The beds! The beeeeeeeeeeeds!

Making the beds was (for me) the more difficult of the two projects from the challenge.  (I should stop and say here, that my simple plan was critiqued and overseen by Mark.  Mostly because this was the only way I was allowed in the shed and to use his power-tools–the things you gotta do, you know?)  When we move though–I will have tools!

I don’t know if I’d mentioned it in the previous post, but I only had 2 real requirements for my beds:

1) that they be flat-packable. I didn’t want to go through the bother and hassle of making them (and bedding for them) only to have to ditch them when we finally move.

2)That they be slightly shorter & narrower than the original (make shift) dorm beds so I have a few mm extra space to jiggle things around for room set-ups.

I tend to be pretty flexible insofar as what I want my finished pieces to look like. This is because I have a habit of wanting to change it as I go along, to make it more …better. This, however did not go down well with Mark, who again was vetting everything I was doing.  Ever take a shop class with that teacher who would stare at you when you said something incredibly retarded?

Yep. Mark is that teacher and I’m that student (when it comes to drawn plans).  We had a disagreement about why I had to draw scale drawings (I knew the sizes of the pieces of wood, I knew where the wood went & how it connected—-so why bother with plans?)

The answer to that is that you can use it to make sure everything is “right”.  Ok, maybe if I were planning on making a crap load of beds I’d bother.  Otherwise—nah.  Stuff for me  (it’s totally different if I’m making it for someone else though) just isn’t that finicky.  I kept my sheet of paper with the rough drawing I’d done and the min & max dimensions I wanted the bed to be, along with what pieces I needed to cut etc.

Anyway, in the process I did learn some stuff I hadn’t known.

Like: if you are trying to drill into pine (or spruce) and you have the sap rings/banding (See Pic)  then you will have to force the drill to go through it otherwise the sap bands cause the drill to veer off to either side.

I actually got all the wood sourced, cut and ready to go in one day.  As you can see Bree had to help with the wood cutting!

As you can see it takes quite a bit more wood than is apparent at first glance.

Here’s one tip–if you’re going to cut a bunch of pieces that need to be the same size (on the band saw) tape them together (provided they’re small/thin enough). It helps to make certain they all end up the same.

The next day I started gluing & drilling. I had to clamp the side rails.

Glue always ends up stuck on my clothes and stuff and this time was no different.

Merrit & Verity helping with the headboards:

This is the place where I should say that when I finally move home (and want to make a new set of beds (and bunk beds, where you’ll see the underside) I’ll buy some good wire & make the faux springs & metal bottoms like the should have had. Buuuuut—they work (and will work if I choose to re-make the bottoms at a later date!) Or hell, they do work as bunk beds as long as I don’t focus on the undersides of them. LOL

Anyway  I don’t want to bore you all with the way I put it together.  Suffice that I did (at that point I just couldn’t be bothered to take any more pics. It was just easier to do than to document!), and then I had to stain it.   I wanted them to match the existing dorm furniture which is stained a dark color. It’s boring (you have to do a coat, let it dry, do another, let it dry etc…repeat. repeat.) I used some water-based varnish from B&Q. Only problem I had was that I would keep forgetting how many layers I’d already applied….oh well. Live and learn.

While the various coats of stain were drying I had to work on the mattresses. After all, I can’t use the old ones (wrong sizes) and I wanted to do them better anyway.  Besides, I don’t remember any dorm bed having super cushy & thick mattresses!

Karly & Eff are showing off the new beds. One is partly stained and the other needed to get stained.

You can see my attempts at mattresses. I wanted them to look a bit more like the industrial /old ones we had when I was at Caz, but I didn’t quite succeed. Part of this was because I only had a little bit of the fabric to make them out of and I tried to scrape by to get it to work. (thus one is actually a bit smaller than the other, and wouldn’t you know that they both shrank in size after I “quilted” them? D’oh!

And one of the other projects I started was trying to get the bedding done (the blankets, sheets & pillows for Nik & Merrit’s room.  So far all I’ve gotten done was Merrit’s comforter. He get’s plaid.  I still need to wash it to get it that crinkled/used look.  I did give it a few rows of wavy “quilting” like you sometimes see on older comforters/sleeping bags.  I took this pic to see how well that size blanket would work if in the future I want to use them as bunk beds:

Anyway, that’s last week’s projects done & dusted.

I’d like to say I’m going to take on 2 more projects but the situation with the house (trying to sell it), trying to research some options for us (just suffice to say some plans fell through) & some of the other joys of life means that nothing is stable enough for me to plan “hobby” time.  Heck — at this point I’m just fighting migraines and trying not to let acid gnaw a hole in my stomach. Ugh

Wish us good luck with the house stuff and I’ll try to keep updating the blog with something  doll or hobby related (since I’m pretty sure no one wants to hear about the house! LOL)