Rachel’s dad was cleaning out his garage and offered me this rickety workbench. I took it home and built a new top for it out of some salvaged studs from a hundred year old house. I fastened it to the wall and now it’s solid and serviceable.

It’s been a frustrating few days trying to get the finish right on this leaf of my in-laws’ table—and I still don’t have it right. But I’ve learned a lot more about finishes and techniques so 🤷‍♂️

One of my finds from my Friday drive was a Stanley no. 80 cabinet scraper. $15, which I thought was a pretty good price for one in such good condition. There was minor rusting on the hardware that came right off after a few hours in vinegar. Replacement blade coming from Lee Valley Tools.

A good weekend for cheap, reused stuff:

1. I came across a thrift/junk store (location: secret) with a large selection of old tools. I didn’t have time to look around much but I will go back next weekend.
2. My in-laws gave me a couple of old garage cabinets. Ain’t nothing fancy—but it freed up a lot of room.
3. An acquaintance gave us one of those roller composters. We’ve struggled with that kind of composting in the past but we’ll definitely try it again for free.
4. We found a bathroom cabinet for $10 in good condition. Rachel has had an eye out for one for a long time. Minor repairs, replaced a bit of hardware, painted it black.

I built a serving tray out of a gate I found alongside the road a few weeks ago. Plenty of flaws, but it was fun.

Door is done! Now everything around it needs new paint.

New video: Screen door, before painting.

I’m hoping to finish the screen door today. This morning I’ve been planing it to size. Maybe I’m sorta kinda almost maybe figuring out how to use planes? Also smoking pork spare ribs on the grill for the first time. And listening to a red-shouldered hawk make its way around the neighborhood.

No one is more surprised than me that the screen door I’m building is square and the half-lap joints are mostly okay. Tomorrow I’ll put dowels in the joints.

Rex Krueger says “don’t measure”—and I’m trying to live by that as I build a new screen door for our back porch. I was recently burned by over-reliance on a tape measure when building a garage shelf.