I have never fancied myself a carpenter.
I can paint furniture, and do any sort of paper crafty-ish project, and I can bake a wicked dessert, but using power tools, and slinging a hammer?
Notsomuch.
I couldn't imagine it, nor did I feel even the teensiest bit of interest in this.
Then I moved into a 1952 fixer-upper cottage.
And I realized I needed to do quite a lot of updating that clearly would require carpentry work.
And, hiring it out would do ca-razy insane things to my budget.
That's when my daughter, handiwoman extraordinaire, stepped in and assured me that I could do this. Really.
Really?
Really.
I said I would be the judge of that.
She came over, chop-saw and nail-gun in hand, and we did a walk through my gonna-be-so-cute-and-cozy cottage. In the end, we decided the bathroom window would be the project I would cut my carpenter teeth on, so to speak.
My mama-of-FOUR-BOYS-tape-measure-toting-carpenter daughter whipped out her trusty crowbar, and showed me just how easy it is to pop off a window frame from 1952.
We then headed to Home Depot, picked up the wood trim, and got to work measuring the window.
Measure twice (or four or five times, if need-be.) and cut once.
We set up the chop-saw on the garage floor, and jerry-rigged a way to keep the wood straight while cutting (If you try this, do as I say, and not as I did...) because my work bench is still covered in tubs of holiday items from my move last December.
(Oh dear. Has it been more than four months already?)
She had me watch her work the saw. Then, she had me work the saw.
Oh my. How fun was this?!
A whole new creative frontier.
Fast, clean cuts. The smell of freshly made sawdust. Instant gratification. Oh yes, I could get used to doing this.
Mmmmm hmmm.
The nail gun proved to be even more fun.
(As if that were possible.)
In roughly eighteen minutes, first the side boards, then the bottom, and finally the top pieces...
...start to finish, we had nailed up and framed my sweet lil' bathroom window, without breaking a sweat.
Aah-mazing.
All that is left is to touch up the seams and nail holes with caulk, and paint.(and spend a good amount of time outside with a razorblade, scraping off the sloppy extra paint on the windows from a paint job a couple decades ago.) and the job is complete.
Squeeeeeeee!
She was right, I can do this! (And I will.)
Step aside Bob Vila'. Gramma Cupcake's gat a nail gun, and she's not afraid to use it.
