More on that below!
In Part 1, we left off with the two frames and screen clamped together while the wood glue dried. That worked out quite well.
The next step was decided by the cup hooks.
Normally, I would just screw the things in as is, but with so many of them, I was concerned that this might start splitting the wood. So I decided to drill pilot holes.
Which is exactly what the instructions on the package say to do.
Which lead me to hunting for a 3/64" drill bit.
I never found one.
What I ended up doing was going with a smaller size, picking up a package of 2 1/16" (1.59mm) titanium drill bits. It only came in packages of 2 and only came in titanium, so there wasn't much choice.
Thankfully, they were also not very expensive.
However, when I got them home, I discovered I had another problem.
The small cordless screwdriver/drill I usually use is more screwdriver than drill. It was not designed to hold anything smaller than the interchangeable tips it came with. No adapter or anything.
I have another drill, though. A much heavier duty corded drill.
Problem was, it hasn't been used since before we transferred to our current until, a year and a half ago. I had no idea where it was, and no one else remembered seeing it, either. It should have been an easy find, as I'd put it back into its original packaging.
After several hours of going through the storage closet and various boxes, I found it lying on a shelf in the laundry room.
*sigh*
It's now permanently in my craft room.
And yes, it did indeed have the capability of holding the tiny, tiny drill bit.
On to the next step!
At first, I was thinking of only one row of cup hooks. Making sure to be working on what would be the bottom of the frame (determined by where the hanging hole was for landscape orientation), I found the middle of the bottom section and marked a line. Then I found the center of that for the first pilot hole, working outwards from the middle, for a total of 5 marks.
After drilling the 5 pilot holes, I decided to do a second row. After marking another line across, I marked for the new pilot holes in between the previous one, for another 4 hooks.
If the lines in the photos look a bit crooked, you're right. They are. That's because the frames are not accurately squared or even.
I'm okay with that, but it did make it rather more difficult to measure out the guidelines and evenly space the pilot holes.
Once the pilot holes were drilled, I used my courser grit sanding sponge on the front and edges. This served to "erase" the pencil marks as well.
At this point, I also sanded the inside edges of the frame, just to round it out and smooth out any little jagged bits.
I could have gone on to using my finer grit sandpaper for an extra smooth surface, but I actually wanted a slightly courser texture. If I had intended to finish the frame by, say, working a mosaic or gluing textural items to it, I would probably have only sanded it enough to remove the penciled in guide lines. On the other hand, if I were planning to wood burn it or paint it, I would have gone on to sanding it with a super fine grit.
Since I had a dozen hooks and 9 pilot holes, I decided to add three more across the top to hang things like rings or bracelets.
Here's a closer look of the wood immediately after drilling, showing how even just a little bit of sanding is a good thing.
Here, you can see how the wood dust from sanding has partially filled the pilot holes, to the point that they can hardly be seen.
If I were not spray painting the frame, it would not have mattered. However, with the dust in there, the spray paint would basically seal the holes, and then I'd have to go poking about, trying to find them again.
Which brings me to something I highly recommend having handy among your crafting tools.
An ordinary bamboo skewer.
It's remarkable how often I find myself using a bamboo skewer as a tool. It's just really, really handy.
In this instance, the pointed end is perfect for clearing wood dust out of the pilot holes.
Once this part was done, I could have added the hooks and decorated around them, or started painting, wood burning or whatever.
However, I chose to spray paint.
One of my daughters does quite a lot of spray painting, so we've got the paint and drop clothes and everything to set up out on the balcony and paint away.
It is, however, January.
In Edmonton.
While we've had a very mild winter so far, we hit a cold snap, going from rain to days of blowing snow to clear but frigid. Not the sort of conditions spray paint works well in.
In the end, I had to get creative.
Which will be the subject of part 3.
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