My wife recently passed away. I used my time off to build her a giant bookshelf

Re:My wife recently passed away. I used my time off to build... by saalweachter on Thursday October 01, 2020 @12:13PM (#24652633)

It's also one of those frustrating life lessons about putting in the work.

Like, sanding. When you first start out you're very tempted to just give it a very cursory sand to get any splinters off the edges or whatever, but once you sand something butter-smooth once, you have the frustrating realization that you're going to have to keep investing that much time and effort on every project you make going forward.

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Re:My wife recently passed away. I used my time off to build... by anonAndOn on Thursday October 01, 2020 @04:39PM (#24655934)

OCD sanding warning: down this path you may discover it's possible to sand some types of bare wood to a mirror finish.

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Re:My wife recently passed away. I used my time off to build... by dr_orpheus on Thursday October 01, 2020 @06:19PM (#24656767)

Sanding well is huge. It can be the difference between "yep, you nailed some 2x4s together" and "oh my god, that is so beautiful"

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Re:My wife recently passed away. I used my time off to build... by kls on Thursday October 01, 2020 @09:52PM (#24657993)

Or you just cheat and epoxy the thing and then poly it for UV protection. Gives a nice glass smooth surface, but every woodworker will know you cheated and took the easy route and you loose the feel of a nice oil finish but everyone who is not a woodworker will marvel at it.

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Re:My wife recently passed away. I used my time off to build... by cpwright on Thursday October 01, 2020 @07:11PM (#24657151)

I took Jory Brigham's TWW guild Hank Chair class, he said something like 30% of his shop time is spent sanding.

For me, finishing is not as fun as joinery; but patience during the sanding and finishing is absolutely essential to a good result.

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