Freshwater: My Desk

Freshwater

Located in the wilds of Wyoming, the name Freshwater was chosen as a Western analogy to Christ. Just as He is the Living Water, and we must have Him to have eternal life, any desert dweller knows the importance of fresh water to life, both for self, and the nourishment of crops or livestock. By taking nourishment in God and His word, we strengthen our own relationship with Him, our faith, and the quality and abundance of our fruitfulness.

Our keystone verse is from Jeremiah, Chapter 17, Verse 8: "For he shall be as a tree planted by the waters, and that spreadeth out her roots by the river, and shall not see whenSave heat cometh, but her leaf shall be green; and shall not be careful in the year of drought, neither shall cease from yielding fruit."

The fruit that we speak of is mentioned in Galatians 5:22
"²²But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, ²³Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law."

And the heat could be anything we experience that might test our faith in God; trials and tribulations, relationships, anything that focuses our love and attention anywhere but on Him...

Wednesday, September 30, 2020

My Desk

I thought I had already written about my new desk, but when I was looking through my posts today I aw I had shared about my new chair, but not the desk itself. And that's a mistake I must rectify, because this desk is very special. Not only is it a beautiful desk and exactly what I wanted, but it is a desk with character and history! I would love to know more of the stories this desk has to tell!

I had been looking at desks, and I was going to build one on my own, using some plans I found on Pinterest (something about building a desk for $20). It was a pretty simple build, and I didn't need anything fancy, but if you've met my potting bench or the table I built for the yard, you may have noticed my legs are not always all even, and I was a bit concerned my desk would wobble. Paul offered to build me a desk, and I thought this was definitely a great offer, because he is a very talented carpenter and builder of things and I knew it would be sturdy, functional, and special. We even went and picked up a piece of wood for the desktop...and then the world got really crazy around here! I knew he wanted to build the desk, but I didn't know when he would ever have time to build the desk, so I kind of started tentatively scouting around for one.

I found one that looked really neat on Facebook Marketplace, and I sent it to Paul. He told me I'd better get that, because it was beautiful. So I contacted the lady, rounded up some volunteers, and went to town to pick up the desk. And it was (and is) absolutely beautiful. And it has stories! It has been all over the world as part of a family that worked for the State Department, and I would love to know its travels.

It was in great shape, but I did go ahead and strip and sand it, staining it my own color, and sealing/sanding/sealing it again. It occupies a place of honor in my library and is well loved and well used.

Here are a few before pictures:

And here are some more throughout the project. I started sanding it and realized it was going to be a long process, so I did use stripper, scrape off the old stain, then sand.

When I finished sanding it, I put on two coats of stain, then polyurethane, hand sanding it smooth, and more poly. The first drawer pulls I had planned to use on the bottom drawers were too long, so I ended up going a different route, but I love it!