I have been busy with my various projects, but I noticed that Jay seemed to be in a bit of a lull. He’s been drawing up a lot of things in SketchUp, but the woodworking machines have been quiet. I’ve had a few projects in mind for him so I thought that now would be a good time to sit and sketch them out.

First problem area: Bob’s wet food.

Bob is on a canned food-only diet. He is also spoiled, so he gets the Fancy Feast appetizers on a semi-regular basis. Not in place of a can of food, but merely has an appetite topper. However, it takes up a lot of space and I feel that there could be a better way to organize the appetizers and broth. Basically, what I asked for is a cubby to tuck the appetizers in, then I can set the kleenex and broths on top. It will condense them down and not take up as much space. It’s a fairly easy build.

Jay already has it cut out and glued together. Once the back is glued on it will go over to my area to be finished.

The next project I’ve been thinking about is a cubby for my bird seed stuff. Currently it’s a mess by my front door.

The piano bench works, but it’s a little long for the space. Plus, everything is just kind of piled on top. It definitely needs to be organized a bit better. I drew up what I wanted, with dimensions, and Jay has started on that one as well.

He’s getting fancy with it and cutting grooves in the sides so that they slide together. Then there’s a v-groove on top where the pieces meet. He has even created a fence for the router table that will allow him to trim off the glue that presses out into the v-grooves to make it easier for the finishing department. He can’t stand the whining that goes on when there appears to be a ton of glue left on the pieces, which have to be cleaned off before the stain is applied.

I have a couple of my own projects that I’m working on, or at least SHOULD be working on. Do you remember the cat couch Jay made me?

Well, this is how it looks today:

I really need to get this done! I have to glue pieces of foam to the frame in order to pad it out in the right places. Then I need to upholster it. That’s the part that has me hesitating. I want to do it in such a way that if a cat is scratching on it they won’t hurt themselves on a staple. I have no idea how I’m going to do it, though. I’m not good with that kind of thing. I have a vague idea, but I need to just sit down and do it.

Next up is this:

This is what happens when you wash a load of microfiber towels, and one of them has been used to wipe sawdust off of a board. Not a big deal, right? Wrong! Those stupid little micro fibers have a death grip on the pieces of sawdust. The bad thing is that half of these cloths I use when I’m washing and waxing our cars. You can’t have pieces of tree in your cloth when you’re doing that! I tried a lint brush, but the wood didn’t budge. I have resigned myself to a pair of tweezers… it’s horrible. I will never do that again!