've got 22' ceilings in the room where the media center sits. The media center, as designed, was around 6' tall. In a normal house with normal proportions, 6' would probably be great. In this house, with ridiculous proportions, 6' was okay. But with curtains next to the media center that are 9' long, the 6' media center was looking a little dwarfed.

So, I emailed Ana to see if she would consider designing a bridge to go across the top of the media center, adding an additional two feet to the top of it. She was willing to do the design (she's posted the plans here!) and I was happy to build it.

Don't be fooled, my friends. This piece is HUGE. Scott and I had a heck of a time maneuvering it through our house and on top of the media towers. But once we got it up there, it was totally worth it.

Here's what we did to install the bridge:

Remove the baseboards behind the media center and push the whole media center up against the wall, as flush as we could get it. Cords seem to get in the way of something like this, so we settled for *almost* flush.
Place the bridge on top of the towers and square the towers underneath. We had to do a little bit of shimmying and shaking to get everything perfectly square.
Using 1 1/4" wood screws, pre-drill and screw from the underside of the top of the media towers into the underside of the bridge. We used three screws in the top of each media tower.
Using L brackets large enough to span the distance from your bridge to your wall, secure the top of the media bridge to studs in your wall. We used 4 L brackets and more 1 1/4" screws (after pre-drilling). It seems really really sturdy (there was a lot of post-installation tugging to test the whole setup), but if we'd had them on hand we would have used 2" or even 2 1/2" screws.
We considered using a few more L brackets on the sides of the media towers in inconspicuous places, but once we got the top ones up, it really felt sturdy so we decided to forgo the side brackets.
Replace the baseboards on either side of the media towers, cutting them so they sit flush up against the towers.

Eventually I think the L brackets will get a coat of paint (grey on the wall side, black on the furniture side) just to camouflage them a bit. I'd also love to have a veritable garden of indoor plants on top, but I'd never water them so they'd die which would be way too sad for me. Scott says he'd like to be responsible for houseplants, though, so maybe. We'll see. I know they are great for filtering pollutants from indoor air, but they won't do us any good if they're dead.

Besides being difficult to maneuver, this piece is also expensive. Just for this 2' x 10' bridge, the materials cost around $300. Just for the wood and one box of pocket hole screws. Because you need long, super straight 1x12 boards for this, you just can't buy cheap lumber. In fact, cheap lumber isn't even available in these lengths. And, don't forget that the $300 bridge is in addition to the $800-ish you'll spend to build the two towers and the console that make up the rest of the media center. But, it's still WAY cheaper than you'd spend buying solid wood furniture this size, and it's customizable, which is my favorite part.

You might notice one special custom touch I added to this piece: the grass cloth backs! Yep, instead of plain black painted plywood in the back, I added grass cloth that I stole from roman shades we were no longer using. The shades were custom made for our french doors, but when we replaced our french doors the shades didn't fit anymore. So I hung onto them for a few years (thank goodness for the under-the-stairs storage in my house, and my husband's willingness to go along with me) and then cut them up to line the bookcases. I love the touch of texture that they add!

My bridge is built out of gorgeous poplar boards. I kind of felt bad painting them, but soothed myself with the reminder that they'd be distressed and some of the grain and a lot of the brown wood would show through. There's more about the finish (plus the plans for the media console and towers!) in Ana's book -- you should get yourself a copy! And get the media bridge plans on Ana's site here.

Psst...for a tutorial on how to hang your flatscreen tv for the cost of a 2x4, a few bolts, and some wood screws, check out how we did it!

{backyard redo} Wood vs. Natural Gas vs. Propane fire pit

2012-12-17T23:37:00.001-08:00

I mentioned in a previous backyard redo post that we had some discussions about whether to go with a gas fire pit or wood burning pit. The idea of doing gas hadn't occurred to me until Andrew asked if we were considering it.

Actually, we weren't considering it. I really like wood fires. They are warm, they crackle, and they smell cozy. But in researching (and asking a few friends who know a lot more about the environment than we do) we realized that wood fires had a few environmental drawbacks. When I googled this topic, I wasn't able to find any simple guide to help us make this decision. That's where our smarter-than-Scott-and-I-are friends came in to simplify and give us some ideas, and hopefully our thought process can help someone else who is trying to build a "responsible" fire pit.

