Author: peterb51

18th October 2025

The last main part of the fence was done today, fitting the gate.

There were a few cuts and the fitting of the hinges, and the assembly into the gap in the fence. There was great relief when all that was done, although fitting the latch was more problematic, I should have read the instructions.

In total I took the thing off four times before I got it right, but it works, and if I don’t build another fence I will be flipping happy.

Once that was done I helped Kelli finish the buffet, fitting handles and doors and attaching the leg frame, that just raises the carcass off the floor a bit.

The rest of the time I spent struggling to sort the wi-fi on the computer. That was not made easy because I had a wireless mouse that I couldn’t connect, and it’s not easy to use a keyboard.

Anyway I need to research how to set that stuff up, you know that technology hates me, so it could take a long time.

17th October 2025

A message came in from the lady who had commissioned the kitchen island, she had a flood in the house and she feared the island was damaged. That was news I didn’t want to hear.

We got in the car and drove to her house.

We felt the pain in her eyes as she opened the door, Kelli gave her a hug, and as we entered the house we saw the extent of the water damage to the kitchen. Something happened in the bathroom where either a pipe burst or there was back pressure somewhere, but gallons of water soaked through the floor into the kitchen and down to the basement. I was nervous to see the island that had been moved into the living area. Now from the message I thought there was a massive crack, but actually there was nothing, other than a bit of movement in the timber itself. I gave a huge sigh of relief. I checked around the rest of the structure and found nothing that would need repair.

Panic over we returned home, I wanted to fit the panel under the buttress and bang in the last post. The final task will be fitting the gate, that will be tomorrow’s job.

I had a message from Chris the musician friend who was due to come tomorrow for a recording session, he couldn’t make it this week, maybe next. I was kind of expecting it, anyway it gives me a bit more time to relearn the software.

Kelli finished painting the large dresser leaving me to stain the base frame ready for the final finish.

16th October 2025

There was no work on the fence today, we needed to do some furniture.

We finally sold the small cedar dresser, that I had to line the drawers. Remarkably, it went better than my last one, the drawers were smaller, so the lining flopped down, almost perfectly.

Kelli wanted to paint the buffet, meaning I had to carry on building a baseframe for it. That was something I had forgotten, I had built half of it, so I just had to do the rest.

The problem was, I just wasn’t into it, everything started to annoy me. I couldn’t find the things I needed, and when I did, I lost them again. I would trip over things, which I usually do, and then I would throw stuff around. I tried to do it in good humour, hoping it would relieve stress.

So, I’ve had better days, maybe the fence took more out of me than I thought, and maybe I’m thinking about too many things at once. The landscaping, collecting hundreds of small stones that have to be moved to the other side of the new fence, all these things are rolling about in my grey sponge.

I discovered that the phone number I had tried to get Henry on was wrong, I inadvertently got the area code wrong, so some guy in Texas must have received my texts and voice mail.

Which was amusing because this Texan called my phone, Kelli answered it, probably said that I was English and doesn’t know what he’s doing, she is probably right on that today.

15th October 2025

What a great day for a drive to Zeeland for another Doctors appointment.

The highlight was looking around Goodwill for any furniture that we can flip, but there was nothing, so we had to contend with doing more work to the fence.

There was one final panel to fit, and the one that gave us the most trouble. I’m sure the professionals would have done the hardest one first, but not me, hard job Pete at your service.

What made it difficult was the design of the house had a buttressed feature that the panel had to fit under.

I took careful measurements, marked it out on the panel and cut the panel to shape. I had also dug a deep trench for the thing to fit in.

What followed was a comical scene of complete mayhem as we both tried to fit this panel into the remaining space.

After a couple of hours of lifting it in and out we made the decision to remove the piece that fitted under the buttress which made it much easier. 

The hard bit was I had dug the trench a bit deep which meant it had to be lifted up to match the other panels, we did it using the old method of leverage, but the effort was enormous, I’m sure we will feel it in the morning.

14th October 2025

It was a wonderful drive down to pick up John the wood from his home in Wyoming, the trees were starting to change into the autumn colours.

That is one thing that I love to see are all the maples in their golds and reds, it makes going through the black and whites of winter bearable. 

Kelli had packed me a lunch, consisting of a sourdough roll with pepperoni in, an apple, and some small biscuits.

Now I have a weakness, that is, if I know there is food close by, I will eat it, if not, it will tempt me until I do. So most of the food had gone before I got out of Holland.

John was his old self, starting a conversation then forgetting what he was talking about. It’s like playing a game of “Guess the next line”. I usually respond with a “Um” or “Mmmm” that serves the purpose.

He did say that he tidied the shop, and that was evident the moment the door was opened. 

The tidy wave also went into the basement where now you can walk without tripping over stuff.

The material that I wanted for the project was white oak of which he had an amazing stash.

He pulled out a few planks, just to check the quality, it was good, I needed eight planks.

Carrying the first few up the stairs I forgot to duck, as the thump resonated through my skull, John warned me to watch my head, thanks mate.

Then it was cutting, planing, thicknessing, and cutting to width, this was great fun, I could spend days doing all that, and I think John enjoys being involved.

By the time I had to get him back home I had glued up most of the middle sections of the chair.

I had taken a model of the finished design with me to show him the stages we would go through, it was a lot easier than trying to explaining it.

I had arranged to pick up an Apple ProTower from someone on Marketplace, the address given was Grandville, I had no idea where that was in relation to John’s house.

I punched it in to the GPS, and up came 4 minutes. 

I had over forty minutes to kill. I decided to look for a coffee shop, could I find one on one of the busiest road in Grandville? Not for several miles.

