The Man-Cave Has Doors

   The second winter we were here a huge windstorm brought a 100 year old spruce down directly across the driveway. With the help of neighbors and a logging crew who were working on the other side of the road, we got the driveway cleared. We found a local guy with a portable saw mill, and stacked the wood in the newly built barn.
   Ed wanted to use the lumber to build all the interior doors, baseboards and door jambs. Luckily he came to his senses before that happened.  He did, however, decide to make the doors for the man cave. There are  seven. Two from the theater room to the shop, three for closets, and two from the saloon to the gym. The lumber he is using is rough-sawn spruce 2x12s.

   I bought two sets of planer blades.
   Ed proceeded to make a Mt. Everest sized pile of wood shavings. After the lumber had been run through the planer numerous times, he sanded it. He beveled each edge of each board. Then he used a biscuit joiner to lock three boards together, glued and clamped them and started the next one. When the glue was dry, he sanded some more, applied stain, then set up to spray the finish. He set them up in the shop portion of the basement, just like he did the interior doors.

   More spraying....more sanding. He hung all the  doors, which weigh a ton. For the first time, the basement looks less cavernous..no wait...that's what he wanted...a man cave. At least now I can't call it a dungeon.  The doors are up. They still need trim, headers and hardware. We're thinking wrought iron hinge straps, clavos, and door knobs.

   The grandkids were here until last week. They are city kids, used to urban pursuits. Facebook, computer games, iPhones. It wasn't raining and they needed to go outside and DO something. At 14, they are a little past the play age, but I sent them out to explore. They had a bottle of water, a box of graham crackers and complete freedom. They didn't know what to do.
   I taped directions on the door.
   They did take a nice long walk down the road to check out the neighbor's horses. Yes, I did let them back in the house.

    Jackson, at 8 weeks, was just too little to send outside to play, so we kept him in and played "dress-up" Poor kid didn't have a chance, although he didn't seem to mind the attention. I have a hunch we won't have any problems getting this little guy out to get into mischief when he's old enough.