When it came to wood, here are the thoughts we ended up with:

Wood fires contribute to air pollution. We don't have terrible problems with air pollution here in Colorado Springs, but given the choice, we'd rather minimize our contribution to pollution.
We experience burn bans from time to time (like this summer when we had super hot, dry weather, not to mention a devastating wildfire). It would be a bummer to have a great fire pit and not be able to use it during the best months of the year. Gas fires are, oddly enough, not banned during burn bans.
We weren't sure where the wood for our fires would come from and didn't want to put in the effort to harvest it ourselves from dead stands of trees or beetle kill or other local, sustainable sources. And if we bought it from someone else, we weren't sure where they'd get it or how sustainably it would be harvested. And pretty much, we're too lazy to do the research.
The biggest benefit of wood? Almost no upfront cost. You can even cannibalize an old washing machine, pull out the drum, and use that for a wood burning fire. No kidding.

After wood burning, we considered natural gas and propane. Propane was out almost immediately.

We didn't have a good spot to stash the tank.
We didn't want to deal with replacing the tank.
Propane comes from both crude oil and natural gas, and we didn't want to contribute to more drilling for crude oil.

Wells for crude oil degrade and fragment ecosystems (think, pipelines running across vast swaths of tundra, construction interrupting migration routes, etc...all the arguments made by environmentalists when a new well is about to be drilled or a new pipeline constructed). We didn't really want to contribute to all of the eco-problems created by wells, especially when given another option. Plus there is the whole, reduce-our-dependence-on-foreign-oil argument. Propane had a few strikes against it.

So then we were left with natural gas. We're very suspicious of fracking. Fracking is the process by which natural gas is extracted from shale. (Watch the documentary Gasland if you want to know more.) Despite the fracking process as it stands now, we think natural gas has the potential to be a better source of energy than gas refined from crude (although still not a renewable source, which would be the pinnacle -- clean and renewable). With a lot of whistle blowing and regulation, natural gas extraction could end up being a domestic source of energy that we can feel okay about relying on until something better comes along. And we think (hope, with our fingers crossed) that this is the direction America is headed.

Another huge part of the equation ended up being totally unrelated to the earth-friendliness of our fire pit: the ease of use. We knew that if we had to set up, start, douse, and clean up wood fires, we'd be less likely to use the fire pit than if we just had to turn on the gas and light it. One of our main goals for the backyard was that it would be a place for our family to gather and enjoy time together. For us, part of that was making it easy to use.

In the end, really the ease of use won out over everything, but if we hadn't been so convinced that the choice between wood and natural gas was kind of a toss up, the ease of use issue might have played a smaller role.

And, for those few times when we just need a raging bonfire, we've still got our old metal fire pit to do that job for us.

psst...for more about our backyard redo, check out these posts.

{backyard redo} Things always get worse before they get better

2012-12-10T10:58:00.003-08:00

You know how it goes with any project -- even when you're just painting a room. That chaotic time after a project has started, when your stuff is strewn all over the place, the floors are dirty and you can't find your favorite (fill in the blank).

That's pretty much how every project goes, I think, but it's especially noticeable when the project requires digging up half your backyard.

A few days before work started on our backyard, our sweet Lab/Husky mix, Libbie, was run over by a car. She was on leash out for a walk when she bolted after a deer. The car ran over her belly, lacerated her diaphragm in two spots, and dislocated her hip. She was in a world of hurt (and put a pretty good dent in our bank account). When she got home from the hospital, Libbie was in a hip sling and couldn't walk well. Of course, she needs to be able to get out the sliding door in the photo to go to the bathroom. So a friend who's dealt with dogs for a lot longer than I have recommended setting up a ramp for her to get in and out of the house. Without the ramp we would have had to walk her out through the garage and through the sideyard every time she needed to go potty. I'm just going to guess that we would have seen a few potty accidents in the house.

Libbie in recovery mode.

Libbie wasn't really keen on the whole ramp idea but we managed to coax her out onto it so that she could get to the bathroom with relative ease. Yeah, she still had to go over and around piles of debris in the yard, but she fought through it.

All of this gravel came from behind the concrete block wall that was removed and pushed back to create space for the fire pit and fountain. Eventually most of the gravel went in as backfill behind the new wall, and all the dirt that was removed was hauled off. Watching the guys dig out the hillside made Scott's back hurt. I'm not kidding.