I got to the place right on time, it was a small business centre and warehouse, Leyland, the chap was there to meet me. He deals with old computers, and he does pretty well with them.

After going over all the modifications and additions he did to it, we loaded it into the back of the truck, and I headed home.

I certainly had been busy, and I was still covered in sawdust when I pulled into our driveway.

13th October 2025

I managed to put in two more posts, and cut out the gate, doesn’t sound a lot but it made me sweat a bit. I even used my laser for the first time.

Of course it was also shopping day, so it was amazing I got anything done at all.

It looks like the neighbours across the road have got a puppy judging by the continuous yapping I hear, crikey, they can barely look after the children they have.

I have taken on a job that I’m quite nervous about. I have to insert a piece of rosewood into the first fret of Matt’s guitar. He bought it cheap because of the damaged fret, and like a fool I said” I can fix that” why don’t I keep my big mouth shut.

I have to build a jig that will allow my small router to cut the old section out, I’ve done it a few times on furniture, but with this I don’t get any second chance.

12th October 2025

Well I turned the corner on the fence installation, literally. The progress was limited by the time available, don’t forget it is Sunday and it’s ice cream fest at Kelli’s mums. 

I managed to secure the second panel, and then added a third panel at ninety degrees. That was hard, I kept hitting roots under the surface that had to be cut away.

I had to make a decision regarding securing the posts along the long side. I didn’t think that the spikes would be rigid enough in the sandy soil that we have, to remedy that I chose to dig holes and set the spikes in concrete.

I cut notches on the spike with an angle grinder to give some grip and ran to Menards to buy the quick drying concrete designed for use with posts. 

I borrowed a hole boring tool from Matt and set about digging. It was easier than I thought, soon I was down two foot, I planned to knock the spikes down a foot and fill the rest with concrete. After propping the post vertical, I poured the dry concrete into the hole, gradually adding water. 

Soon it was done.

The next post to be set will be the gate post, then I would make the gate by cutting down a fence panel, but that’s tomorrow’s job.

11th October 2025

It was fence building day, finally a project two years in the planning now in progress.

I had decided to use metal spikes that I have to hammer three foot into the ground rather than concrete, mainly because of the roots in the area. 

I had decided to aim for three panel installations, I thought that should be achievable.

I had to cut the posts in half first, then came the difficult bit, banging in the posts where I wanted them. Sounds simple but they seemed to go where they damn well wanted to.

The first panel went up, it matched the height of the existing fence, but in order to do that I had to dig a trench to allow the new panel to sit correctly. The second panel wasn’t so easy, there were roots under the surface that interfered with the panel, so they had to be cut out. This fitting took ages, I did assume the panels would be square, but I had real difficulty in getting it level and abut with the fitted panel. I was farting about with it for ages, well until Kelli called me in for dinner. 

There the result for an afternoon’s work was one panel fitted, and another panel clamped into position, mm I don’t think I’m quite cutout to erect fences. 

10th October 2025

I had planned to drive down to John the wood to start building a prototype for some lounge furniture that I want to make, but there were several reasons why that didn’t happen.

I usually gave John a call just to remind him that I was picking him up, but he has a very unreliable phone, so often I have to phone his wife, but this time both their phones were not working.

However I had my fencing delivered and I went out to expect them. What I saw pissed me off big time, and I should have watched them unload, but every panel was crap, and when I say crap they were disgustingly rubbish.

I only needed six panels and they cost me over a hundred dollars to get delivered.

There was one panel with part of the strip missing, the rest had unequal gaps and the timber used? I have burnt better stuff.

I made an immediate visit to Menards, seething and angry, but by the time I got there my mood had mellowed.

I went to the next available person at the building supply checkout and spilled my story and with the aid of pictures made it clear that I was not a happy man. 

The lady serving me had a look of sympathy, but said that she could help me, and summoned a manager. Up came a young chap who looked at the pictures and agreed that they were substandard and would arrange for new panels to be delivered and the old ones collected.

That was a relief, but he said that the earliest they could be delivered would be Monday.

So I left the store feeling a bit more happy, and I even tried John the wood again to see if he would answer. 

This time the call went through, I told him of my issues and we agree to meet on Tuesday.

I had a few things to do when I got back, so I would waste the day, but halfway through the afternoon there was a call to say that the new panels would be delivered in a few minutes time, but I would have to help to unload.

The white truck arrived a a burley chap jumped out. I showed him where I wanted the panels stacked, and he moved the truck. 

The unloading went okay, they were heavy but far better quality, so it was worth the effort.

We then loaded the crap panels, and he was off.

9th October 2025

A very rare event occurred, I forgot to put out the rubbish bin, and it was one of those rare times when the thing was full. I was reminded when the truck went up the road, so Kelli rushed out to place it at the end of the driveway.

I had forgotten that the trucks take an odd route.

It’s not the one that goes up our road, that then comes back down, oh no, that would be too simple (and sensible) it is the truck that goes up the next street that cuts across, and then down our road. The end result was we missed it.

I had a phone bill to pay and Kelli wanted to go thrifting. She has latched on to another side hustle,  buying certain clothes,  and then selling them. There seems to be a good market for bohemian style items that go like hotcakes. She belongs to a group that sells or trades this type of garments, and they pounce on the postings as soon as they are live, our printer is alway spewing out labels.

So whilst we were out she found a couple of items, one a Mexican poncho that is worth a decent amount, well that went on straight away.

I did a little bit outside, making templates for a project I’m planning for the future, but the hard thing is to get the machines that I have meet the accuracy I want, therefore I also need to make checking gauges as well.

It certainly is colder, I have to cover my legs and arms, soon I will have to put socks on as well.