Conjunction of Moon, Venus, and Mars

Last night was a conjunction of the crescent moon, Venus and Mars. It was so cool! I don't normally pay a lot of attention to astrological occurrences, but this one was easy (no telescope needed) and the night was so clear, that it wowed us despite the sub-zero temperature. Unfortunately we didn't have out camera with us so couldn't take a photo (argh!).
If you missed it last night, you have another chance tonight. The crescent moon will have moved off, but Venus and Mars will be together. Look toward the west, a bit above the horizon, around 6:15pm or so. Venus shines so very bright and Mars will be a small red light just above and behind it.

Happy star gazing!

Miscellany

Chris is now dimensioning and planing the wood for the landing surround and wall boards. The work is cold (you have to do it outside), loud, dusty, and boring to photograph. So here are some of the other things we've been up to:

Testing a new recipe for Cook's Illustrated (don't be impressed, all you have to do is volunteer). I love this magazine and it's great fun to try out recipes before they're published. Plus you get to see how they changed from the trial once they actually appear in the magazine.

Getting the ingredients ready

Figuring out a Pinterest inspiration - a pinafore. Obviously I didn't have it quite right yet as the straps are not the same length. I'm using waste fabric (an old flannel sheet that had holes in it) to create the pattern as there were no instructions. It's been a lot of trial and error and I'm learning lots.

Not quite there...

Listening to Chris play out with his band. This gig was at a local music hall. I like how moody the photo came out (as opposed to being upset with my blurry photography - that's my story and I'm sticking to it).

Playing out

Attending agility trials.

The first jump - off to a good start.

And then she saw me...

Back on course

Ta da!

Finishing the mockup of the pinafore and showing it off (I'm such a newbie sewist that I really need the encouragement when I finish something!)

Ta da again!

Destroying the house at 3AM as we help the dog and cat catch a mouse. Both animals had the mouse multiple times but apparently they've adopted a catch-and-release policy. Fortunately Chris believes in a quick kill and had the fireplace shovel to back it up.

The great mouse caper

Making soup and using my improvised lid vent. This was a Pinterest inspiration too and I got to use a cork from my absolute favorite wine for it. Works great for releasing steam.

Venting steam to reduce the soup

 Battling deep snow from the latest storm.

Cooper loves the snow 

Look at that face!

16" in the first storm followed by another 12"

Smiling despite freezing his butt off

Bringing some sunshine into the house with key lime parfaits. And wearing the pinafore that is supposed to be just a mockup. Apparently I really like it. I did buy some linen to make the real one and wearing the mockup lets me know if I need to tweak anything (again - story, sticking to it).

Making the graham crust

Experimenting with homemade fire starter. Since Chris is planing down a bunch of boards we have plenty of shavings. I saved a cardboard egg carton, some candle nubs from the candelabra over the table, and am trying to make homemade fire starter. I'll let you know how it works out.

Trial and error

Unfortunately all of this has come to a screeching halt as Chris came down with the flu last night. High temperature and all. I'm nursing him along and hoping like hell that I don't catch it too. Let's hope my flu shot works...

Pretty birds

That's all - just some pretty birds at the suet feeder. We have several kinds of woodpeckers and they really appreciate the suet all winter. 

And we have landing! A stair landing that is.

When last we left, Chris had finished the compass rose and was fitting the white oak flooring around it. This was a painstaking task but it came out great. 

We put a light coat of stain and poly on it and then took a deep breath.

Wait - you want to do what to it?

Why the breathing exercises? Because we (Chris) decided to do a copper inlay of an N for North and a ring around the compass points. But first he did a practice piece. We picked a font, figured out a good way to secure it to a board, and then Chris carved a channel for the copper wire.

The practice N. There is wire in the middle channel

Once the practice piece came out good, he had to carve the N into the finished floor. Very nervous making.