Here's a view from our back door -- the one that Libbie uses to go out to her potty spot. The grey concrete block panel in the photo above is the base for our new fountain. The lines dug to it are for water (to fill the fountain automatically, so that it doesn't run dry) and natural gas (for the fire pit). You can also see one of the little Blue Spruce trees that Andrew and his guys planted for us. As it grows, it should fill in that spot nicely and create a pretty good screen from our neighbors. There are three more of them scattered across the back hill.

Looking back at these photos, I'm pretty thrilled that this phase of construction is over. Even though I know going into every project that things always get worse before they get better, that doesn't really help lower my stress level over the mess, even when I'm only looking at it through a sliding glass door. It also helps that now (a) Libbie can walk and (b) she doesn't have to dodge concrete blocks, tubing, old deck wood, and tools when she goes to the bathroom. Funny how things that seem so simple, like a trip to the doggy outhouse, can be such a big deal!

psst...for more about our backyard redo, check out these posts.

{backyard redo} The Plan

2012-12-06T23:05:00.001-08:00

You know from this post that a couple of months ago we ripped out our sorry excuse for a deck. That was the first step in renovating our backyard, something that has been on our to-do list since we moved into our house in 2004.

I liked to call our old deck "the raft." Or "the dock." It reminded me of a little dock out in a lake...the kind you'd swim to when you were a kid and then lie around for hours in the sun, occasionally doing flips off the side of the dock into the lake?

I didn't spend a lot of time at a lake with a dock as a kid, but somewhere in the recesses of my brain, I know that at some point I experienced a dock like that. And I'm certain that docks like that belong in lakes, not attached to houses and surrounded by grass.

Our backyard before we started work on it.

Another before, but from a different angle. There are, ahem,
a few extra pieces of furniture sitting back there in this shot.

The dock/raft was not a great place to gather. It wasn't big enough, for starters. There was no great focal point and no good way to arrange furniture to seat more than six people. I always kind of wondered when I might fall off and break my ankle. It also lacked afternoon shade and in the summer it turned into a great place to get a tan as long as you had a ten gallon jug of water to keep you from dehydrating like a raisin.

The patch of grass between the deck and the retaining wall wasn't really big enough to play in and it was hard to keep it green. We live in the desert. Grass doesn't really belong here, so to have grass in the back that wasn't even the right shape or size to use for anything seemed kind of lame.

Shall I continue with the multitude of problems in our backyard? Let's see...we back up to a hill and at the top of the hill is a neighbor. There are two scrawny pine trees between our house and theirs, but no trees to provide a great screen.

Deer walk through our yard regularly and browse on whatever is not deer resistant, so the few trees we've attempted to plant have been consumed. The back hill is hot and dry and the soil is a crumbly mess of dried clay. We have a drip system but we never enriched the soil and because it's not an area where we like to hang out, I haven't put much effort into getting anything to grow. So it looks like crap.

I do have some awesome peonies, though...for two weeks a year.

When we were ready to get to work on the backyard, we knew it wasn't something we could tackle ourselves. Plant a few plants? Yes. Reroute the sprinklers, pour concrete, dig out part of the retaining wall? Uh, not so much. That's the kind of stuff we leave to the professionals.

So I started with my friend Patrick's awesome service, Home Project HQ. I listed our project there and got bids from a few different contractors. The one who we ended up going with, the one who I now consider a friend, was Andrew Newland of Newland-Scaping and Whole Yards.

When Andrew came over to see the yard and chat about what our goals were for the space, I knew pretty much immediately that he was the one I wanted working on my yard. Andrew is not like other contractors I've encountered. Let's just start with this: he doesn't look at me like I'm nuts. That was enough of to sell me, right there. But on top of that, he's creative, artistic, and willing to try something different. He gets bored when he does the same thing over and over again and he seems to enjoy the challenge of working with materials in unconventional ways. He cares about sustainability and we see eye to eye on the elements of a healthy lifestyle. My initial impression of him was super positive and I'm thrilled that we were able to work with him on our yard.

