Sawdust Girl®

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Use it or lose it

All Posts, Master Closet

As in talents, skills and knowledge. Or maybe you won’t “lose them” per say, but they certainly can be MISPLACED! Talking about me and cabinet building, I can’t say if my skills are lost, misplaced or just rusty. I need to build cabinets for my master closet so it’s time to get back into practice!!!  Slow and painful as it may be. 

I haven’t forgotten everything. I got all the cabinet pieces cut just fine. It was a nice day so I set up a temporary work table outside my garage – which is on the basement level.

Cutting material for master closetI figured the easiest way to get all that material to the main level of the house would be in my truck. I couldn’t close the tailgate so I found some twine. Crossing my fingers and hoping it would stay in the truck as I drove it up my steep driveway. It did!

I did remember how to clean up the room before bringing in all the newly cut wood. Look at all this space!

Hauling every- single- lovin’- last board into the closet by myself was a no brainer.  No talent there, just (tiny, tired) muscles –and sweat!  :0)

Hauling materials to build master closet built-ins

The fact that it took me about two hours to build this ONE SIMPLE STINKING CABINET is what is the problem.

Building wardrobe cabinet

-I could blame it on the fact that I’ve gotten maybe 6 hours of sleep combined in the last two nights and I’m a 8 -10 hour a night gal.

-Or on the fact that I kept getting interrupted by various people and errands and don’t do well with distractions.  (All necessary distractions I’m sure.)

-My drill batteries are on their last leg and only retain enough power to drive about 5 screws before they die.

-I was fatigued from carrying all that MDF from here to there and back again all day.

***AND MOST IMPORTANTLY :  I didn’t measure and verify the cuts made at Home Depot and despite the fact that the nice lumber man was doing everything he could to make accurate cuts, their saw is not a precision cutting machine and if one side of a cabinet is 3/16″ shorter than the other, IT’S A BIG PROBLEM!

(That was totally MY BAD for not re-checking.)

Honestly, these excuses aren’t an effort to make me feel better about my failure as much as they are intended to help me hope that I’ll get my MOJO back if I build under better circumstances.

The good thing is I think I ran into almost every possible hurdle yesterday and was able to fudge 1 square cabinet anyway.  I’m fairly certain that today will bring better results and I’ll wiggle and squirm and find a way to nestle back into my DIY saddle again very soon.

p.s.  That cabinet looks HUGE!  As soon as I get the back on it I’m going to stand it up and see how it “FEELS” in the room.  It’s been a week of changing my mind at the last instant so who knows, I might decide that all those long “side” pieces need to go back in the truck and down the hill and into the shop to be ripped 6″ narrower.

Good Lord, I hope it “feels” good when it’s standing up in the room!

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Comments

  1. see this is why I got a different drill. I freaking hate those stupid battery-powered ones. They always die when I need them. I get the usefulness of no cords, but it’s outweighed by the misery of having a screw half-sunk in the wood and it’s not going any further.
    🙁

  2. Those don’t sound like excuses, but good reasons to me. I am an 8 hrs of sleep kinda girl too. I swear two bad nights and my mind is mush. I dont deal well with interruptions either, I might have a touch of ADD. Those things alone would probably have detoured me into a nap, so I applaud you for building with quirky equipment and messed up materials. I bet I wouldve just put it off until I had a whole bunch of sleep and a new drill.

  6. Uhhhhh, if I had to carry in all that MDF all by myself I would have been done for the week! You are doing awesome!! You’ll get your groove on in no time.

  7. All the reasons you stated just makes me extremely glad that my construction is with fabric and not wood. I know it will be amazing when you finish. Cheering from Brentwood.

  8. Sandra I have the same issues with HD ripping down the sheets, their cuts are so-not-precise it’s painful. But I’m okay with fudging it a little bit, it’s way too hard to rip off 3/16 from a long board with only a circular saw! I’m sure the cabinet will feel right once it’s up, at least good enough to make all your efforts worth it. Can’t wait to see the finished closet.

  9. It’s like riding a bike, right? You might be a little rusty, but it comes back quickly!!

    I build a lot with my dad and sometimes three are breaks of a few months and my first day or so back at the shop is always a little bit disorienting! 🙂 But it comes back fast!

    And the drill battery issue?? That is HUGE!!! The sound of a battery losing power as you try to tighten screws is frustrating, isn’t it? Popping in a fresh one though? Now that is a sweet sound!!! 🙂 Order new ones now!!! 😉

  10. I love my makita drill. Bought the pack that came with the impact driver, which means I always have two batteries and one is always charged. What did I do before having two?

    Hope things go smoother from here on out.

    • Definitely have to have 2 batteries. (And then it sucks twice as bad when they die.) Almost as expensive to buy a whole new set than just to replace the batteries. 🙁 Totally looking into the lifetime battery replacement from Rigid. (Thanks Jaime!)

  11. I am going to attempt a built in unit for our family room so I am watching each step REALLY closely. You are amazing!!

  13. I have a cordless DeWalt drill and it is FABULOUS! I’ve had it for about two years now and use it all the time. It came with two batteries so I can always have one charging, but each battery has pretty good life. In fact, the contractor who just finished hanging sheetrock in our basement (a friend) used my drill instead of his b/c his kept running out of batteries 🙂 Just my humble recommendation if you are in the market…
    BTW I love reading your blog. You inspire me to get off my butt and start finishing all the projects that are half done in our mostly-owner-built (us) house!

    • Thanks Lindsay. The drill I have now is actually a DeWalt and I have loved it. 2 speed, drill/driver combo with adjustable clutch! Everything I need. I was trying to remember how long I’ve had it and I can’t recall. I think it might possibly be 8 years! Now if both battery packs have lasted that long, that’s pretty remarkable. However, this might be the second drill in that time frame…I just can’t remember. Still 4 years-8 years, pretty good for battery life. Jaime told me that Rigid has lifetime battery replacement though and you can’t beat that! I’m def checking that out.

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