Our house has a fabulous new improvement, compliments of our mad carpentry skills. That’s right – we have skills. Carpentry skills.
We have never been thrilled with our eating arrangement in the kitchen, and have hence not invited tons of friends over for dinner, unless the weather was nice enough to be outside. I had Ladies’ Poker with about eight friends once, and it was quite an uncomfortable fit. All the energy in our tiny house just seemed to smack right into that corner of rickety chairs and bad lighting, getting lost.
Well… no more!
Jay had the great idea to turn the awkward corner into a custom-made L-shaped bench. I designed it and incorporated piano hinges on the seats to lift up for added storage. We went into the project with very rudimentary carpentry skills, but we hated our current arrangement enough to brave the task.
We had the helpful guidance of my grandfather to oversee the operation. It was a good opportunity to spend long hours with him, as he’s getting up there and I know he loves seeing us. He is an amazing woodworker, so he taught us a million things in just two short weekends. (This is what is behind my motivation to rebuild the chicken coop. After learning so much, I can just see so many glaring problems with my current coop…)
Anyways, here is the finished project! We used an eco-friendly stain that we purchased from EcoHaus here in Portland which we were very pleased with. It looks great and we love gathering around the table now. My sister came over the other night for a seed swap and we were there for hours just sprawled out with catalogs, snacks, and plenty of elbow room. So look out world: We’ve got skills.
Synchronistic encouragement, I tell ya. We are going to be building a 10′ long bench for our covered area outside, with hinged seats on it too. I don’t know if we’ll go with a back rest like ya’ll have, but seeing the picture makes me think that would be cool.
If you ever need hardwoods for future projects, check out Portland Urban Hardwoods. I am working on some ideas for projects just so I can buy some of his ultra cool wood. All from urban Portland trees, and kilned in his own back yard. Very cool: http://www.urbanhardwoodrecovery.com/
That is gorgeous! I’m impressed!
It’s official. You ARE the most handy person I know!
I am truly impressed. And the table looks to be movable… meaning a fat friend (say… with a shaved head, for example) could fit there and eat a meal… you know… if, say, he were invited.
(I am, of course, kidding. We both know that there are only, like, two vegetables I’ll eat)
But I AM impressed.
So, today I discovered your blog, and I’ve already emailed myself links to a half dozen posts AND subscribed to the RSS feed on my Google Reader. But this post in particular has been such a DUH! moment for me that I had to comment.
We have a small 1923 house with four (sometimes 5) people living in it, including giant boys (the 5th is a college student). We have a “nook” that is the only place in the kitchen to put a table to sit around (family dinners are very important). Getting in and out is always a pain, and if we ever have guests we end up putting the children on stools with plates in their laps. Just awful.
I can’t wait to get home from work and show my husband (a carpenter) this post. Why have we not done this before?! The bonus storage inside the benches is also ideal for those seasonal extras (large serving bowls, turkey carving implements, special guest placemats and napkins, etc) that we currently store in a box in the basement that gets buried, dusty, etc.
THANK YOU!!
HSM, you are so sweet! Glad you are enjoying the blog and have found some useful posts.
It felt like a “duh” moment for us too when Jay got the idea. We eat all our meals there now, where before we avoided the disorganized area at all costs. Hope it works out for you too!