12.25.2019

Hope everyone had a very blessed Christmas!  It was a wonderful Christmas Eve Mass last night - to make it more special, the choir at our church is outstanding and the director played the pipe organ.  When we got home, the sky was clear and the stars were so clear and bright.

We had a very relaxing Christmas Day - started the day with traditional cinnamon rolls and opening stockings.  Kyle checking out his Worf lego set...

Jim and Kyle put some tubs up in the pole barn attic but we mostly just relaxed, ate and watched some tv.  

Merry Christmas cheers from us to all our family, friends and loyal blog readers!

High 33/Low 22

12.24.2019

Hope everyone is having a wonderful Christmas Eve!

Our day started off early - we had 9:00 appointments at Sam's Club to get snow tires put on my new wheels.  Kyle was getting snow tires as well, so he was coming up from NYC and met us at Sam's, which is outside of Albany.  Jim loaded up the wheels for the trip down...

All went well - Kyle and I both have our new tires!  We were grateful for wonderful, dry weather because after they put the new wheels/tires on, they loaded up my older tires in the back of my car.  Even though they put some plastic down and Jim had brought some blankets, it could have been messy.

Once we got to Saratoga, Jim and Kyle decided to go to Panera's for a "business meeting" as is tradition.  I headed home to make some Christmas cookies.  When they got home, they helped with some sugar sprinkles...

We are going to eat a lighter dinner and then go to Midnight Mass (actually 10:00).  Many blessings to all of you!

High 33/Low 16

12.23.2019

After putting the slides on the drawer yesterday, Jim brought the first one up to see how it fit in the cabinet...

First time, no adjustment needed, beautiful!

These are great slides - look how far the drawer will come out!  Plus, they are soft closing which is nice.  Jim has other slides on order - he wanted to compare them to these from Home Depot.

Time for the second drawer...

Beautiful!  I already have them filled up!

Next, he moved on to the corner cabinet work.  He got the Formica glued on the bottom...

The face frame pieces are all cut!

Making pocket holes in the face frame pieces...

Lots of millwork done on the back of the face frame to make it fit flush against the cabinet...

Assembling the face frame...

Face frame done!

Trimming the Formica...

High 43/Low 22

12.22.2019

Jim started putting together the drawers today!  Look out pretty the color contrasts are...

Bottom all covered in Formica and everything fits perfectly!

Trying it out in the cabinet in the shop...

Putting together the next drawer...

He assembled 4 drawers - they are so pretty!

He figured out placement of the slides on the large drawer.  He obviously has to be careful with putting screws in so they don't come through the inside.  We'll try it out tomorrow in the kitchen.

He then started working on making the wood for the face frame on the corner cabinet...

Putting a coat of polyurethane on some of the corner cabinet pieces...

High 32/Low 26

12.21.2019

Looks like Ohio and a lot of the country will not be having winter weather for the holiday.  We are to get a bit warmer but will still be around the freezing mark on Christmas.  Definitely a White Christmas here!

Saturdays are always short days but Jim got lots done today.  The painted drawer fronts came out beautifully!  Jim's going to let them continue to dry for at least another day before assembling the drawers.

That gave him more time to work on the corner cabinet, continuing to put blocking in place...

A test fit of the cabinet - awesome!

Then at the end of the work day, he got all his polyurethaning done.  This is the third and final coat on the drawer assemblies...

Done and drying...

The bottom of the corner cabinet gets a coat just for protection...

As do the sides...

 Off to get ready for church!

High 22/Low 14

12.20.2019

Another below zero start to the day - and it's not even officially winter until tomorrow!  But on these frigid mornings, we are again grateful that we have both our vehicles inside.  No more scraping, warming up cars, or mice crawling inside to stay warm!

I had to head out to Saratoga to do some grocery fire school errands.  I even had to interrupt Jim's work a couple of times to get him to log onto my computer and send some files to the printer for me.

Jim was happy to be back in his shop today.  He got all the drawers assembled!

He did some hand sanding of the drawer front edges where the back spraying met the front to get them ready for painting.

Then he started working on the next cabinet - the corner cabinet!

Getting blocking made and in place...

Jim waited until the end of the day to spray the fronts of the drawers so there wouldn't be any dust in the air...

 Drawer fronts drying in the shop - they all turned out so pretty!

More...

And even more...

High 20/Low 4

12.19.2019

This was probably our coldest day of the season so definitely a hat day - especially because we spent most of the day out and about.  It was zero when I woke up and never got that warm during the day.

Jim had a morning doctor appointment in Saratoga for his kidney stone follow up - the X-rays were clear and all was well so that was definitely good news.

We went into Home Depot and had another gallon of cabinet paint mixed up so Jim can continue painting.  

But no woodworking today!  By the time we got home, it was almost lunchtime.  Then we had to head the other direction for Jim's annual physical.  They were running behind and the doctor spent good time with Jim, so it was after 4:00 by the time he was finished.  But, again, all good news there as well so we are very grateful!

A quick stop at the post office and home to do trash duty and the day was over!  But all those doctor and dentist appointments are now done for the foreseeable future so it was a good day.

High 16/Low 4