monster update
oh happy day!
Today was long and tiring. Since Tuesday I have been working non stop on getting the doors installed in the nursery. It has been quite a process, but it pleases me to say that I’m writing this blog rested and relaxed in the comfort of my Adirondack chair on the back porch with a cigar in my mouth and some HEB sushi in my belly.
Installing new doors is not easy. Its quite a long process.
I first started with the door slabs. I gave them about 3 coats of semitransparent polyurethane. Sanding with a really high grit between coats. (like 320grit.) This alone took a day. It takes a while for the coats to dry, and then you got to flip the doors and do the other side.
As you can see in the picture below... the doors come natural. They look nice but lack that finished glossy look and protection from crayola, hence polyurethane.
In the downtime I worked on hanging the Conan poster in the stairway and touching up the paint in the nursery.
So today I started with the real work. I got to say, its pretty daunting. But I look at it the way my friend Ceci looks at even the most daunting of computer problems. “Man made computers. Man should be able to fix computers”
So while its not really an option anymore, seeing as how I gave away all the old doors and I cant afford to have anyone come and do them for me…
I marched on…telling myself, I’m a college graduate. I can do this. All I need is instructions.
That brings me to a point. I have been thinking a lot lately about what I will teach my son. I have thought a lot about how my dad taught me. And how that worked or didn’t work. Well I shouldn’t say that. Because I don’t think anything didn’t work. But I cant get over the thought of how I want my kid to like soccer so much. But then I think…but I don’t want to force soccer or any of my intrsets for that matter upon him. Then my mind realizes that I only need to expose him to it and hope that he likes it.
Because after all, that must be how my dad got me to like soccer.
Because here is the funny part. My dad was known as a Football coach. American football.
I never even played football in junior high school or ever.
So how did I become such a soccer fan? Well I know, but that’s not the point. The point is, is that my dad never forced me to play football. That’s one thing that my dad has taught me without even telling me anything. I have been thinking about my dad a lot lately for obvious reasons, and because its his birthday tomorrow. Happy Birthday Dad!
But things come up here and there as I journey on this path.
I think my friend Chirs Goelkel summed it up best. He is a new dad and I asked him in a very generic way, “so what's it like to be a new dad?”
His answer was unforgettable. He simply puffed on his cigar, looked around for a bit, looked at me and with a smile in his eyes said, “I get it. I get it all. I understand. My dad..the commercials..everything! I get it now!”
And I’m starting to get it too.
But I’ve had too much sake tonight. Lets stay on target.
We went in for a check up today. All is good!
Lil’ T is more beautiful with each day that passes. And Baby G is really starting to …poof out? I don’t really know how to explain it. We are now full term. So if the baby decides to come early all will be ok. The doctor says that the baby is measuring at 7 lbs 4 ounces right now. But I don’t think the baby will come early.
And neither should you. Or should you say it. I was reading this baby ethics thing online about what not to say to a pregnant women. I ran them by Theresa and she agreed.
1. Oh , you look big!
2. Oh, you look small!
Yep. People are different. In sooooo many ways. One of them, in women is how they carry a child. Telling them they look big or small (for oh say week 30) might make them feel worried or fearful.
Just tell them they look beautiful.
3. Miscarriage stories.
4. Critiquing names
5. Oh, are you gonna make it to the due date? You look huge!!!! There aint no more room in there!
Ok, seriously, back to the doors. Geez!
Oh, Theresa and I have talked. If you want to come visit the baby, you better visit him in the hospital, cuzz Me and T and Baby G are going to be bonding for a month with no interruptions. That means no family visits too.
Ok doors.
So I spread out the instruction from the lowes website, from the door knob instructions and from the instructions from this awesome little kit that is supposed to make door installation easy in 4 simple steps.
Oh this gets me back to what I meant to talk about when I started going off about my dad. I read instructions. I started thinking about it. Did my dad teach me to read instructions? I tried to remember that last instance that would put us in that situation. I could only think of when I was in boyscouts and we had to build little racecars for the pinewood derby. I cant remember if he read them or not. But I do remember there being instructions.
But anyway, Im going to teach my kid to read instructions.
Ok so, moving on.
In the interest of making this quick, im going to do this photo essay style!
1. figure out where the hinges go. measure. double measure. triple measure. get confused. second guess measure again. and set the template.
chisel away!
remove the template
remove template and chisel the leftover.
install the hinges and make sure everything lines up.
Install doorknob jig
bore the doorknob hole.
bore the lockset hole.
route and chisel the lockset plate and install the strike bolt in the door jamb
install the door knob
and wahlah!
This was so tiring. the hardest thing was chiseling. its not easy, especially if you want your mortise sets to look nice. but i did it! and the end result looks awesome! there are a lot more steps that i didnt mention. After you have done one door, the rest come easily. kinda like cubitec!
So both doors in the nursery are done! horray! So now the nursery only lacks the shelf that my friend tony is building. after that is installed, the nursery will be complete! (insert malefic laugh here)
It feels so good the have the nursery doors installed and finished. after all the prep and work that went into the first door, when i had finished the last step in the process, screwing the doorknob in the door. I simply closed the door. I heard it shut. I opened it. shut it. and laughed. I just couldnt believe that A. it worked. and B. that i did it, and its done. I laughed for about 30 seconds and then i just sat there and looked at it. amazing.
I got to say, this would have been much harder if not impossible to do if i didnt have my friend Tony. He told me how to sand the doors, let me borrow his chisels and taught me how to chisel. I would not recommend doing this on your own unless you know someone like Tony with all those tools and stuff.
Now i have to paint the bedroom doors and start with them!
