Last Friday I had a near catastrophe as I went to preview the most recent post, prior to publishing it -- thought I had lost the whole many-pictured many-captioned post (the bad news)! But thanks to a little advice, and a little courage and ingenuity, and a lot of what can only be called luck (although some may prefer to call it the vast intricacies of Google software design), I rescued it. I include this picture mostly to remind myself that the trick turned out to be clicking on the "close" link, which closed the little block. Heaven help me if something different goes wrong the next time.
To those of you who have already tasted the heavenly Belgian Waffles made by former NKU professor Marty Meersman, this photo, in association with my tiny house, needs no caption. For the sadly underpriveleged rest, this photo signals my success in scheduling Marty's Waffles Food Truck for an appearance at the tiny house clean-up and housewarming party near the end of next month (the good news!). Yum!
The sight of the finished starboard siding is really deeply satisfying; having the entry door frame trimmed, and the whole wall sided somehow shifts the exterior work from being "in-progress" to "nearly complete" in my mind. Now it feels like we are almost ready to roll! A vastly untrue, but still very uplifting thought. Again, it looks like a house from this side now; the doorway, even without its door, beckons entry, doesn't it?
M took me into her shop over the weekend and showed me the sheet of hammered copper with its rainbow of colors from annealing it, preparatory to cutting and forming it into the shower pan. Beautiful.
Now we have the decision to make about the final surface color treatment, which could be left as is (as I am sure J in Baton Rouge would want) or treating it with liver of sulfate and giving it a lovely dark brown tone. We have not attempted to explore the myriad of other possible patina options, and, for the sake of keeping it simple, probably won't. Apparently after the color is achieved, a lacquer may be applied to preserve it, the only question for me being: Might there be any issue with soap and water, and tender bare toes, coming in contact with the remnants of the creepy-sounding liver of sulfate over time? I don't mind the thought of the copper aging and acquiring some additional organically patterned patina of its own.
Things-an-inexperienced-metal-worker(me)-did-not-think-of-on-her-own: #1) M devised a crimp for the corners of the shower pan which will have I believe the only soldered seams. Not unsurprisingly, the corner joint needs to be stable in order to solder it, and having the two cut edges simply meet would not be stable. M had the forethought to solve this issue in the design stage, thereby leaving Kyle enough time to rout very shallow channels in the wooden frame to allow PERFECTION of fit for the finished pan into the frame. Wow!
P's well-worn steel-toed boots dangle from the loft as we ponder and cogitate over what 12V wiring I will actually need. There is a constant balancing act between keeping it simple and the sensible idea of slight overkill at the stage of installing wiring into walls. Now is obviously the time to painlessly add paths, devices, etc., for whatever need may be imagined to come up, in the near or distant future. On the other hand, just how many light fixtures and outlets can possibly be needed in a 7' x 14' house that has 7 windows?? Assuming the continued existence of both candles and oil lamps, and that the sun also rises, just how much back up do I need?
A nifty little kit with connectors will allow us to create a 12V outlet without needing separate wiring for a switch. The plan at the moment is to use five doubles and two singles of these, and only one hard-wired 12V device, for a vent fan.
The 100' spool of the Rolls Royce of 12V wire: waterproof, oil-resistant, double-insulated, 14-3, tinned copper, stranded marine cable. Thank you R in South Norwalk for your advice, and L in Columbus for your promptness. We (i.e., P) will be ready to (un)roll on Friday!
I happened to see this label on the inside of the exterior plywood sheathing. Good to know! Minnie will surely have more confidence in this whole enterprise ...
On the topic of labels, this one was cleverly hidden on the edge of the lower sash of the one Marvin window on the house (a circa 1999 display unit), the evergreen-colored one from B's Bargains in California, KY. With the help of two of Kyle's shims, I managed to tilt the sash outward and copy the information so T at Marsh Building Products in Ft. Thomas could order me a full screen for the window. Amazingly (although 1999 seems to me to be a mere moment ago), I could order it in the original evergreen. Thumbs up!
The floor finishing begins with my drawing pencil lines lengthwise on the plywood subfloor, about 3" apart. Then in the distance may be seen a few test lines I stained with the exterior stain/sealer from the cedar siding, and to their right a few lines drawn with a wood stain marker.
The wood stain marker won out, and I was able to draw ALMOST all the lines with one marker. A good buy.
After drawing the stain lines I began sanding (see upper right patch) with medium grit sanding sponges, with the direction of the drawn lines, NOT with the grain of the plywood, which went side-to-side. There were two purposes for the sanding: first, to clean up the dirty surface without wetting it, and second, to impart as many lengthwise striations as possible, to enhance the lengthwise hard wood floor effect.
Above may be seen the floor after directional sanding, as compared to the left-most strip here, that has not yet been sanded.
One 4' x 7' piece of flooring is prepped for staining. But it is time for my wrists to take a break, so more anon.
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Thank you for commenting on my blog. I think this message is for anyone who comments, to let you know, in my case, that there is no knowing when, if, or how I may respond directly to your message!! To quote a famous wizard; "I can't come back! I don't know how it works!" And a famous poet, "We walk backwards into the future." Anyway, I have a feeling this thing is going to grow on me, so we'll be in touch, eventually. Thank you again.