TEDCO Refinishing

Teddy has really gotten into the furniture refinishing business big time. She has been haunting all of the thrift stores down here looking for quality furniture that just needs some TLC and this is what she has come up with. If this keeps up we are going to have to get another trailer to pull behind our Cardinal. Seriously though she has come up with some real bargains and has learned a lot in the brief time that she has been refinishing them.

They will go perfectly in the farmhouse when we get back.

Meanwhile back at the farm our contractor has informed us that he is finished with the drywalling. We are excited to see it.

It all started when she found this 48" round oak table at a thrift shop in Pahrump. (see previous blog entry on Thursday, November 18, 2010)

On Dec. 1 we left Pahrump and relocated here in Lake Havasu City. Shortly after arriving she continued refinishing the 48" table. Here, after staining she applies the first of three coats of poly.

After the final coat of polyurethane varnish was dry we wrapped it securely in bubble wrap for it's trip back to "The Farm" in Michigan.
We will use it for our dining room table.

Teddy had enjoyed her refinishing project so much that after a couple of weeks she began searching the thrift shops here for well built furniture items that were also in need of some TLC.

She bought this solid Maple Captains Chair for $5.00 and was soon hard at work This is the result after stripping, sanding, staining and varnishing with 3 coats of poly. It will go into a corner of the dining room back at "The Farm".

I thought that she was done but once the fever had struck
there was no stopping it.

She got this small 24" round table for $15.00 at another thrift store. It is made of solid Oak but someone had finished it with a mahogany almost black stain so dark that you could barely see the grain. Stripping it revealed this beautiful oak grain that was a shame to hide.

Here it is after 3 coats of poly and hand rubbing.

By now Teddy was becoming somewhat of a celebrity here in the park and folks were stopping by to see what she was working on now.

Soon after finishing the 24" table she came

back with this console table which she

picked up for $30.00. It is 16" wide by

49" long and will go nicely against one

of the walls in the dining room.

(that's the pedestal for the 48" table and a wine rack sitting under it in the back of our trailer where it will ride during the trip back)

And now she's working on this solid maple end table which she picked up for $15.00 Here it is after stripping, sanding and applying the first coat of poly.

She plans to use it as a night table in the bedroom.

Teddy has learned a lot since she started, picking up hints from
woodworkers here in the park and by trial and error.

I must say that I am quite proud of her.

Even so she has to stop or we will have to make two trips
to get all of this back to Michigan.  

Still Here

I haven't updated our blog in a while. It's just that when you are having fun, the days just seem to run together. Additionally we haven't been engaged in many activities that I haven't previously blogged about. Every morning I rise at 5am and join a group of guys in the clubhouse for BS and coffee. I generally get back to the trailer at about 7:30 as Teddy is just rising. She then disappears for an hour or so to join a morning exercise group. Then when she gets back around 9 we have breakfast...and so it goes. I know that doesn't sound very exciting but we really are enjoying our winter stay in Lake Havasu City.

For several years now on Saturday mornings from 7 to 9 am we host a breakfast at the clubhouse staffed by volunteers from the park and I, once again am the chief waffle maker making waffles to order. To maintain authenticity, I claim to have graduated from the Waffle Institute in Brussels.
Teddy OTOH spends her Saturdays with a geological club out foraging in the desert for what I call rocks. They sometimes travel up to 100 miles from here in their quest for their stoney specimens. Oh well, different strokes...

My other function here at the park seems to be the court jester, providing comic relief to the other RVers, as in, "What is that crazy Larry Page up to now?".



 I write poems for our semi-frequent buffet dinners, collect and print oddities from the internet, act as the park photographer, maintain a park directory, sometimes MC at the dinners and...

...ham that I am, this year have taken over as the bingo caller on Tuesday & Thursday bingo nights.






Other evenings we generally sit out in lawn chairs with our "Snowbird" friends, sip scotch or drink beer and swap lies.

So you see, we do keep busy with our little make work activities but even so I do manage to sneak in an afternoon nap just about every day.