Today was long and tiring. Since Tuesday I have been working non stop on getting the doors installed in the nursery. It has been quite a process, but it pleases me to say that I’m writing this blog rested and relaxed in the comfort of my Adirondack chair on the back porch with a cigar in my mouth and some HEB sushi in my belly.
Installing new doors is not easy. Its quite a long process.
I first started with the door slabs. I gave them about 3 coats of semitransparent polyurethane. Sanding with a really high grit between coats. (like 320grit.) This alone took a day. It takes a while for the coats to dry, and then you got to flip the doors and do the other side.
As you can see in the picture below... the doors come natural. They look nice but lack that finished glossy look and protection from crayola, hence polyurethane.
In the downtime I worked on hanging the Conan poster in the stairway and touching up the paint in the nursery.
So today I started with the real work. I got to say, its pretty daunting. But I look at it the way my friend Ceci looks at even the most daunting of computer problems. “Man made computers. Man should be able to fix computers”
So while its not really an option anymore, seeing as how I gave away all the old doors and I cant afford to have anyone come and do them for me…
I marched on…telling myself, I’m a college graduate. I can do this. All I need is instructions.
That brings me to a point. I have been thinking a lot lately about what I will teach my son. I have thought a lot about how my dad taught me. And how that worked or didn’t work. Well I shouldn’t say that. Because I don’t think anything didn’t work. But I cant get over the thought of how I want my kid to like soccer so much. But then I think…but I don’t want to force soccer or any of my intrsets for that matter upon him. Then my mind realizes that I only need to expose him to it and hope that he likes it.
Because after all, that must be how my dad got me to like soccer.
Because here is the funny part. My dad was known as a Football coach. American football.
I never even played football in junior high school or ever.
So how did I become such a soccer fan? Well I know, but that’s not the point. The point is, is that my dad never forced me to play football. That’s one thing that my dad has taught me without even telling me anything. I have been thinking about my dad a lot lately for obvious reasons, and because its his birthday tomorrow. Happy Birthday Dad!
But things come up here and there as I journey on this path.
I think my friend Chirs Goelkel summed it up best. He is a new dad and I asked him in a very generic way, “so what's it like to be a new dad?”
His answer was unforgettable. He simply puffed on his cigar, looked around for a bit, looked at me and with a smile in his eyes said, “I get it. I get it all. I understand. My dad..the commercials..everything! I get it now!”
And I’m starting to get it too.
But I’ve had too much sake tonight. Lets stay on target.
We went in for a check up today. All is good!
Lil’ T is more beautiful with each day that passes. And Baby G is really starting to …poof out? I don’t really know how to explain it. We are now full term. So if the baby decides to come early all will be ok. The doctor says that the baby is measuring at 7 lbs 4 ounces right now. But I don’t think the baby will come early.
And neither should you. Or should you say it. I was reading this baby ethics thing online about what not to say to a pregnant women. I ran them by Theresa and she agreed.
1. Oh , you look big!
2. Oh, you look small!
Yep. People are different. In sooooo many ways. One of them, in women is how they carry a child. Telling them they look big or small (for oh say week 30) might make them feel worried or fearful.
Just tell them they look beautiful.
3. Miscarriage stories.
4. Critiquing names
5. Oh, are you gonna make it to the due date? You look huge!!!! There aint no more room in there!
Ok, seriously, back to the doors. Geez!
Oh, Theresa and I have talked. If you want to come visit the baby, you better visit him in the hospital, cuzz Me and T and Baby G are going to be bonding for a month with no interruptions. That means no family visits too.
Ok doors.
So I spread out the instruction from the lowes website, from the door knob instructions and from the instructions from this awesome little kit that is supposed to make door installation easy in 4 simple steps.
Oh this gets me back to what I meant to talk about when I started going off about my dad. I read instructions. I started thinking about it. Did my dad teach me to read instructions? I tried to remember that last instance that would put us in that situation. I could only think of when I was in boyscouts and we had to build little racecars for the pinewood derby. I cant remember if he read them or not. But I do remember there being instructions.
But anyway, Im going to teach my kid to read instructions.
Ok so, moving on.
In the interest of making this quick, im going to do this photo essay style!
1. figure out where the hinges go. measure. double measure. triple measure. get confused. second guess measure again. and set the template.
chisel away!
remove the template
remove template and chisel the leftover.
install the hinges and make sure everything lines up.
Install doorknob jig
bore the doorknob hole.
bore the lockset hole.
route and chisel the lockset plate and install the strike bolt in the door jamb
install the door knob
and wahlah!
This was so tiring. the hardest thing was chiseling. its not easy, especially if you want your mortise sets to look nice. but i did it! and the end result looks awesome! there are a lot more steps that i didnt mention. After you have done one door, the rest come easily. kinda like cubitec!
So both doors in the nursery are done! horray! So now the nursery only lacks the shelf that my friend tony is building. after that is installed, the nursery will be complete! (insert malefic laugh here)
It feels so good the have the nursery doors installed and finished. after all the prep and work that went into the first door, when i had finished the last step in the process, screwing the doorknob in the door. I simply closed the door. I heard it shut. I opened it. shut it. and laughed. I just couldnt believe that A. it worked. and B. that i did it, and its done. I laughed for about 30 seconds and then i just sat there and looked at it. amazing.
I got to say, this would have been much harder if not impossible to do if i didnt have my friend Tony. He told me how to sand the doors, let me borrow his chisels and taught me how to chisel. I would not recommend doing this on your own unless you know someone like Tony with all those tools and stuff.
Now i have to paint the bedroom doors and start with them!
posted by THE MODERN DAD at 9.8.06
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