Day 3109 It’s big.

18th February 2026

It was back to the barn, the weather was glorious, the warmth was rapidly thawing the snow, it felt like spring.

I was a little early, but John was ready with his water bottle in hand.

We arrived at the barn, the thick snow that I had to plough through was gone, all the piles of timber had emerged from their white shroud, the place looked different.

The inside looked different as well. Gone were the stacks of hickory and cherry, all of it had been machined into flooring, and stacked waiting for collection.

What also was waiting for collection were barrels of wood chips that I helped him filled when he had the last blowout. Finally, the chicken farmer arrived to take them back to the farm as bedding, so more space was gained.

Today was going to be assembly day, this was when the enormity of the piece was going to be revealed. I made a few adjustments so the parts fitted tightly together, then drilled the pocket holes.

Then each piece was slotted together, and clamped holding it firmly whilst I added a few screws into the pocket holes.

Then I stood back, “ Shit! That’s a big bugger”

I double checked the drawings, they matched the physical parts. There was no going back now it was there in front of me.

This new sofa is exactly the same footprint as our current one, but because the mass of the arms are considerably less it looks bigger. 

The last major part is the base frame, that will be tackled next week.

As we were leaving, John handed me a sheet of paper with some numbers scribbled on it. This was the cost for all the flooring he had completed and needed to get paid for.

This is when I realised he didn’t have a clue about coatings. 

We talked about the process, the milling of the lumber, the kiln drying, the cutting into planks, running it through the moulder that produces the tongue and groove feature.

He told me that he needed four blades for the milling station, that was $600, the kiln cost $2000 to run for two weeks. In total he had run 945 feet of flooring, with an amount for labour and overhead we arrived at $7.00 per running foot giving a final total of $6615.

I have agreed to help him set out a costing model, rather than some guesswork on his behalf, that should be an interesting exercise.