Yesterday I finished the sanding of plugs and some stains on the baseboard.  There's a bit of hand sanding remaining, and possibly a go-round with a finer grit on the whole thing.

But what has got me excited is the 'hard' part about to take place.

Today I fashioned a jig for cutting narrow strips, which will probably be needed to cut pieces from the short boards I have, since I don't think there will be enough stock for all of the pieces I need to come from the long boards.

I also did a LOT of thinking about process....and a LOT of measuring.

Measurements and muddles. What I have to work with are a number of short leftover boards ranging from 2'-3' in length, 2 oak boards approx 3' x 11', and 1 oak board approx 2" x 8'.

There are 3 things to be cut: 

• The top chair rail which is the same thickness of the posts, about 9/16" by 1 1/4". I need about 30' of that.
• The inside bottom piece that goes on top of the plywood in between the posts against the wall,; it is 9/16 x 5/16".  There are about 20 pieces, mostly around 2' long
• The outside bottom piece which runs along the length of the wall in front of the posts, also 9/16 x 5/16".  For this I need  some longish pieces, about 40' in all.

I spent a long time thinking this out, and the best way to make it happen.  I hope my thoughts are helpful.  Each of these cuts will have to be edge planed before going through the saw, and the long boards will probably have to be thickness planed before anything else is done.

Well.....the best laid plans........

I changed my mind on the thickness of the bottom pieces, back to 1/4".  Brian arrived and said we could cut 1/4" strips on the right side of the saw blade with no problem, so my jig-making was redundant. This worked fine up until the very last strip which was way too tricky for my taste. Because the jointer is not working, I need to sand those pieces by hand.

Unfortunately, apart from the first 9 strips, the rest of the day was disappointing because  the jointer turned out to be not working - belt is off, and the bolts holding the top to the bottom  were missing.  I suppose I could have tossed them in my cleaning frenzy a few days ago.  I would expect them to have been someplace nearby, and I moved almost all of the nearby stuff -- so Brian's visit turned out to be more troubleshooting and jointer fixing than making actual progress.

Nonetheless, I learned a pile of stuff from him about planing and cutting and what you can and cannot practically do.  I will be having some joints in the top rail, and in the outside bottom piece in order not to lose massive amounts of stock due to crookedness.  Might just need that mitre saw after all. 

Woodworking as a practical hobby for me seems quite far off.  There is way too much to learn and remember, such as the million kinds of bolts there are, and what a nut driver is and which knobs do what on the power tools.  The jury is still out on whether I will be making this a long-term project.