Our Haul of Lumber

Yeah, we drove back from rural Cleveland with that. That's somewhere in the north of 150 board feet of lumber, a couple empty 33- gallon barrels that once contained the stuff they make marshmallows out of (seriously), and my backpack. We wrapped it up in a couple tarps because we expected rain (naturally because we tarped it there was no rain), and drove it along down the Ohio and Indiana Turnpikes, the Illinois Tollroad, and finally Wisconsin's blessedly toll-free freeways back to the Shaw.

Seriously, screw you toll roads...

Rye Barrel Aged Rye Strong Ale... and Coasters

Besides carpentry, I also dabble in home brewing. Have been since I was 13. Yep, 13. Anyway, for a few years my family and I had kicked around the idea of barrel aging a beer. The problem with barrel aging beer is that barrels tend to be big... really big... like 250 gallons big. I was at a beer and art show in Chicago with my girlfriend (everyone drank the beer, a few people looked at the art, let's just call it a beer show), and got to talking about the barrels are too damn big problem with one of the brewers there. He tipped me off to a company that distills small batch single barrel whiskeys and sells their barrels. Woodinville Whiskey Co., thank you for aging whiskey 8 glorious gallons at a time.

Magnetic Knife Strip 2.0: Walnut Edition

I delivered Magnetic Knife Strip 2.0 to its proud new owner today. He was stoked.

Art Deco Floating Coffee Table and End Table Set

This is a set of two end tables and a coffee table that I just finished. The table top is Honduran mahogany and the legs and rails are made of maple. Nothing was stained. I used a gloss polyurethane finish (Pratt and Lambert's Varmor, which you can't get anymore thanks to the meddling of dirt worshiping hippies). The design features a distinctive "floating" top, and the effect is heavily influenced by the art deco style, because art deco is awesome, obviously.

The coffee table is 17 and 1/2" tall with a top that is 16" wide by 44" long. The end tables are 26" tall with tops that are 16" by 16".

Rubbing a Finish

Rubbing a finish is an optional step that "finishes" the finish. If you zoom in to a microscopic level, a finish is rough (Note: "finish" here could be shellac, varnish, polyurethane, etc..., in my case it was polyurethane). Once the finish cures, ideally a few weeks if not a month, and becomes as hard as it's going to get, you can sand it and smooth that roughness out.

Red Oak Frames

I found some really sweet prints of Miller Park and the Promised Land, Lambeau Field (thanks Huckberry). They needed frames, so I grabbed a little stray red oak and whipped 'em up.

Planers

Big machine, eh?

That's my uncle's planer. It's a big BAMF of a tool. It eats up boards in a hurry and without much struggle at all. Talk about planers generally and a comparison to the one I use after the jump...

Oh, also these suckers are loud. Loud enough that they are the only thing we bother using ear protection while using. Loud noises, power tools, pretty sweet, right?