Kitchen window post

This post was a long way coming. Since I have a lot of images to post, I have been experimenting with some code added to the blogger template in order to have galleries to display the images. It is very clunky but it does the job. I should seriously consider importing this blog into my main website blog, but I have to think how and if I'd still like to keep it more separated.

Meanwhile, let us continue.

It has been cold, wet, and miserable. January and February are not pleasant to work around outside here. Luckily Pim and his father do not seem to mind too much, I have bad joints and I just can't work in these conditions, so besides a coat of paint in a small surface while wearing a Peruvian oversize pullover (what a wuss right?) I have done nothing of this project until the windows were in. By March however I have started gardening ;P

In the gallery below we pick up where we left in the last post:

• Sliding door beam concrete-d, bricks removed, edges redone. First time we can really see some of the garden from the house. In this case, a big pile of bricks :D
• Dining room window (where the shed door used to be) beam placed and concrete-d, bricks removed to widen, bricks added to make door into window, edges redone.
• Bit of wall where the radiator goes gets painted, green of course, and the radiator put up (it was in the way, this is one very large and 100 kg heavy motherfucker).
• Existing door widened, some bricks added between the pre-existing door and window for a stronger structure.
• Existing window narrowed and lowered to be as low as the kitchen counter.
• Outer windowsill stones (Belgian blue sandstone) placed. Some of these are very heavy... unlike other windowsills in the house, we had them delivered, but Pim and his dad installed them. I was able to help moving a couple ;P
• Threshold stones placed, same as above.
• After some delay, windows, door and sliding door/window? placed by the window guys today!
• And now PHEW!

And now, onto other kitchen things... walls, floor, insulation...

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Storage, and a recycled door for the attic bedroom

This last weekend we worked on the door and the storage.

We found a couple of doors in the attic when we bought the house. We think they used to be another partition in the living room (the frame is still there) although it is difficult to know if they belong together since one of them was chopped short. That's the one we're recycling for the bedroom.

One of the glass panes was missing, and the door is too transparent for a bedroom anyway, so I removed the lower two rows of panes, and I will replace them with something opaque. Thinking about options. It was difficult to get them out without breaking some of the... sticks of wood that attach the glass to the door... :(

Some of them were already split from putting the nails in, so no way they weren't gonna break. Anyway, I glued the damages together. 

The bedroom side of the door will be white. That side is also more damaged (and the side where the stick thingies I removed go). Scrape, sand, fill holes, paint.

Decades of grime

Oops

Already split

OOPS

Glue-up

Glass removed, wood lightly scraped

The lock mechanism was fucked up, so we removed the entire box. We'll not put a key back in so I put some thin wood to cover the hole left:

This ebay find is extremely blunt...
and it is still the best saw I've ever used!
Apart from my jewellery saw.
I have to learn to sharpen it.

Glue and clamps

And a little filler to
hide my shoddy job

First layer. Can't find any primer...

Loki...

Second layer today...

 Pim started building a false roof to make storage space in this weird ceiling bit:

OSB "floor"

Today he put up the rest of the OSB, next, plasterboard on the bottom!

Picture dump

I haven't updated in a while, so I'm gonna do a picture dump with a little commentary.

I started removing paint from the front door. It's a mess!

We'll perservere.

We also installed much needed blinds in the attic windows.

We doubted a long time about the colour, finally went with white.

They absolutely block the light.

Shellac!

There was a spare night table around so I washed it, shellac-ed it,
and it is now extra storage in the attic bedroom.

The bathroom vanity suffered water marks, so I fixed it...

The first layers of shellac I used, I mixed well with all the wax contained in the flakes. I found info that the wax is more protective against vapour, which worried me more than a few droplets of water (we ventilate a lot but showers happen). However it is less water resistant.

I rubbed the spots with alcohol and a piece of cloth, which worked quite well, and then gave a few more layers of shellac, this time skimmed from the top of the mix. There will still be wax, but less. If this doesn't perform well enough (we are trying to splatter less, but we're human), I'll have to bring out the varnish :(

And... workshop! I'm very excited about the workshop ;P but it needs lots and lots of work...

Closing gaps with PUR.

Plastering.

Installing water pipes.

Putting up plasterboards.

Water, yay!

Living room double doors

Unfortunately, the double doors from the living room to the front rooms (not sure how to call them yet! we basically have three living rooms...) have been eaten and scratched by a doggy, then ineptly "fixed":

    

Not pictured here, some of the wood between the glass is very damaged, and also difficult to fix. So, on an intact place, I took a "mold" with plasticine to make a metal template-spatula:

With this, regular spatulas, and a variety of fillers I've been trying out, for the last days I've been working on the reconstruction of the doors. Slow work.

Due to the deep damage, they have to be painted. We've chosen semigloss black paint.