4/26/2014

I met Raven at Starbuck’s for coffee, we headed for Salvation Army. Raven needs luggage for her trip to Sweden soon. We found a nice small roller case that she likes as well as an Ipad briefcase and on the cheap.

I went digging through the bins, found a nice boat clip, a can of body parts molding stuff and some stained glass stick on. The glass stuff turned out to be cut up but more is available at Home Depot, good samples to try.

Heading home, getting hungry. It’s a cool day, Raven wants chicken root soup. I have some potatoes that are sprouting but still good, pealed and diced. In the garden, the carrots and beets are beginning to shoot, time to pick them. The beet cooked separately is a bit woody. The carrots are huge, half munched by gophers and slugs, but after whittling them down excellent. I also have some choice wax beans from TJ’s, garlic, a sprouting onion I picked out the best of, fresh garden herbs, oregano, thyme and parsley. Half an organic chicken breast diced, boxed broth, red wine, thickened with flour and water. Served in cups in the warming sun, perfect.

Raven worked on the cabinet doors as I cooked, adding black paint to the edges of the doors.

After lunch I noticed the fenders need to be sealed in metal. I have some galvo but it would be best cut at work on the brake and shear in the model shop. I’ll need a pattern, more card stock from the Dollar store, off to Healdsburg. Meanwhile Raven is drawing in more details on the corner battens. It’s harsh on the pencil, she resharpens it often on the lapidary grinder, the ultimate pencil sharpener.

I cut the patterns for the wheel wells with Raven’s help marking as I held it in place. That done, we need to install corner moldings inside. I found some suitable redwood and 45 degree angle cut four pieces. The stock had some cutouts I filled with putty, then sanded them on the lapidary with a newer belt removing the saw marks. The putty doesn’t match, paint or stain. Here’s the corners and patterns on the wheel.

Last week I was off for a memorial, next is questionable for Raven as she has a performance dance. We shall see.

4/12/2014

We met at Starbuck’s for coffee this morning, talked of a battery and charge system for the water pump for when not connected to the grid. Heading for home.

Raven started the D side details as I searched for the lost shutter screws. I found two by eye, but a ways away, got the Neodymium magnets off the fridge in a cloth bag sweeping, took a while but it picked up the last one and a bunch of filings from the trailer grinding years ago for this vardo.

It’s tax day, I need to get this done, it took hours just to figure out the stock sale I made.

Meanwhile Raven finished painting the gold detailing on the D side, it looks great though the picture doesn’t do it justice with the sun glare.

 

 

I struggled with the govie forms as Raven cooked a fine lunch of grilled cheese and my smoked turkey on sprouted wheat with O tomato soup, a perfect comfort meal.

She went back to painting another coat of black on the cabinet doors to clean up the edges, considering a wee gold edge to cover the last little light paint.

I finally finished the taxes and started sanding another easel I cut last week on my return from a family reunion, one for me as I gave my sister the first best one for her birthday. The original I gave back to my niece Amber at the reunion, so I’m running on paper measurements and a picture. It’ll work with a few errors as expected. The second one is always not quite perfect for some reason, don’t know why, third one will be better as it works out. I’ve found this to be the case in many product introductions.

Raven headed home as I finished sanding the easel parts on the sander. Another productive spring day.

4/5/14

well this morning i headed to the LDS family history center for some ancestral research and some other errands, so arriving to the vardo a bit late.  i got started right away with completing the front side batten details, i was waiting on friends to come and thought this would be a good task, but they’re not following through, so i decided to do it :}

took a break for lunch, out back with the view and the cats.  spotted a hawk and four playful, divebombing ravens whilst dining.  next i worked on the passenger side roof edge detailing, which was challenging, doing it freehand!  it was also quite hot and the paint kept getting gummy, a few runs the the paint thinner to clear the brush helped.  i completed it, roughly, still thinking of coming back later with a detail pen to make the edges smoother.  but for now it looks ok. 

 

while i could have easily put up the newly varnished shutters, i chose not to.  i’m not sure how to handle the sun’s fading of the front paint and details, and can imagine the shutters will get baked when i put them up.  maybe repaint the front, put up the shutters and cover the front with a tarp?  hmmm.  since i got to the house a bit late, these two tasks took me right up to dinner time.  took a spin around the vineyards, mugwort is growing like mad, but no elderflowers yet.  river is hoppin, and this was a good day.