Sedona – Wall Installation (Part I – I Think…)

Holy crap, what the hell happened to summer? Just when one starts getting adjusted to the longer days and cooler nights…you’re already getting blasted with reminders of “hey, fall’s ’round the corner folks!”.

The last couple of months have been unusually busy. Typically, the summer months meant I can finally do some catch-up in terms of office work. Basically get things done that I had to put off because something more pressing came up. Unfortunately, my new bosses are feeling very ambitious this year. So suffice to say, it’s been non-stop work. Which basically meant, whatever hours I had at home, I was seriously putting towards my husband, our families, and pets. And not so much on my hobby. 😦

But enough sad violin tunes. This past weekend was the first where BK and I opted to do absolutely nothing. Translation: BK catching up on his books at our patio, while I was hunkered down in the dining room, reconnecting with the Sedona roombox.

Considering the Sedona is built to be an adobe roombox, stucco was the obvious choice of finish on its wall. But since I wanted this to be more on the modern side, I wanted to add some kind of interest. Enter exhibit A.

Doing a dry-fit run. Wanted the maple panel to be flanked by the cherry wood panels for contrast. Used some painter’s tape to secure the panels in place during the measurement process.

I found these beadboard sheets from D’s Miniatures and Collectibles, one of the many sellers I frequent via eBay. The seller carried beadboard sheets from Laser Creations of various woods.  Figured the small paneling would give the roombox a certain “something” that I was looking for.  So for this project, I bought a couple of sheets of the 1/8″ spacing  in cherry and maple. Because the sheets are about 2 7/8″ x 12″, a dry fit run was in order before I started cutting them up. At $6.50/sheet, I really couldn’t afford to fudge these up.

Once I measured and marked where to cut the panels, I spun the roombox around so I can mark where the holes are located. Especially since these panels need to accommodate the round beams. Yes, it did occur to me that I was drawing circles on the panels that I’d need to cut out. But at the time, I figured to best look at this one step at a time.

Once the holes were marked, I pulled out my craft knife, a container full of new blades, and started the cutting process. When it came to cutting the panels down to the correct length, the cherry panels were much easier. So long as you used a new sharp blade, it only took about a dozen cuts  per panel. The maple panel (the lighter toned wood panel), on the other hand, took much longer. I didn’t realize maple is a much harder wood. <face palm>

So far so good…

Once the panels were cut…then I moved to cutting out the circles to make the ceiling beams fit. Since I didn’t have any tools that would make a circular cut (*cough* holiday present *cough*), thought maybe I could get away with just cutting out the opening by hand. Bad idea apparently — it took me almost 10 minutes to just outline the shape with my blade. And that’s just the first pass.

Looks impressive, but not really. Hand’s cramping just looking at this.

Given I was doing this at…I dunno, 1:00 am Sunday morning…I knew I had to come up with something else. Real fast.

So I took my ruler and pencil, and basically drew a square surrounding the circles I traced. And handcut the openings as such. It made for a much faster process. At least on the cherry panels. The maple panels took longer. Because, again, they’re harder and feel denser. Like my skull apparently (hey, I never claimed to be a genius).

Yeah I know, it’s a cop-out. Please don’t judge me.

Once the panels were cut, then came the dreaded dry-fit. I had to make sure the new openings could accommodate the beams. Otherwise, I was going to be in a lot of trouble (and out several dollars for wasting the panels possibly). Luckily, they worked out!

Woohoo! It works!!

Figured as a last hurrah, to go ahead and put up the panels. Just to see how it looks overall.

Aw yeah! Just the way I had hoped!

The feature wall and the left wall.

Not bad right? I wanted the left wall to have the paneling as well. That way, any other areas that aren’t covered will be covered in stucco.

Whew — part I is done. Now I need to wait for BK to help me with the next step….