Saturday, August 27, 2016

Working on my projects

 I have been maxing out the # of projects I can work on in my "Tiny House" @ once. They have been spilling out to other parts of the property! For instance: the barn in the back of the pecan grove has hosted my wood working project: making the bench/window seat/desk for the living room.
I picked up a batch of can pallets from the local coffee roaster Jittery Joe's, which I have been using for all of the interior structural frames of the wheel wells, the cabinets, and now the window seat. The leg of the bench is box elder and the trim cedar.
Middle support frame
Attaching the box elder leg/desk top 

 smooth paneling under side and the under side molding..
  gluing and clamping the front molding  Last gluing and clamping for the top molding, ready to sand and put a coat of danish oil on.
 Bringing my new baby home from the barn out back on bike! The seat cushions have straps that thread through the seat platform.
The wall mounted portion screwed to the L brackets, and the top plate glued and clamped.
 And here's the seat sans cushion.
 In the desk position, the legs double as the support legs for the dining room table.
 And finally here as the window seat! I will have to make another cushion with some more red fabric I have for the back rest. Love having projects to work on!
and finally I added two little legs to support the whole shi-bang!

While I was making the seat/back cushions I made my curtains too! Then I had to make curtain rods to hang them on. I used some scrap and some new 1/2 copper pipe to make frames that fit inside each of the picture windows and bracket type rods that mount on the window doors. It is so much cooler inside now that the curtains are up. 

 Kitchen
 Bed room
 Starboard side doors
 Port side doors
 Living room
  
I had a dream WAY back in the days when the frame was still going up about the curtain design. The dream also showed me how to build the roof trusses too, with partially exposed wood members. In the dream the curtains were made in the Japanese door curtains style design,  but with eye-lit embroidery of bamboo, willow fronds, bamboo stalks, and in the bed room and a "dia de los muertes" type skull illustrated with half the head on each half of the curtains. Maybe I will get to that....the living room window curtains was damaged when some of the bike carts I have been building fell, with the curtains all piled up on them, which I am sure looking at will encourage me to get the embroidery done to correct. I am just glad I didn't break a window! 

So these cart and bike are for my new business!!!! I have been working very much part time lately, helping a local compost service Let Us Compost, build up their bike powered residential curb side pick up service, because the reality is that I am now living with an ankle that has been seriously broken, and I have been hit by a car, which damaged a lot of my tendons and muscles.  I can't stand or walk for any length of time, and I can't exert physical force over time anymore. This limits the type of work I can do, but I have always been such a physical person, getting a sit-down job is out of the question! My doctor said I can ride my bike in moderation, so the compost route once or twice has week has been great, but it's not enough. I would be getting more done on my house, but $$$??
 In the spring I took a small business development class at the Athens Land Trust, and from that, I have embarked on starting a bike powered advertising service, Pedal Promotion.  I have welded two carts together to hold three ads each, re-furbished a bike and done a lot of paper work! So...there will be some sit-down work, but at least it's for my own business instead of someone else's. As of last week I am officially a corporation!
 Here's one of the carts all fixed up with banners, and here are the logos for the business. As with everything I do..it's all made by hand. 
Here's the Pedal Promotion Biz Blog too!