Chair Repair

Today's post falls under the category of: if you don't take care of what you have, you won't have anything.

We have some nice wooden chairs that take a ton of abuse from our teenagers. Occasionally, they pull apart.

If a chair in this condition isn't immediately repaired, the chair could break and be ruined. Chair repairs are very simple and anyone can do it. You can repair the chair the easy way or the hard way.

The hard way? Pull the chair completely apart at all the joints. Clean the joints. And Re-glue the chair.

I am going to do the repair the easy way; I am only going to reglue the joints that have come undone.

There is a lot of different kinds of glue out there and everyone has their favorite. This one is my favorite for a very simple reason: it has a screw on cap that prevents the tip from hardening. There is nothing worse than grabbing your glue bottle and having to chip away at harden glue, or try to pull out a nail or pin that has been glued solidly to the nozzle. With this glue, I simply unscrew the cap and I am ready to go.

I clean any loose glue from the joint and then apply ample new glue to the hole and the peg.

I then put the peg back into the hole and apply pressure until the glue sets. I make sure to wipe up any extra glue that has squeezed out of the joint.

The glue I use takes 24 hours to fully set, so, the chair gets set aside for a day.

That is all there is to it!

Lamp repair

Another lamp broke while house cleaning.

I couldn't do much for the lamp shade (and oddly those tend to be the most expensive part of a lamp). I was able to save the lamp socket with a little electrical tape.

Tighten the screws!

My family might be the only family that likes to lean on cupboard doors when they open them. This causes the crews for the hinges to work loose. Every few months I go around the house and tighten the screws. For the ones that are really bad? I take a wooden match stick, remove the ignition portion, and then break the wooden match stick off into the screw hole. That will allow the screw to have a tight fit.

Hooks

I don't know who invented these hooks, but they are great! I attach a hook to any wall using a sticker. There are no holes, no finding a studd, no screwing around. I just attach it anywhere I want. And when I am done with it, I can detach it from the wall with no mess and no damage.

Unfortunately, they aren't very durable  and tend to break. But that is OK because they are very easy to replace.

Kitchen project day 2

The old floor section was cut out and the subfloor replaced. Next? The flooring will be patched.

Our kitchen project

Why is our kitchen wrapped in plastic?

We don't have a storm door on our back door. As a result water has penetrated under the door and entered the house. Unknown to us, the water has gotten under the vinyl floor. Our house is only 9 years old and we estimate this water damage has been happening for most of those 9 years. It has caused not only the underlayment to rot but caused the 5/8" subfloor (guaranteed for 50 years) to rot too!

The home builder is coming to cut away a large portion of the kitchen floor. He will cut it all the way to the rafters below! Then he will surgically replace the subfloor and brace the subfloor from underneath.

Then a flooring company will come to replace underlayment and replace the vinyl flooring using a nearly invisible seam material.

That is why my kitchen is wrapped in plastic - to try to avoid getting all the saw dust on our food and dishes.