Vader boots part two and Stool.

Well this week was busy as usual. I have a ten page, four page, and five page paper due in three different classes and a big math test on Monday. That has been frying my brain all week, today I visited the Denver Art museum for the four page paper. Lets see, I began to field day my house, since we are having thanksgiving here. I started planning for that as well. After getting my Vader boots I am a bit disappointed. The spit shine isn't very good, in fact I don't think they used polish at all, just some chemical. It will work, but ill have to re-do it at some point. I added the pics to the other post.

I managed to finish building a stool for my grandma so she can get into bed easier and fixing my fence. Here is the pile of extra wood that I grabbed the stool from:

You can also see parts of my halo costume on the shelf below, they were made by Thorlossi not me, I still need to finish them. Next I then guesstimated the length and cut the top two pieces. Good guess because it came out to 30 and 1/2 inches exactly. I then used the extra material to make the feet and braced them with a 2X4. I used a pocket screw set to construct it. I learned a couple of years ago that the best way to make furniture is a pocket screw setup, not only does it hide the screws, but the pocket and angle makes for a very strong connection. Plus it adds a professional look. I then routered the edges and stained it black.

Once dry I beat the top with different implements I found in my garage to give it a weathered look. Then sanded it smooth using 220 grit. Sanding most of the black stain off shows the grains of the wood and really highlights the weathering we did earlier.

I then stained one leg with dark walnut and the other with a red stain. I liked the walnut but decided to leave the red on that one leg. So I stained the rest with the walnut and let it dry. Then gave it five coats of clear varnish. I found out last year that I prefer to use spar varnish. This is more expensive since it is meant to be used for maritime items. I don't really understand why they sell anything else, If I am putting a clear protectant onto one of my pieces I want the most protection available. I can't believe it took me this long to discover it. I used it on my dog run fence when I fixed that earlier this year in an attempt to find something that would actually work, since the stuff I used before flaked off over the years. If this also does not last the next thing I will try is a two part resin mixture type application.

These pictures don't really do it justice. In person it is super shiny and the wood grain is so deep that one almost gets vertigo thinking you are going to fall in. The weathering makes it look like a antique not like I just built it.