I think I can, I think I can

It’s been almost 6 months since my last post, and I don’t have much to show since then. I do have a better excuse, than the dog ate my homework though. Shortly after my last post, I severely strained a muscle in my back by, and that  put me on the sidelines for a good month and a half. By the time I was fully healed The heat of the summer was upon us here in central IL. The stat I heard was in August, we had 27 days with a high over 90 degrees. I know that doesn’t sound that bad, but my shop is usually 10 to 20 degrees hotter than the outside temperature during the summer.  Right as the summer started to subside and getting back into the shop seemed like an enjoyable experiences again, I cracked my ribs in a mountain biking accident.  So after again being sidelined for almost two I was able to start working on my end tables  mid December. Hopefully 2013 will bet better for woodworking than the second half of 2012 was.

With all that being said, I have made some progress.  I have started gluing up sub-components of the end tables. I have the front and back of both end tables  glues together, as well as the both the bottom shelf’s. I have even one of them finished. The finished i used was one coat of Boiled Linseed Oil, and then 8 coats of  satin Pratt & Lambert 38 varnish deluded by 50 percent with Mineral spirits so I could wipe it on.  Finally I learned another valuable lesson from this project, 1/4 sheet sanders will never be completely be replaced by random orbit sanders, because they are much better at sanding complex curved surfaces.