No Pain, No Cane

Dan and I were recently given the assignment to recane a few of our chairs. You have no idea what I'm talking about, huh? That's ok, when we were given the assignment we didn't know what it meant either.

In short, that lattice-like wooden screen that you often see on chairs is called "cane" or "caning". It's actually not wood at all, but the skin of the nonporous rattan vine. Its impermeability makes it ideal for furniture because it won't stain or react to humidity.

Behold the odd and strangely useful things you learn as an innkeeper...

We have a few chairs that feature a lovely woven cane backing. They had unfortunately taken a bit of a beating over the years though, and two out of three chairs had holes ripped through the cane. Rather than replace the whole chair, John opted for Dan and I to re-cane it ourselves. One benefit being that it's significantly less expensive, but another being that it's the greener decision because fixing an old chair instead of buying a brand new one means less resources are used. It's a win-win!

Anyway, this is how the process looks currently:
Kind of a mess. You'd think that throwing a screen into a panel would be easy, right? Not so much... First off, the directions are really vague and don't have any pictures.

Through process of elimination [and some pieces being kind of obvious] we determined that these two pieces are the spline and the cane.


See how they fit into the finished product? (By the way, that's an old, unbroken chair, not one that we've finished.)

Aside from the spline and cane, the wedge, chisel, and hammer were pretty easy to identify...

One line in the directions mentions using "4 wedges to hold the spline in place, and the fifth to pound it into the groove". How do I hold 4 wedges in one place, a fifth in another, AND somehow manage to hammer at the same time? And why in the world do I need 4 wedges to do what two of my fingers are doing in the photo above?? What kind of crazy person invented this process???

As much of a pain as this is, it's going to be neat to be able to proudly say when it's done, "Hey Bob. I caned a chair once. Did you know that?" And he'll be confused and have no idea what I'm talking about. Then I'll be able to rant on about rattan vines and permeability and spline chisels and prewoven cane and...

...I'm doing that right now, aren't I?


With Love,
~Brande N.

Regarding my love for Technology

Please, dear readers, forgive me for my unexcused absence. It's been a whirlwind of craziness here at the Inn. Summer preparation is in full swing and BOY is there a lot to do! In addition to all the usual summer prep, miscellaneous this-and-thats [broken lamps, clogged showerheads, order placements and pick-ups, new bed deliveries and set-ups, power outages, and the pool situation, just to name a few] keep coming up here and there that need to be attended to. So unfortunately, there isn't a whole lot of time for blogging in between all the chaos!

But I haven't forgot about you, I promise. In fact, for the last week or so, I've been working on a neat little slideshow about the aforementioned pool. As we've been repairing and painting it, we've also been setting out the pool furniture and putting in an entirely brand new fence. In short, we're getting it prepped for the big opening this weekend. Each day there's a bit more paint, a few more chairs, and a couple feet more fence. It's fun to watch the transformation. The pool is still on schedule to open this weekend (knock on wood!), so as of this morning I was almost done with my photo set and it was going to be a great post.

Also on the camera with the pool pictures were photos of the aforementioned dining guide, and photos of my birthday and the day that Dan and I spent with friends and family who visited us from NY. I wanted to upload the pictures of the dining guide so that I could [finally] blog about it, so I put the memory card in my computer and get ready to start the post. Then I realized that I had only taken pictures of the construction of the book and not the final product. So I took the memory card out of my computer (being very certain to use the "Safely Remove Hardware" feature), and put it back in my camera. I went out to the Guest Pantry, took a few pictures of the Dining Guide and a few more of the pool, and went back to my computer.

When I put the memory card in, however, all of the photos had somehow been corrupted. Everything was lost. The pool photos, the making-of-the-dining-guide photos, all of the pictures from my birthday, everything. It was all gone. Ugh.

I'll still do a post about both the pool and the dining guide, but unfortunately they won't be as complete.

Isn't Technology just grand?

With Love,
~Brande N.

Prepping for Summer

The sun is shining, the flowers are blooming, the grass is green and lush, and the air is warm. What does that all mean? It means summer is coming up on our heels and we're working on a million little projects to get ready for it.

The biggest project right now is our pool. It didn't start out as a big project, though. It needed to be repainted and have a bit of masonry work done, but nothing too major.

Wrong! It turns out that the three layers of paint on it right now are all different varieties; two layers are epoxy, one layer is water-based, and the paint we bought is low VOC rubber-based! In an effort to prevent the paint from chipping (which would mean draining, repainting, refilling, and retreating all the water), we're in the process of sandblasting off all of the paint so we can start with a blank slate.

Therefore, our pool, which looked like this last summer:

Currently looks like this:


"AHHHH!!!"

That's what you were thinking, right? Have no fear, however, because regardless of how scary the pool looks now, we're still on schedule to be up and running by Memorial Weekend.

Whew!

With Love,
~Brande N.


PS: Since I'm a history nerd and I like sharing these things, I think you should check out our History page if you're curious to know more about our pool. For example, did you know that it's almost 100 years old?

Innkeeperitis - UPDATED

Over the last few months, as I've progressed through Innkeeping 101, I've learned a lot. Most recently, I had the realization that there are a few things Innkeepers do that I believe very few other people do. At least not normal people.

Examples? Innkeepers find their pockets stuffed with miscellaneous this-and-that at the end of the day. Lint pulled off curtains, a loose thread from a pillowcase, a twig fragment and tiny pebble kicked in from outside. All of it in my pocket. Right now. As we speak.

Why, you ask? Because when we're doing room inspections and there is a lovely, perfectly empty trashcan with a clean liner in it, you better believe I'm not soiling it. I will put a squashed crust of raisin bread in my pocket before I soil a clean wastebasket. And I have.

Worst of all, [with no prior diagnosis of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder or any military training] We demand that all things be at a 90 degree angle. The tissue box in relation to the soap dish in relation to the sink in relation to the edge of the counter; all 90 degrees. It's terrible. I find myself straightening Sherry bottles when giving tours. I tell guests that I have "Innkeeper Syndrome".

Yes, it does!

It also bothers me that the pencils are sharpened to different lengths. And the pens are kicked ever so lightly to the right. Ahh!

I really do have Innkeeper Syndrome, don't I?

With [crazy] Love,
~Brande N.

UPDATE:
Today I found myself on my hands and knees, a sparkly pink hair comb in hand, combing the tassels on our rugs into neat, perfectly straight lines. I am officially insane...