The template and the practice N

Taking a power tool to the new floor (breathe, just breathe)

After carving the channel, he fit copper wire into it and then hammered it flat(ish). Then he sanded the wire to be flush with the floor. Sanding wire has a cool effect - it makes the wire sort of spread and fully fill the channel.

The flash makes it hard to see the copper

The effect is subtle but it looks great in real life. The copper just catches the light.

No flash - see the N at the top left?

A couple coats of poly later, the floor is tough enough to wait for Spring weather for the final finish (that stuff stinks - better to wait until we can open windows for ventilation). Up next is the landing wall and built-in dog kennel. 

Fitting the compass rose

Chris has cut out the compass arms and glued the segments together. As a reminder, the light wood is birch, the dark is walnut. Even without any stain or finish on it I think it already looks amazing.

Fitting the pieces

We took a compass reading so that the arms would actually point the correct directions. North is, appropriately, at the top. It makes the compass rose crooked on the landing, but we think it's much cooler than just centering it.

Positioning the rose to point North

Once the rose was positioned, Chris had to start piecing together the floor boards so they'd fit around the arms. I suppose technically this is marquetry rather than inlay since the pieces go all the way through. The North symbol and the copper ring will be inlay as they'll just barely be inset in the wood. At least that's the plan - we've got a lot of practicing to do before we try that for real. The thought of messing this up after all the work that has gone into it is enough to make my stomach hurt.

The floor boards are white oak. We got them from a friend who'd had the wood stored in his basement for the last 30 years (a very dry basement fortunately). He didn't want it anymore and was going to burn it (no!!!!) so we scored a good deal on it. None of them were tongue and grooved however, so Chris used the router to do so.

Each floor board is custom fit to the compass points

It's painstaking work fitting all the pieces together and there has been a bit of cussing when something has to be done over. But it's really coming along much faster than I ever expected. 

Almost finished

I'll be testing different finishes on scrap lumber so we can get the tones just right. The color variations you see from photo to photo are just tricks of the light (taken in daylight, with or without flash, or under the work lamp).

Installing the ceiling grates

When we designed the house we chose not to put any heating units on the second floor. We have solar powered radiant floor heat through the slab on the first floor but our main heat source is the wood stove.

Everybody loves the wood stove

Really, really loves it

We did this with the assumption that heat would travel up the stairwell (much like it did in our Troy house). Just to be safe we also cut two air ducts into the ceiling/floor to help with air circulation. One is right above the wood stove (maximum heat transfer) and goes into the upstairs bathroom; the other is in the kitchen and goes into the master bedroom.

This has worked great. It's quite warm in the room off the stairwell, very warm in the bathroom, and about 5 degrees cooler in the bedroom, which makes for more comfortable sleeping anyway. On the downside, we've had two holes cut into the ceiling for the last two years. Obviously we have not had holes in the floor - we covered those immediately with antique grates. But we never seemed to get around to putting in the ceiling grates; just wasn't a priority. 

But we finally did it!

In the kitchen - screwing in the supports

And over the wood stove

Mounted

Close up

It's a small change. Barely noticeable really. But it's one more step toward finishing the house. And we get to cross it off the 2015 goals. Woot!

Designing the stair landing

The main staircase to the second floor has been in construction mode for a long time. It's safe, it gets us up and down, but it's got temporary stair treads, a plywood landing, and rough railings. Chris decided it was time to start finishing this area and has been planing wood (flame birch for the treads and white oak for the landing) and coming up with ideas for the landing. He wanted something decorative on the landing and we decided to do some inlay. A compass to be specific.

High tech way to draw a circle

Drawing the design

Labeling everything

Cutting out the pattern

Itty bitty pattern pieces

He's going to take those tiny pieces of paper and use them as patterns to cut out the wood (walnut for the dark parts of the compass rose, birch for the light, copper inlay for the circles) and do an inlay. My part was easy - help design the compass rose, draw it, cut it out - I'm done. Now he gets to figure out how to do the artistic stuff. I'll have many more pictures to come.