Bliss

Some of what I’ve been up to over the past month.

More later.

Wax On, Wax Off, Or Something Like That

Recently the Venn Diagram of Life had enough overlap that I was able to address the problem of the blanched finish on the sill/shelf of the new bay window in the dining room.  As you may recall, I trimmed out the window with antique cherry I had in my stash, and sealed the shelf with epoxy because there was a 100% chance that Mrs. Barn would be using it to hold plants.  In order to unify the overall appearance of the window and shelf, I glazed the veneered pine shelf with an oil stain to match the cherry.

It looked grand until I varnished over the glazing with P&L 38 that then blushed overnight as it dried.  I mean, the kind of blushing when we were spraying cellulose nitrate on a muggy July day in South Florida.

A reader wrote to tell me that an amine component of the epoxy hardener was the culprit.  Despite several efforts to mitigate the whitened surface it remained in place, leading me to the inescapable conclusion that the oil varnish and the oil glaze underneath it had to come off.

The time for that to occur had finally arrived and the combination of a low-odor stripper with the open windows inflicted minimal affect inside the house.  A very small test area worked well, a larger test area confirmed my path of execution.

My method was to brush on some low odor paint remover, cover that with aluminum foil, and let it work its magic for about three hours.

At the end of that time the foil was peeled back and the now-dissolve varnish and stain scraped/wiped off slicker’n cat snot.

My original plan was to introduce a colorant into a new application of the varnish to achieve the same cherry tone, but the fact is we like the contrast so much I am going to leave it looking just the way it is.  I’ll rub out the epoxy finish and call it “done.”

Latest Gabfest (NOT woodworking)

My friend of 35 years, broadcaster Brian Wilson, just posted our latest conversation over at his Brian Wilson Writes Substack.  Feel free to find and give it a listen unless you dislike pungent (but not vulgar) commentary on the current state of affairs, with topics ranging from Self Irrigating Planters in the garden to “Just War Theory” in the world at large and many points in between.

Greenhouse Update – Mrs. Barn’s SIPs

Things have been popping in the orbit of Shangri-la, what with summer gardening (soon to be complimented with winter gardening), visiting the grandsons (and their parents), preparing for the upcoming woodfinishing workshop and historic trades fair, and a multitude of other stuff disrupting my writing and blogging routines.

The greenhouse is currently the home for a series of Self Irrigating Planters Mrs. Barn asked me to create for her.  We built five different versions and in keeping with her background as a plant scientist she was conducting a standardized experiment to determine which version is the one to go with in the future.  We plan to use SIPs almost exclusively inside the greenhouse so her efforts are well worth it.

These images are from a month ago, so the plants are all bigger now and burgeoning with tomatoes or eggplants.

In addition to the greenhouse experiments she’s been harvesting the seeming bushels of green beans we love so much.  Nothing quite like fresh green beans, and her dilled beans are the best.

The asparagus season is long in the rearview mirror but was savored intensely in its time.  The asparagus plants are now full-blown bushes about ten feet tall.  Mrs. Barn sez this is one of the keys to keeping an asparagus bed thriving.  She must be right, ours is many years old.

As for all the other activities, stay tuned.