White Church Gallery: January 2015

What is the White Church Gallery?

Mike and Carrie Zaitz are renovating an old Methodist Church in Grindstone City, Michigan. Mike claims he just wanted a place to work on his art. He sold Carrie on it, since she's usually up for adventures. From that happy December of 2011 till now, the investment in time and money has seen the church rebuilt from its glorious bones into a work of art, in progress. Carrie is documenting the process because, well, it's easier to hold a camera than to hold an edging sander. She's done both, because she is having an adventure, but it is Mike who drives this project with his intelligence, talent and energy. Together they are working toward creating an art gallery. A gallery which holds objects of beauty and inspiration, but which always points back to the source, our heavenly Father.

Friday, January 16, 2015

Water Hole

One of last big changes for the Church is to have running water inside. Yes. This beautiful old church has never had indoor plumbing, in all the 135 years of services, weddings, Christmases, funerals, and even during the recent Reign of Raccoons.

We need a potty!

So in December of 2014, we started excavating the stage in the front of the church. We needed room for a water tank, and that was a logical place to put it. Of course, we didn't realize that there was a floor under the stage, so taking out the floor was a two step process!

Two levels of stage. Who knew?

We have to get down to the bottom of this! The tank is here!

300 gallons of agua, coming soon!

It's going to lay flat in the space cut out of the stage.
Cutting out the flooring out was a messy job, as usual.

Is it snowing in here?

No, it's just the usual airborne dust. It was definitely time for masks. While Mike worked on the stage, I fiddled with another project: the doors.

We found these old wooden doors in the antique shop in Bay City, Michigan where our set of display cases is currently being housed. They are gorgeous, no? That is if you can see under the paint and the fact that they will have to be totally resized to fit the Church.

Imagine it the size of the blue tape. With no paint!

Mike sanded the flat side and the paint came off well.

Belt sanders are powerful.

Sometimes a little too powerful, as we found out.

Divots happen…

The other side had the interesting bits. The fiddly bits. That's the side that I attended to.

It's in rough shape.

The paint was actually pretty thin- just a layer of primer and the black, making us wonder if they had been redone before.

Comes right off.

Progress:

More elbow grease, please?

The fiddly bits had to be done by hand.

Better, but not best.

It turns out that there is a tool that is made for this kind of work. Fiddly work. It's a sander that looks like an iron! It's the Ryobi Corner Cat!

I assume "ponceuse" means sander!

It's very green.

It's very interesting…sniff sniff…

And, most importantly, it's awesome for the job.

Works like a charm.

It came as a surprise from Mike, and it is now my favorite piece of equipment, after the Robosaw, of course.

Robosaw has been repositioned for maximum convenience.

More on the amazing Robosaw in the next issue! For now, we'll let the dust settle.

But it's almost February!!

Stay tuned for wood, amazing wood!

Friday, January 2, 2015

2014! and Love News

This is a bit of a love letter to 2014. It was a busy year! But a lovely one. And only good things to come in 2015.

Love is Patient, Love is Kind...

Love is a doggie named Thomas!

The Church will be open by June. How do we know?
How could we possibly be open in 5! Five! 5! months?
With a punch list a country mile long?
Because we have a wedding to get ready for!
Coming in June: a June Wedding. The daughter of a close friend wants to be wed in the old country Church, and it will be our excitement and pleasure to prepare the aisles.
Hey everyone, grab a tool and let's get bizzy!

This'll do!

With the exception of the water tanks going in the floor, most of the very large objectives have been met.

Let's review: 2014 started out with good cheer and lots of ambition.

Happy New Year!

It was also one of the most brutal winters I can ever remember.

Frosted window panes.

Sub zero temps, snow snow snow. Six snow days from school, three of them at the end of Christmas break. We hunkered down.

Some members of the household are permanently hunkered down!

Luckily the geothermal heating system made the Church snug for comfortable working.
So we did trim work. That meant caulk, and lots of it.

Caulk Love!

"I'm in a tight spot"

There was lots for everyone to do.

We hit it hard almost every weekend.

Painting the ceiling…

Sanding the floors…

This one about did us in. We didn't plan it this way, but after the big sanding effort, we took a bit of hiatus. We still worked, but the giant exhausting efforts were put on hold for the rest of the summer…

We did have visitors and fun. Speaking of the upcoming nuptials, here are the parents of the bride checking out the status of the church.

We'll have her in ship shape, no worries, mateys! (Ignore the mess!) (arrr…)

We also worked on other projects back in our home and our cottage. Projects to make the rest of our life away from the Church a little nicer.

When we bought our house in Royal Oak, the entire place was paneled and featured dropped ceilings. We gutted, drywalled and painted the entire place with one exception: there was one room that didn't get the treatment. That was 12 years ago.

We kind of dug the panelling, at least enough to keep it for 12 years. Plus it was a spare room, and we used it as a walk in closet.