When a luthier builds a stringed instrument there comes a moment greatly cherished ... it is the magic moment when the build is "complete" except for the finish and any adjustments that need to be made before the instrument is delivered to the owner ... at this magic moment the builder strings the instrument, tunes it to proper pitch and plucks the first notes, hearing for the first time the "voice" of the instrument he has created.  This is referred to as "stringing it in the white".  A luthier has toiled long and hard, usually in complete solitude to bring the instrument to life and there is simply no more joyous moment than hearing the first notes "in the white".

I had a similar experience today with the crib ... the pictures show the crib "in the white" ... no finish applied, final sanding still to be done, some knot holes need filling ... but all of the cutting, shaping, drilling, gluing is done the hardware is temporarily installed and I have verified the fit and square of the whole thing ...

It's a good day ...

From The Crib

From The Crib

From The Crib

From The Crib

Well ... progress IS being made ... it's amazing how long it takes me to accomplish basically ANYTHING nowadays ... I start to do something that should realistically take 2 hours ... and 5 hours later I'm still dealing with "issues" that have come up on the effort ... I'm not really sure why this happens ... but it does with enough regularity that I have simply come to accept it as "the way things are" ...

Here are some pictures of the crib laid out on my workbench and "clamped" together to check several things:

1. Is it "square" ? ... You see "squareness" for me is a bit of an issue ... just look at the garden gate or any other thing I have had a hand in building ... "square" is one of those "goals" that I keep reaching for ... happily in this case the crib IS in fact "square" ... .... ... 'enough'

2. Does the mattress spring (and thus the future to be had mattress) actually fit inside the crib (to be) as it is supposed to?  This has been one of those things that keeps me up at night ... did I measure correctly? ... did I cut correctly? ... knowing me as I do ... did I measure AND cut correctly and then find some other way to screw things up? ... again I am happy to report that "so far" (and we have a long way to go affording I am sure MANY opportunities to screw it up) the springs do in fact fit inside as they should.

3. What about the "leg length"?  I've been concerned about this for several reasons the biggest of which being that I have modified the "plan" as it came to accommodate a different more "mission style" look and that meant changing the shape and size of the "headboard" which in turn changed several of the measurements that effect height and leg length ... AND ... when I was dimensioning the wood on the planer I was faced with several 'decisions' about how to get the longest possible piece of useable wood out of the rough lumber I had bought ... these decisions too had an impact on how long the "leg" pieces got cut.  After the dry clamp up shown in the pictures I took several measurements and determined that I skated by with a whole 1.5 inches to spare ... whew!!!

So .... these pictures are just a dry clamp up showing progress to date as I took the measurements for the next critical steps of drilling holes for dowels and construction screws.

From The Crib

From The Crib

From The Crib