Well it's been quite some time since my last post as I had to temporarily shut down my shop. But I'm finally back in action! Let me tell you, it's a relief too. When creating is in your blood it's hard to be away from it. My wife and I moved across the country for her new job, which all happened quite suddenly about 1 year ago. But I had to deal with getting our old home fixed up and on the market, not an easy time to sell a home that's for sure.
Then we found a new home (a foreclosure naturally, I'm not sure there was anything BUT foreclosures for sale in our price range). And naturally the new home needed extensive work. So after fixing up and selling our old home I had to jump right in to fixing up our new home. Starting first and foremost with a complete kitchen remodel, since the old particleboard cabinets had extensive water damage and were basically mush. I'm proud to say that I did all of the work on the kitchen myself, with the exception of the granite counter tops.
Here are a couple of before and after shots of the kitchen, just for fun -
This is the before shot. The cabinets were all nasty particleboard covered in laminate. The counter tops were just white laminate. Everything typical builder's grade stock back when the home was built in 1989. The water damage came both from the kitchen sink, which basically just sprayed water out the bottom when it was turned on, and the dishwasher, which when the home inspector turned it on, just started flooding the kitchen floor. On a little side note, if you are buying a home you should ALWAYS get a home inspection done. It doesn't matter if the seller is offering a home warranty or not, get the home inspection! And make sure that the inspector you hire is ASHI certified. I used to be a Realtor, and I hate seeing people make that mistake.
Anyways, moving on :)
On the right is the after shot of the kitchen. Big change, right? I'm very pleased with how it turned out. I used RTA cabinets, that's Ready-To-Assemble, so we literally saved 67% off the cost of comparable cabinets if we bought them locally. I know some people knock RTA cabinets because they join together with just cam sets. But since all of the construction included dadoes and rabbets for fitting together I just glued up and clamped the cabinets instead of only relying on the cams. This made them just as strong and durable as factory assembled cabinets.
Here is a detail shot of the tile back splash. I'm really pleased with how this turned out. The main tile I used is an Italian porcelain that has the look of tumbled blue stone. Then I added the accent strip of tumbled green stone, I think it's strips of onyx. For the back splash behind the range I wanted to do a focal area, so I used tumbled marble.
Well, I know this post has been quite a bit different than normal posts which focus on my artwork, and I promise that I'll be getting back to posting about my work in future posts. So here is a teaser shot of the next piece I'll be posting about. These are tooled leather bracers with Celtic dragons dyed black.
Growing up I used to be big into RPGs (Role Playing Games) like Dungeons & Dragons and Rune Quest. I played them well into college. I don't play anymore, although I do miss it sometimes. I'm also a big reader of fantasy novels, David Edding's Belgariad are probably my favorites. It's no wonder that I have such a love for medieval armor or fantasy armor. I haven't made a lot of it to date, some other Celtic knot bracers and a Celtic Targe - shield. But I do have plans to add to the armory, as it were. I'm hoping to expand and eventually be able to do a entire suits of tooled leather armor. Can you imagine how awesome an entire suit of intricately tooled leather armor would look?
