It’s that time again – Thursday, yes – but also time to share what has been happening with Emily’s Room for the second week in the One Room Challenge. This past week, I built all four panels of the cabin bed – which is way more than I expected I would have done at this point. Remember, in the first week’s post, my goals were to clean out the garage to reclaim my work space, find my tools and purchase materials!
So, today I will show you how I have built those panels and share some of the challenges I encountered with that. This next week, I will be adding the trim to the cabin bed and pre-assembling the roof system. Plus, I’ll also probably paint it up so that when the flooring is all replaced, I can just haul in the sections and set it up in her room. Then we will be heading into the real fun – demolition and flooring!
So, amazingly, I found my tools in pretty short order in my mess of a garage, which totally surprised me.
We headed to Lowe’s on a day that storms were in the forecast. It seems each time we head to go pick up materials (wood in particular), it’s the one day of the month it is raining in South Texas. We got lucky, though, and our drive home was between rains. I am following this plan from Ana White and some of her followers, which usually spells out the projects quite well.
The day we brought the materials home, I started on the cut list for the side panels. By the time Sunday evening wrapped up, I had finished an entire side panel.
The trickiest part was the center truss and rafters at the top. They had to be aligned just right so that they maintained a 30 degree flush angle all the way from the 2×4 legs through the rafters. Getting them in place and to stay in place while you are fastening them was challenging!
The next day, Monday, I knocked most of the other four panels out all day long with Emily hanging out with me. We spent the entire day outside either working in the garage, swinging from the tree swing or eating snacks/lunch. Emily helped me drill a few pocket holes too actually (under strict supervision)!
By the end of Monday evening, I was completely exhausted, but we had completed an additional side panel, the back panel and half of the front panel. Plus, I learned a few new tricks! Like using a speed square to draw your angled cut!
One of the biggest challenges I had was trying to attach the legs to the paneling part of the bed. When I was using the pocket hole system for the 2x4s, the drill would completely bore out the hole, leaving nothing for the screws to hold onto. So, I changed my approach and went for self tapping screws, which seemed to work most of the time. The picture below shows the side panels, which I had a much easier time with.
The back panel 2×4 legs laid flat instead of on their side, so the self tapping screws were not long enough to go in straight. I used the screws at an angle from both sides and the center, which seemed pretty sturdy.
Finally we got to the front panel, which features the windows. I’ve never cut windows out of a panel before, so this was another first! First, I measured and drew the window on the panel based on the plan.
Then, I used the below drill bit to bore a hole out of the window.
Once I had the hole in place, I used the jigsaw to cut out the window from the inside out.
Ta-da!
After Monday, I needed to recuperate because the next morning as my feet hit the floor, my body told me as much. So instead, I went to cook some dinner for a friend of mine who has a brand new baby at home and yesterday was filled with a brief stint at my old job where I have been training my replacement for some time now. Today, I am meeting the contractor in Poth for the Small Town Renovation to get working on the realities of the newer floor plan I worked up and am meeting a friend/colleague for lunch to discuss potential business ventures in the healthcare sector.
You better believe that I will finish up the main sections of this cabin bed this evening, though, and get moving on the trim!
What a full life!!
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