Happy Birthday, Nicholas!!

It all started the previous Saturday with our mum's group birthday party. A cake constucted by cupcakes and deconstructed by our 2 year olds. Zahlia enjoying a chocolate one and Lauren in the background.

Nicholas's actual birthday was on the Thursday so not much happened. A fun day with Mummy including a visit to the park, climbing a tree:






But then, Saturday, the bed is finished. Let the party begin:

And a special semi-trailer truck cake. Yum! How good are those oreo wheels slightly softened by the chocolate ganash icing?
Happy Birthday, beautiful boy. We love you xx

Happy Birthday little mate!!...

Ahhh... finally... very happy indeed with the outcome...

... and the little fella gets his first look with a little friend - Marcia... seems ok Dad

... yeah ok - it's really cool dad - ta!!!

Shellac...

Shellac is a natural coating used by furniture types for centuries... it doesn't fade much over centuries, is very hard, gives a very warm feel and look and is easy to work with... comes from the substance secreted by a south asian beetle in protecting its eggs... beetle spit... kinda...

sanding back the first fill coats of shellac on the foot end... head end nearest camera...

putting together the frame for the first time to accurately determine foot and head board lengths...

... then back to shellacing and sanding... you can see in the bottom right the head end top surface is starting to glisten well after just a few coats...

all the mattress tub boards are held by jigs off the floor so it is easier to coat the routed edges as well...
... using a shellac 'rubber' is the best way to apply shellac over a large flat surface... it holds a good 'charge' of shellac and by using pressure you can very finely control the amount of shellac deposited...

Power Tools...

Wood Blokes love power tools... and in my quest to become a Wood Bloke I have sequestered a range ... one of my faves is the router. Cool name. It does a range of things depending on the bit you use... I am using a '3mm rollover' here to get a smooth look to my edges but keep the tough 'square' thing happening...

...making up your own 'jigs' to hold things, space things, do repititive tasks quickly etc is a source of quiet pride amongst woody people... to hold down the compound saw to the workbench I am using bolts with butterfly nuts and spring washers. By holding onto the butterfly nut with one hand I then use my little impact driver to buzz it up. There are four of these holding the saw so doing them by hand would take minutes... this way it takes seconds!!! cool hey?! Also note one of my two workpiece holding stands and spacer jig to clamp timber to when being sawn...!

Irwin clamps (the blue things!!)... the strong ones not the little ones... brilliant things ... total one handed operation... here I use the vice on the saw to hold downwards, an Irwin clamp to clamp towards the fence, and another to hold the piece to the workbench...

I had decided to use epoxy and screws as pins to fix the mitre joints... one of the problems of putting in screws (over dowelling) is it creates a hole where the screw goes in... tada! tapered plug makers!!... obviously you can't just buy a piece of dowel to plug the hole 'cause the figurative pattern would be disrupted ... so you have to match the 'figure' or grain in the wood and create your own tapered plug from very near the hole (and with Silky Oak having so many different patterns each set of holes - four all up - have to be individual sourced)

first select a piece from the immediate cut of below the leg... then jigsaw from that a piece about 7mm wide and match the grain to the screw hole...

... then using a tapered plug cutter cut the plug naking sure you pencil in an arrow for the grain direction...

then carefully massage it into place... and cut it off with a flush cut saw. You'll have to see the finished result!

sanding... lots of sanding... first you prep the wood from the 'dressed' state receive it in from the wood place.... then after all the routing is done ... and then the hand sanding with the 320 and 400... the old chestnut about working thru the numbers applys to sanding... it is sooo much easier to buy all the grades of sandpaper/sanding discs and just work up in steps rather than trying to go straight to the fine one and do lots of sanding with it...

BTW... 5in disc sanders with variable control - ace!!

did I mention lots of sanding?!

... unfortunately power tools only go so far and a few hours of my life have been spent snuggled up with a sanding block and 400grit sandpaper...

Smile :)

Taken at a mum's group outing to Kalinga Park, a fantastic adventure playground, but not the most ideal place for a group of mums of 2 year olds to actually get to talk to each other! Still, a great afternoon was had by all - especially the little fella pictured who discovered a tap was the most fun installation in the park.

Constructing a Mitre

The first challenge in constructing a 45 Mitre joint is cutting the angles so they are flat and have even edges. The next big one is glueing them under pressure. Lots of clamps and a special perpendicular jig. Love it!

A Bed...

...we had been out bed hunting for our little mate a few months ago ... afterall, he would be two soon enough... did the rounds of the homemaker hells looking at cheap asian imports or expensive wood but shoddily put together aussie beds...

and decided... da, dah!

...buy some decent cabinet timber and make our own!! I had made some furniture in my teens - how hard can it be to make decent stuff?!

1st learning experience ... Power tools ... had to return 2 sets so far... what is with letting the customer do your QC for you?!

2nd learning experience... timber... so far out of my depth can't feel the bottom even on my tippy toes... these guys deal in lots of different sorts and mostly undressed - the timber not the timber blokes. Timber blokes wear King Gee, carry tape measures and don't go much for words over 3 syllables... but they do know about quarter cut, end grain, shooting boards and 'on the mitre' ... you don't know what all that is do you? Nor did I - and they knew that I didn't know...
but they were old skool and integrity still prevails which is why - after an error on their part and them (Watts Wood) having the good grace to fix it - we ended up with two 3.8m lengths of 95x45 dressed Silky Oak. The bonus was half of one face was cut on the quarter which gives that classic silky oak shell effect...!!




This changed our plans and a decision was made to do mitre joints to show of the pattern rather than easier and quicker butt joints...
3rd learning experience... there is a reason why you don't see mitre joints in store bought furniture - it is exacting and time consuming. We even had to add a new power tool to the arsenal - a Hitachi compound saw and a lot of clamps - wood blokes love clamps...

expect progress reports up to 26 may!