Only a few days left and I'll have to change the header to 2014.

In the meantime, the scenery in the back yard changes with the sun.
On Tuesday it looked like a crystal landscape with bright sun and frigid temperatures.

On Thursday, snow was added to the scene.

Personally, I'd prefer warm breezes and palm trees, but there is a purity to is all with the fresh blanket of snow.

Now back to..."the project".

I finished machining the end rail mortises.

I've decided the answer to the impossible notch is to dowel pin the frame to the legs. I set up the fence on the drill press to drill the dowel holes in the leg.

All the holes finished.

Final sanding of the end panels so they can be stained prior to assembly.

With all the parts cut, machined and sanded...

Final end panel assembly.

So step 1 is complete.

DTE came through!!!

Power restored at 6:45pm ahead of schedule in spite of some major damage in the area.

Detroit Edison?  Don't need no stinkin' Edison!!!

Isn't there anything working in Detroit these days?

Needless to say, we're powerless except for the trusty home generator.  It's wired into the breaker box so we have the bare necessities...like coffee for Kathy and internet.

Here's why...

The power went out about 5:00am but so far, we've only had some small branches fall from the trees.

Mr. Edison promises to reconnect me to the grid sometime before midnight.  I won't hold my breath on that promise.

What a great way to begin the Christmas holiday!

Seems that the winter vacation plan to a warm spot on the planet is a month or so late this year.  The view from my Lay-Z-Boy is more like mid January than December.

On to the winter project...

After gluing up stock, I squared up the pieces for the four legs and marked them for the through mortise joints.

On to the mortising machine to "drill" the mortises.

That step was successful.

Then anything that could go wrong...did.

A dado to be cut between the mortise holes became a mess when the fence on the shaper moved.  A day of patching saved the stock but then the project came to another halt when the plan called for a series of blind notches.  The text mentions using chisels and handsaws for this step.   Whoa!!!  Hand anything is not my style.  It's all about the machinery.  So, I've spent a couple days analyzing the plans and making the necessary adjustments to get this done in a more "builder friendly" manner.

I'm ready to continue.

More to come.

Shopping is complete, the gifts are wrapped, and baby, it's cold outside!!!  Time for winter project #2.

The plan is to turn this...

into this...

A seven drawer dresser.
There's a few construction features in the project that I'm not totally sold on so there needs to be a few decisions made before I get too far.  In the meantime, I can get started with some of the basics.

So it begins...

The first cut.

The dresser has 1 3/4" square legs so I need to glue up some stock to get that.  It will take a days worth of gluing to get four legs.

I grabbed an old paper out of the pile to glue on.  It was from November 1990.  How about a 27" TV for a whopping $900?  A $250 boombox?  $350 for a mobile phone?  How things have progressed.

This project is going to take a little time and effort.  Hopefully, I end up with something more than a pile of sawdust.

Stay tuned.

So, winter project #1 is complete.

I finished the assembly of the cabinet today.  It's a four drawer cabinet with folding top extensions that create a 2'x4' surface.  This will serve as a material cutting surface (when used with her cutting mat) for Kathy in the Florida residence.  Due to space limitations there, I opted to make a smaller cabinet with a top that converts to a large surface.

Here is the cabinet with the top extensions folded down.

I made some supports that fold flat to the sides.

They fold out to support the extensions.

...and the final product.

Still five months to boating season 2014.  I need to find another project while the snow flies.

Stay tuned.