Fog Lifted on Garden Castle Shed

The fog lifted today and the sun came out about two so we dashed out to work a couple of hours. After all these years with my Dutchman I've picked up some of the habits. I remember when we lived in Holland the three years. When the sun comes out by afternoon everyone drops what they are doing to go sit out in the sun a while.

I cleaned off a few pieces of barn wood and a turned piece we picked up in September.

The painting station in the turret is fun to work in, here I've got my paint washes for some of the wood. The log got a coat of clear varnish to protect the bark from flaking, I have plans for several logs.

More painting and that is my paper mache supplies on the left.

Jan is working on the entrance wall. We decided it needed to be solid for the door framing. He put in lots of pieces that go almost to the edge.

Now it's ready for the bending plywood strips for the door frame edges and the inside entrance wall. The ceiling will be insulated but not the rest of the walls, it is a shed after all.

I told Jan the front wall looks like it has chicken pox with all those screws! I'll be filling them in and painting them.

I wrote out my question on the blackboard after the post was paint washed.

These paint washed pieces will be signs.

Finally, here are some great buys from last weekend's swap meet, $1 each for the saw, chisel and file with the nice turned handle and $2 each for the Irwin clamp and coping saw.

A little cleaning and sharpening the chisel will get these tools in working order. Now I need a little rolling tool chest and hand wood working station.

No Stormageddon in Fresno

Stormageddon last week bypassed Fresno. It was a good rain and then fog in the San Joaquin valley. We are at the very northwest area of Fresno and don't get much fog. Bring on the rain, after several years of drought it is needed to replenish the aquifers for the valley farmers. We've actually had more rain since then, yeahhh!

Last week we had our Bible study group's annual pot luck Christmas dinner. It was at our home so it took a couple of days to whip the house into ship shape condition for company. A few doors were closed to hide all the extra things that had to be moved to make room for everyone. I hope nobody peaked but they know me and probably guessed why the doors were closed. I'm still squeezing into the laundry room to do laundry, two sewing machines were shoved in.

Each year I use some holly from a bush in the yard to decorate the table. The bush was dead! Shows you what a terrible gardener I am, in this hard pan area I don't even try. It was too late to do much so dashed to the closest store, SaveMart and picked up three small poinsettias. Not creative it all but with friends, great food and laughs we had a great time.

This photo is for Lisa, to prove I cleared the counters. The table runners were waiting for all the food everyone brought.

Last Saturday we went back to the swap meet on Olive near Clovis Avenue to see what we could find in old tools. It was almost noon so we may have missed some tools, only found the rusty hammer for $1 and the lion drawer pull for $3, we wanted to come home with us.

We decided to hit a few antique shops in old town Clovis, such a fun place to go. As we walked by one shop Jan commented that they didn't have much before and wanted to move on to the antique mall store next door. I commented that you never know, things come in all the time. 

Jan did find something he wanted, the full set of bits. They were in good condition and in their original storage roll. We have been watching Paul Sellers incredible hand woodworking videos on YouTube and his site Woodworking Master Classes so now we see old tools in a new light. With just a few hand tools you can more accurately cut wood than with power tools.

Many years ago I did woodworking and was always so frustrated that things would not be accurate even when using a miter box. I blamed myself when it was the large saw space in the miter box that caused the inaccuracy. Paul Sellers has a video on making your own miter box that will fit your saw for accurate work.

The lion head drawer pull may show up on a drawer made with hand tools! I've always wanted to make dovetail drawers, in the late 1970s I bought a dovetail template for a router but it was just too complicated and confusing, I never did it but now that I've seen Paul Sellers make a perfectly fitting dovetailed box with just a few hand tools it will happen, in the new year.