2 weekends of wood work...

Well...
after 24 hours in the wood shop last weekend--and 8 hours of help from PACE student, Joe C--I successfully cut down the pile of wood (which, by the way, $400 of wood is not visually that much--it was a stack, really, not a pile!! How the heck much does it cost to build a house!!!). 2 sets of shelves, two flat files, a window seat, a shoe rack, and the loft for my office all came to life! And I have found that I am just as sloppy in my wood working as I am in my printmaking, but things fit together and look just fine! I learned to make dados on the table saw--which is very very very fun--and much less scary then I thought.
I have no good pictures of the furniture for the house since it is still in pieces in my garage, but here are two lovely shots of my loft at school!


Now all my silk screens, paper screens, printing paper, demo materials, etc can come to school and stay at school.
And I like it in my office better--it is like I made myself a fort to hang around in all day!! And it smells like fresh cut wood, which is one of my favorite smells!!
Ah...satisfaction from hard work...
now on to sanding and finishing...

obsession...

I can see that I have house on the mind...
I promise that in a couple weeks there will be a new post about art...
Art Tents, ideally!

ikea...

Yes, I admit it!
I LOVE IKEA...
I can't help it...things are cheap and cool there!
And Chicago is littered with the stores (ok ok there are only two but Matt's family lives maybe two blocks from one of them!)
And now with the new house on the horizen, Matt and I have been combing their stock for possible new furniture...

I love that most of the stuff that we are looking at is raw pine, so I could treat it to match the furniture that I am making for the house!
And I can't wait to see if we can get some of this stuff in the as is area!
We might have to rent a truck!

wood, wood , and more wood...

Soooo....
I am a lunatic and am going to attempt to make the following for our new house and our move:

-- a 96" x 84" set of built-in shelves (for the wall that bridges between the kitchen and living room)

-- a 64" x 32" set of built-in shelves (like the one at the bottom of the stairs in the image in the past post)

-- a window seat/storage unit (for under one of the double windows in the kitchen or living room--mostly so that the cats can look out!

-- a shoe rack and bench for the hall to the back door!

-- and a flat file for prints and paper to go in the loft bed space in one of the bedrooms


Today I am learning to use the router for the first time so that I can make grooves (I guess they are called dados) for the shelves/dividers/supports to slide into.

And so I can soften the edges of the furniture.
I am going to try to get all the cutting, routering and basic sanding done this weekend...then I will move the wood to the garage for oiling, specialty sanding and poly.

I am also going to create a loft in my school office. Which, well, will make it a tad tight in there...but with losing the garage--what can I really do right now! I need somnewhere to put silk screens, paper and prints, and boxes of stuff for demos, etc.

$400 worth of 1x 10's, 2 x 4's and plywood are being delivered to the Art Building on Saturday morning!
I will have splinters by noon!

I am nervous!

Only three months till we move in!

Well, finally we have jumped through all the hoops and 59 First Street is as good as ours!

It inspected AMAZINGLY well. We only need to do a minimal amount of maintenance type work—extend gutters and other water diverting tasks, some landscaping, water seal the wood siding and deck, add and secure some basement support beams...
Really only little things!
The house has a dry basement, good electric and plumbing, half the roof is new and the other half has about 10 years left in it. It does not have termites or gas leaks...
We went in and measured everything yesterday, so we can begin to think about what to get rid of and what we may need.
It is all very exciting! I even have a little dogwood sapling that I am going to plant!

Oh, and I forgot to explain...
It is currently a rental house. So we will not close on the house until the current lease is up and the renters have moved out. So we close at the end of June and begin to move in on July 14th!!

More about 59 First Street...

We felt good about this house from first word about it. And we were pleasantly surprised on how attractive it was and that it was in such amazing condition! It is an old farm house that was basically gutted and recreated on the inside. Even the basement was basically redone. It is small--technically only a 1.5 story house--because the second story has an "attic" feel. But it is very cozy. It is also set on Athens West side, which is mostly student rental houses. But it is nestled in a wooded and quiet little lot.

There is a cute little wrap around porch. It is very skinny but opens up as you walk around the house to the door off the left hand side.


The house is on an EXTREME hill. I was VERY surprised that my old station wagon got up it! We asked how it was in the winter and we were basically told to walk to work!!
Well, at least winters are mild in Athens and the house is only .4 miles from Matt's job...little more to mine (we would actually be closer to town then we are in our current rental)!!


This is the living room, which has glass double doors that open on to the back of the porch and look out down the hill.
The house has hardwood floors on both floors.
Can anyone tell me from looking if they are the orginal hardwood?
And a brick chimney runs up through the complete center, you can see it here between the living room and kitchen.


The kitchen is very functional. WITH A GAS STOVE--which has been very rare! And pink tile countertops!



Well, lets just say that I am VERY excited!!
And I am sure to write more very soon!

We have found a house!!!

CHARMING 4 BEDROOM, 2 BATH HOME WITHIN WALKING DISTANCE OF OU CAMPUS. WOODSY LOT WITH PRIVATE PATIO AND FENCED BACKYARD, FULL FRONT PORCH. OFF-STREET PARKING. HOME WAS BUILT IN 1898, REMODELED IN 1996 AND TASTEFULLY UPDATED. OPEN FLOOR PLAN, FIREPLACE. ALL APPLIANCES STAY. WOOD FLOORS, LOTS OF STORAGE. REALLY ADORABLE.