Spiral Stairs & Home Projects

I don't know if I mentioned, we've had to do a bit of rearranging of the living room.  We had to do that because our furniture, which I bought... Long enough ago that my hair was a different color.  So we'll just go with a long time.  We've had the furniture longer than we've been married.

We bought it by going to a furniture store and when it was delivered it was amazing how small our room looked.  It looked fine and normal sized in the showroom but the furniture was massive.  We do not have a large house.  The couch and chairs were definitely designed for a larger room than where they were living.

Long story short, we had to buy a new couch.  And a new chair.

This time around I did a lot of measuring.  The new couch and chair fit in the room much better.  They work with the coffee table and the two side tables we have for the lamps that I bought cheap.  I wouldn't care about making things work with the coffee table but its from my grandmother and a really nice piece. 

The problem is the new couch is a sectional which I love, but the way I tend to sit on it makes it hard to reach the coffee table.  I tend to sit with my back against one arm and my feet on the other end.  This is nothing new.  If I want a drink though I have to either fall off the couch to reach the coffee table from my corner, or I don't get to sit in my preferred position.

So I decided we needed a sofa table.  You know, one of those tables that goes between the wall and the couch so  you have a place for cats to walk or drinks to sit or maybe to put a book down?

It's not easy to find one that's narrow enough or long enough to work.  Too wide and the couch pushes out so far we're left with the room feeling too small again.  Too short and it looks...well it looks stupid.

So I looked up some things on Pinterest and decided to make one.

This was a little more complex then adding legs to the bedside tables but I'm pretty pleased with how it turned out.

It took most of Saturday to do. And then I moved a bookcase and put the table behind the couch where it will live.

I'm pleased with my efforts considering it was my first try.  It kind of makes me want a truck to haul wood around in though because I had to have my boards cut down enough to fit in my car.  It also makes me want another work table.

But here are a couple of pictures of my work.

 

You can see the Building Inspector has no fear.  No suspicion of a new couch or table.  I need to get some new pillows since the ones on the couch actually go with the old couch and when it leaves they'll go with it.

I took the rest of Saturday off because wow, really tired.  But Sunday I began to work on the stairs for the WQ's tower.  I've been stalking Brae's Aero Squad Lounge because I love her stairs.

I want narrow stairs with a thick central post up the middle because that's what I've seen on most of the research I've been doing.

I have Styrofoam left over from when I cleaned out the closet and boxes a while back so I used the template I'd made for the floors and cut out a couple of circles.  Then cut the circle into eight steps and chopped off the tips of the triangles to accommodate the post.

Right now the glue is drying and the steps are leaning against each other and the tower wall.  I made two sets of four and added another three steps because the foam is slightly less than an inch thick and it's nine inches to the second floor level.  I made one set of five and another of four, and I'll glue the other two and then everything together completely once the glue is set and they're more stable.

The steps aren't perfect or even completely regular and even.  I don't want them to be perfect since these aren't exactly modern 'to code' stairs.

I want to get at least one set of steps done, even if I end up scrapping them ultimately because even a mockup will help me determine window placement and where my sconces should be positioned on the walls.  I really need to go to Hobby Lobby and get one of those wooden models like Brae has so I can make sure no one bumps their head on the upper floors.

Unfortunately it's looking like the glue won't be completely dry for a while so I'll fill you all in on the rest of it later one.

Hope everyone is having a great weekend.