During our initial meeting, these are the goals I gave Andrew for our yard:

rip out the whole concrete block retaining wall and replace with river rock
bump back part of the wall to enlarge our backyard space
pour an exposed aggregate patio with a flagstone border and make it big enough to cover almost the entire backyard
install a wood-burning fire pit
build a pergola using wood from the existing deck (this made other contractors squirm)
plant at least three, preferably more, Blue Spruces to screen our yard from the neighbors

I gave him a budget of $15,000 to work with which is, frankly, not nearly enough for the kind of work I was asking him to do, but that's what we had to work with. I also asked him to incorporate used wine bottles into the retaining wall. Between that off-the-wall request and the undersized budget, I figured Andrew would be totally justified in walking away and never coming back again.

But instead he sent me this amazing video of what our yard could look like. Not everything on the video was within our budget, but Andrew was willing to work with us to get the yard done in phases or to let us do what work we could do ourselves in order to get close to our budget.

Here is the proposal that Andrew sent:

I know, right? Is that completely amazing?

To stay close to our budget, we agreed to shrink the patio a bit and only push back the retaining wall in the immediate vicinity of the fire pit. We also agreed to use river rock to replace just the part of the retaining wall that we pushed back instead of all ten million feet of retaining walls that we have in our yard. Instead of doing all the planting for us, we agreed that Andrew and his crew would just plant four Blue Spruce trees. Scott and I will landscape the rest bit-by-bit. We also agreed (after some research and discussion) that the fire pit should be natural gas instead of wood burning, and so in his bid Andrew included the cost of running a gas line.

I was a little wary of having a fountain -- I wasn't sure that we could deal with the maintenance, but Andrew talked me into it and Scott and I are both thrilled that he did. It's much less maintenance than I thought it would be and it looks and sounds lovely. Plus, it's made out of copper pipe, reclaimed wood, and reclaimed corrugated metal. My vocabulary sadly lacks the appropriate words to describe its beauty. You'll just have to see for yourself.

I'll be back in a few days to show you how things are progressing!

psst...for more about our backyard redo, check out these posts.

Christmas fun with CeCe Caldwell's Paint

2012-12-05T07:33:00.001-08:00

Inspired by this pin, on Monday I painted the Joy sign you see above. I'd been working with CeCe Caldwell's mineral-based paint on a table and was getting frustrated because the top wasn't coming out exactly how I wanted it -- there is definitely a learning curve to CeCe's paint when you're transitioning from conventional latex paint. So instead of driving myself crazy with the table top, I took my frustration out on something I knew I wanted heavily distressed...and I looove how it turned out! (Eventually I got the table right, too! More on that next week.)

Here is what I did to make the sign:

Lightly sand the surface of the wood. I used reclaimed dark-stained plywood from an old closet shelf.
Slap the Omaha Ochre CeCe Caldwell paint onto the board. I literally slapped, smooshed, and dragged it on to leave the surface far from smooth. I did this on purpose, so that when I waxed it at the end with dark wax, the wax would have crevices to stick to and add more depth and age.
Slap on a second coat. In retrospect, I could have gone without the second coat probably.
Lightly sand (with 320 grit) the dry paint to give me a surface smooth enough to take the letters.
For the fifth step, I should have distressed with a sponge and then sealed the Omaha Ochre paint. I'll explain why later. If I were to do it over again, I'd use my favorite PolyWhey sealer to seal the distressed paint.
Using a pencil and a 1x3 board to loosely measure my letters, I outlined the letters.
Fill in the letters using CeCe Caldwell's Traverse City Cherry paint. Again, I slapped it on and smooshed it around.
Once it was dry, I lightly sanded again. Here's where I got into some trouble. Sanding mixed the red into the ochre paint and then I had to be super nitpicky about rubbing down the ochre paint with a sponge to get the red out of the cracks and crevices. If I'd sealed the ochre first, this wouldn't have been an issue.
Distress with a sponge -- CeCe's paint is like unsealed drywall compound; it comes off with a damp sponge until you seal it, then it becomes impervious like conventional paint.
Seal with PolyWhey.
Wax with brown wax and then "clean up" extra brown wax using clear wax, which takes off and disperses colored wax.
Wax plywood edges with brown wax.
Buff the heck out of the whole thing with a soft, dry rag.

Here are a couple of close ups so you can see how the dark wax sits in the grooves made when I mooshed the paint around.

In addition to the Joy sign, I made this Noel sign.

These two signs took almost no paint -- you could easily buy two small CeCe paint containers and do this project plus several others before running out.

