Fall

In lieu of snow we had freezing temperatures which made the leaves fall like snow this morning. It was pretty amazing to see, given the lack of any wind.

Rain chain detail

Rain chain detail

Front walk task has a "checked" next to

Front walk task has a "checked" next to it

Jet race at dusk!

Jet race at dusk!

Stepping towards completion

First the pun. I've been making stepping stones for the front walk. Here are 6 in progress. The bottom ones are poured concrete, and the top shows the leaves I'm casting in them. Sorta of fossils / kind of a time lapse photo set of the 2009 Fall season.

Here's one up close

Jess is industrious! Here's a picture of her picture wall project. She probably tried 100 arrangements on the table as she designed it.

Here's some throw pillows she made that we throw. They're on the new couch.

Sorry I'm not tons chatty today. I asked this squirrel from out back to do the talking for me. She was in the pecan tree that's donating the leaves for the stepping stones. However, she couldn't talk because her mouth was full...

Breakfast is served!

Breakfast is served!

Rain! Rain! Rain!

Rain! Rain! Rain!

Cold front

Cold It's only in the 90's and it feels great out! Hopefully we're done with the 100's.

Front Both these pics are from a lazy Sunday (perhaps sundae later...?) hanging out on the front porch while the dogs lounge in the grass. I'm sitting on the front step thoroughly enjoying myself as I type you this note. I can't express how happy I am to have Charlie, and to watch him enjoying his day. He's had a very rough last few days and we were pretty sure his time had come to an end. His recent rebound is nothing short of miraculous. It's like dog spelled backwards.

See the new paint and stenciling on the glider that my sweet is sitting on? That's project wrapped up today. Also, J.C., our architect, came by to take pics today. He wanted them for portfolio and may send out some proposals to get it published.

Concrete and now wood

The rest of the counter tops have been installed a couple of weeks now. They're made from 1 x 6 planks of oak that I glued edge to edge. The face has a 45° cut (miter?) and there's a 1.5" edge piece to give them mass.

Here's a pic of the bulk of them so you can see them rounding the corner and surrounding the stove.



Here's a close-up so you can see the concrete adjacent to the wood and, if you click on the pic, you'll see the wood's details.

One more chore - done

I installed the concrete countertop today. I learned a lot in this process, so if you want to do your own read on and don't be afraid to just ask.
Click the pic to enlarge the details.
The cost was about $250, or $15 per square foot. Compare that to granite!


Useful sites and some notes:
Cheng Design. The book and DVD were indispensable
Although I now think that lots of the admix stuff (for strength) is selling to your fear of failing rather than helping tons
This online instructables article
Diamond polish pads Also, get a couple of hand pads and maybe an extra 50 grit if you're going to do lots of grinding to expose inlays or aggregates.
If you've done a ton of searching, but found no leads... McCoy's sells rapid set water reducer in small packet quantities, I just wanna share this because it took a while to find any leads for small batches. However, I didn't use any.
For my mix, I used Quikrete 5000 and 1/3 the suggested Cheng Pro-Fomula for a project my size (3 cubic feet). A 1 cubic foot mix kit came with the book, so I threw it in. It gave me the grey color. I'm pretty sure the color would have been nearly black had I purchased more. I think their pigments are top-notch. If you do buy them, then you gain the reducer and fibers as a bonus.
I used a gas powered, rented, mixer. I should have rented a vibrator. Check this posting for details on my sander-turned vibrator. Next time I'd pour each half separately, so I'd net out twice the time for vibrating and scribing per piece.

The counter is installed on Ikea cabinets. It's 400 lbs. I replaced the Ikea cabinet feet with pedestals made from 2x4's. I sistered the interior cabinet walls with 3/4" plywood. And I used the cross braces provided by Ikea across any spans. There's a sub floor of 3/4 plywood under the concrete to distribute the weight, and at the end near the fridge, I left a small overhang. This is because there was no room inside the cabinet (with the drawers) to sister in any extra wall strength. If I ever want to bolster that wall, I can use the lip of plywood and wedge in a sister outer wall. Otherwise, after freaking out about the weight a few times, I decided to not freak out any longer.

Thanks to all my helpers. They were great for both brawn and moral support.

We're in RI

We're in RI this week visiting the family and this is the Block Island ferry. We're having a great time. Hilltop Ice Cream, Dunkin ice coffees, pasta, and (most important) lotsa great UKC members. A couple of members are missing during this visit and we miss them!

CSA bounty

We've been getting bi-weekly boxes of veggies from a Community Supported Agriculture program (fancy / poopy name for a farm). The one we currently belong to is Johnson's Backyard Garden. Anyone have a good cucumber recipe?

weekend projects

I (think, hope, think, hope) I finally have a decent test countertop casting. I'll know next weekend when I remove it from the mold. Here's a pic of it just after the pour. Ever wonder what to do with the palm sander that eats sand paper? Screw its pad to a piece of scrap wood and then screw that wood to your concrete mold to vibrate it. (Ryobi, avoid them by the way.)

Jes is working on her pillow sewing method. She used an old table cloth for these. We're gonna put pillows in the dining nook and dine cozy.

new spaces and creations

Jes has been making herself the perfect office. She found a great old tanker desk and we scored a cool pegboard for a whopping $1.50 at Habitat for Humanity.

She's using the pegborad as an inspiration holder.

This is Bandito. His fur is the recycled bed from our friend Melissa's former dog's bed. Melissa's dog, Max, died a bit tragically, and Jes used his old bed and some fabric and vintage buttons to give it new life as a memento of Max.

And we have a dining table. I built this over the weekend from pine plank flooring. Now, I've gotta surround it with some benches.

Command Vehicle?

What's with all the SWAT Winnebagos owned by the city of Austin? This thing was passing the office just now.

update 6-19-09... another one! As a taxpayer, can I sign one of these out for a road trip?

Seeqpod time with Matt & Brady

Seeqpod time with Matt & Brady

New x-stitch art from Etsy

New x-stitch art from Etsy

HH 4 his b-day 4-25

HH 4 his b-day 4-25

DSC00244

DSC00242

New dining light and more

Just installed a dining area light today. We purchased it from Rejuvenation in Portland, OR. Jes supplied the details of all the parts we wanted and they built it out.

Closer...

Here's a print that Jes got through etsy.com. Have you checked it out yet? Crafty people with web store fronts. This one is by an artist in Mexico and it's the ends of logs stacked in a pile.

and Charlie... next to Lucy's mega eyeball.

From cartoon to real life

Looking at these pictures next to each other makes me feel like a bridge between second life and first has been made. While, I know countless architectural drawings have been cast into stone, steel and wood prior to now, this is my first time to take part in such an endeavor. Also, using Google Sketchup is as close to playing "Second Life", the online game, as I have come. And, although I didn't draw the one posted here, I have many versions of my house that I have cartooned in Sketchup and so I feel steeped in the mindset you can get from being able to rotate and walk through a cartoon while meditating on the goal of actually building the model one day. As we started this project, I had this cartoon printed on my desk at work so I could keep my eye on the target. It's so cool to see it all in real life.