Island!

The island! The island is in! 

"I'm here!" 

It's fantastic!

The top left spot is for the knife drawer and below it will be the trash/recycling bins on a pull-out contraption. We saved the old drawers from the old Florida island and these will go in the three middle spots; Nate is making new fronts. On the right will be the mixer lift!

The other side of the island, the side facing the windows, has shelves for cookbooks.

"So," I hear you saying, "The island is in, but what goes on top of it?"

Glad you asked! A butcher block counter!

It was really big, so it had to be cut down to size. Nate set up the sawhorses with a thick piece of insulation board that he's used for a makeshift cutting table before. We don't have snow on the ground yet and this slab was HEAVY, so he made the call to work on it outside rather than in the basement shop. The fewer stairs with this sucker, the better.

There was quite a lot of measuring with different kinds of measuring things.

Making the first cut with the circular saw!

Measuring for the cut out around a bit of corner. 

More measuring.

Just making sure. 

Jigsaw action! 

The troublesome notch is cut! 

After this, Nate used the router and gave the slab slightly rounded edges.

Using the router...let the chips fly!

Then, we sanded and sanded, going from 80 grit sandpaper all the way to 320. We were after s-m-o-o-t-h, and we got it!

The only way to sand...

The counter is now in place on top of the island. Right after we installed it, I was initially afraid that we picked something too light in color, but that vanished quickly. I didn't want a dark counter.

We are in the process of finishing it with a mixture of beeswax and linseed oil. It goes on in a thin coat, which you let sit for an hour. Then, rub with a clean cloth until the surface is dry. Twenty-four hours later, burnish with steel wool. Repeat until you have finished 3 coats. I finished coat #2 today. It's looking very, very nice--the wood almost glows and has a depth that I didn't expect. (I kind of want to pet it.) Coat #3 will probably have to wait until Wednesday and it will be Thursday before we can put anything on the counter, but that's not too far away! Hooray!

Lucy would have hated today, with both of us going in and out of the house so frequently. It wouldn't have been good to keep her outside with us, as she always disliked power tools and their loud noises. The dust would have been bad for her as well. At the same time, she would have howled if we'd kept her inside when we were busy outside, as she hated being away from us if she knew we were around. I miss her so much.