Come on Summer!

I'm ready, aren't you??  Here in sunny California we've had a long, cold winter.  I know people who are laughing their fannies off right now at what I consider cold, but when you're used to winter temps between 60-70 degrees, the 20's and 30's we've been getting are just too much for me!  

So, I'm ready for summer time.  Hot days, warm nights, and outside parties with family and friends over for BBQ's and swimming.  I always have to borrow ice chests when I have family parties.  One for beer, one for sodas, and something to chill wine.  They line the ground next to the BBQ area.  When I want something, I have to bend down to dig through them - I'm old and bending down to get my beer or soda is not something I want to do anymore!

Camper daughter and SIL gave me one of their ice chests.  They said it didn't fit in their motorhome, but I really think they were tired of having to deliver it to my house and then take it home again!  In any case, I'm happy to have it.  This is what it looks like:

  It's huge, so it holds pretty much all the beer and soda we need.  

Which means I can do away with 2 small coolers!  

Well, here's what my laziness prompted me to make and what I was so excited about yesterday!

  

 Pretty cool, huh?

The ice chest fits right down inside the cedar box - cedar, does that ring a bell??  I think I mentioned in an earlier post that my Logger SIL sent me home from a visit with a trunk load of cedar that he'd milled for me.  I used pretty much all of it.  

Notice that I even used the rough edge of the boards with the bark still on it!!!
Wow, I was so impressed with myself.  I had a plan and I made it work.  I was impressed until I got it all nailed together and then noticed that I had nails sticking out all over the place!
That edge is thinner than the board and my nails, which were the right size in the think parts of the wood, didn't quite work right in that edge!  A disaster just waiting to happen is what it was.
After using my little pincher/cutter plier like things to snip off the pokey sharp ends, I think everyone will be safe as they grope for cold drinks!

My brother, Jimbo, had made one of of these that is similar, but much smaller.  He very kindly gave me drawings and clues.  This should have made it simpler, but, in case you don't know, my bro Jimbo was a cabinet maker (all of my brothers were cabinets makers, as was my Dad!).  And, as "simple" as his instructions were, it was still me reading them.  I tried, but some things were just beyond my understanding; oh, I did kind of understand, but I just didn't know how to make it work with my ice chest!

So, I just started cutting wood.  Cut the legs to the height I wanted.  Then tried to lay boards around the chest to determine the width and depth.  The ice chest has bowed out sides!  And handles that don't come off and are really bowed out, making measuring, which we've already established isn't my strong suite, even harder!  Somehow I got it together and the ice chest fits snuggly inside.  

Then I had to make sure it sat inside at the right height for the lid to close correctly.  I measured, and measured again, and added the bottom cross pieces.  And put in the chest.  And, lo and behold, it was about right.  So I nailed the supports in really well.

Then I added the trim around the top of the box.  And, then it dawned on me that I'd forgotten to include the trim in the depth of the box, so now the chest was too low!

I ended up making a box to sit on the supports.  It works, and I'm telling myself that the box will add much needed support to the whole thing!  Yep, that's what I'm telling myself...

See, I had to make sure that lip on the ice chest sat above the trim to that when the wooden lid closed it would fit into the channel in the lid of the ice chest.  

Here it is in it's almost finished state.

You can see in these pictures how I used the rough edging in the trim.

Can you guess what this is?

I needed some really short screws to attach the ice chest lid to the wooden box lid, and I didn't have any. I was scrounging for something to use as  kind of washer, which would add some thickness and allow me to use the screws that I did have, when I found a sheet of these things.  

In it's real life, it's a rubber bumper that sticks to cabinet doors so they don't bang shut.  But, it was the perfect size for what I needed!  

Thank goodness I kept these things when I found them a couple years ago because they did the trick!

So, I'm ready for a party!  I have someplace for you to put your beer.  And, since you're all getting old right along with me, I know you'll appreciate not having to stoop down to grab a cold one!

Soon, very, very, soon!

And, just a plus, looks what's blooming at my house.  I can't remember what these are called, but I've had one for years.  I dug them up from Cara and Jon's house way back in 1998, and have dug them up and moved them with me every time we moved since.

To me, these are spring time...

(and the jasmine's starting to bloom too!)

Bedroom Update...

Well, the headboard is in the room!  It may be a bit too tall - I'm still considering whether I want to chop a few inches off the legs!  If you have a thought about it, share it with me!  In any case, I love it.

Disregard these pillows!
The big ones will be recovered, and I have some pretty, small throw pillows just waiting .

My bed is the kind where the foot and head of the bed moves up and down, it's old and it's lower than most beds these days.  I had a 3" topper on it and I liked the height, but the topper wasn't very comfortable, so I went back to my low mattress.  Instead of chopping off a few inches, though, I just learned that Temperpedic does sell something that you add to the legs to increase the height.
Maybe I'll do that...

And, today I started on the nightstands.
Because there's not a darned thing wrong with these nightstands I've been putting off doing anything to them.  But, today I told myself to get a grip and just do it!  They're only nightstands, what's the worst that could happen?  My answer was that if I really screwed them up and just hated them, I'd take a trip to the thrift store and find something that I could live with.
So there - problem solved.




Still, that first coat of paint looked mighty scary!

First things first though, I had to get the drawers out of the thing - and what a struggle that was.  When the scrapes on my knuckles  started bleeding I was almost ready to give up and just paint it with the drawers still in it.  A piece of tape over the top of my hand solved the problem and I was able to pull hard on the drawer while holding down the little metal tab thingy that pops up to hold the drawer in.  Voila!  the drawer flew out - and just a tiny bit of blood was lost!

I don't have much patience-really, almost none at all when it comes to finishing, but today I really tried to slow my painting process down.  I do want the finish to last (unless I really hate it, then I'll want to sand it all off really fast!!).  So, after rubbing a deglossing compound all over everything, then cleaning all of the deglosser off the pieces, I was ready for the first coat of paint.

I used this 

NO!  Not really.  I love yellow, but this is just too yellow even for me.

This is what I'm using.  It doesn't look yellow in this picture (taken from the Home Depot site), but it is a pretty, soft yellow called "Straw flower"  - even the name is pretty.

And, if you've never used one of these when using a can of spray paint, you should run - don't walk - to get one.  They make using spray cans so much easier!

And, then I had this

 See, that first coat really was scary!  

But, after about 8 very light coats, I had this!

 And, this.

A satiny finish that just needs a very slight sanding.  

Tomorrow I'll tackle nightstand #2, and add some slight distressing to the edges.  I can't wait to get them done and back in my room (it's a mess right now with the stuff from just this one nightstand spread all over the bed and floor!).

Oh, see that thing in the background?  I'm going to tell you all about that just after I fix myself something for dinner-or maybe tomorrow morning!  Depends on whether I have a glass of wine with dinner - hmmm, probably tomorrow morning.  It's a fun thing and I'm really happy with how it turned out.