I had originally planned to sell the Noel sign, but I'm pretty crazy about it sitting out by my front door with my Craigslist antique sled. So...who knows. It may be in my family for years to come. The Joy sign is at my friend Emily's house -- the first in a series of a few pieces I'll be making for her to repay a barter for some sweet Frye boots she gave me.

I'm pretty sure I got the good end of that deal -- an awesome pair of boots and a chance to go crazy with wood and paint. What's not to like about that?

Seeing red

2012-12-02T23:29:00.003-08:00

I think I may have mentioned on Facebook last week that I went a little chair-crazy.

After painting the house grey, I was ready for some color. Specifically, some bright and shiny color. And, since we're in the middle of re-doing our backyard (more to come on that later in the week) and had no furniture to go out there, AND since Black Friday/Cyber Monday were upon us, it seemed like destiny.

It was time for new chairs.

As if I needed confirmation, our old leather parsons chairs sold on Craigslist in about 27 seconds. Within five minutes of the old chairs getting picked up from my house, the UPS man dropped off the new beauties pictured below.

So, as you can tell, it was obviously meant to be.

Of the 16 chairs I bought (you read that right, and yes, there are only four butts in our family), only 10 have arrived thus far. We've got eight of the ones you see in these photos, plus two red director's chairs like these. The red director's chairs will be perfect for chilling outside.

The other six chairs are on their way here via Greyhound.

I know. I'm full of surprises today. Did you know that you can have eBay and Etsy purchases shipped via Greyhound? I didn't. It's way cheaper than the usual shipping methods.

Anyway, the other six chairs (the ones coming on the bus) are old school chairs. Not old-school, as in old-fashioned. Although...they are that too. They're actually Heywood Wakefield chairs that were used in schools starting in the 50's. They are industrial and funky but not worth much so I've got a fun revival in store for them. A revival which will involve the color red. Once they're finished, the school chairs will hang out inside the house -- four at the table, one at my desk, and one at my sewing nook. These other lovely ladies will go out to the patio.

But for now I'm totally enjoying them inside the house.

I had some serious concerns that these chairs would feel too cold. They are, after all, metal and my house is usually about 65 degrees. They are a bit chilly for the first few seconds, but after that they warm up nicely. And, actually, they're surprisingly comfortable. I can sit in the one at my desk and get sucked into Pinterest for hours at a time, just like I did in my cushy leather parson's chair of yore. And for Scott, whose back sometimes aches when he sits in a chair that is too soft, these are just right.

The only person in the family who is unhappy about these chairs, actually, is Callie. Callie, our seven year old, doesn't like change. But, she LOVES bright colors and shiny things, so I thought she'd be into these chairs. To my surprise, when she came home from school and saw them in the kitchen she burst into tears.

I know. It's crazy that she even thinks her unsolicited decorating opinion matters outside of her own room, but for some reason she does. She doesn't like the chairs because they're metal. I don't know why -- that is the only explanation she'd give me. For the first few days she refused to sit in them while we ate, but she did give in last night and sit at the table with us. I guess they're growing on her. Or she's tired of standing while she eats.

So, now, the 411 on these chairs. I settled on these because they were the cheapest. Period. They're not locally made, they're not antiques, they're not supposed to last for a million and one years. But they were only $169 for four chairs and no shipping charges. And their reviews were very positive. Go Overstock. Overstock calls them Tabouret Stacking Chairs.

Others I looked into were the Tolix chairs at Pottery Barn ($269 each), the Marais A chairs from Industry West ($145 each), the Emeco 111 Navy Chair ($260 each), and the Goodform Navy Chair (price varies).

I also searched Craigslist for something similar. I almost lucked out and bought nine Toledo drafting chairs for only $20/each from someone who obviously had NO idea what he was selling, but I was too slow. I even offered to pay over the asking price, but he'd already promised them to someone else. Someone who only paid the asking price! I pined over those chairs for about two weeks (I may have moped around a bit and then even cleaned my house in reaction to losing them) before I bought the Tabouret chairs. I know, they're completely different from the Toledo chairs but I just needed something...bright. And happy.

So for now, these shiny red chairs are brightening my days. When they make their way outside (I have to build them a table first) you'll be the first to know. And when my old school chairs arrive and begin to undergo their revival, you'll hear about that too. And then when I have a party and invite the entire city because I've obviously got seats for everyone...well, I just might keep all the chairs to myself, actually.