Handmade Home #6: Nose Piercing

When we ordered doors for the inside of our house we didn't get one for our bathroom. A door would have made it pretty tight in there and since it is in the office, we just would shut the office door. Unfortunately there is also a window right outside the bathroom, so we had too keep it closed. That makes for an even warmer office.

Back when we were having the bamboo around the temporary building in Santa Rita redone Jimmy brought home a couple pieces of bamboo. We thought it would be great to have a door that served as a sort of screen to block the window so that we could have a breeze in the office again.

So Jimmy used his machete and cut the bamboo in half and then built a door. It looks nice closed, but most of the time we still close the office door and have it open at an angle to block the now open window.

I love the texture of the bamboo and hope to find more ways to incorporate it into our forever house. It was a pretty easy build until Jimmy went to hang it. He was in a hurry that day and wasn't being very careful. He was drilling into concrete (which is hard enough anyway) above his head and unfortunately also in the direction of his face. The drill slipped and before he could take his finger off the button, it made contact with his nose.

I was at the other side of the house and heard a painful "Ugh!" Followed by the groan, "Shelley... I hurt my nose."

When I came to see what had happened this is what I found:

Poor Jimmy had pierced his nose. A philips head drill bit went all the way through... while it was still spinning.

You can see the "x" shape in this picture. (I'm not sure how he was still smiling.) He drove himself to the Mennonite clinic in our town. They said, "Yep, you have a hole in your nose!" and warned him not to blow his nose. All they could do was put a bandaid on it.

This all happened before we went on furlough, so since then it has healed very nicely and only left a faint scar. The memory will last forever though!

Besides a new door, our office also got a new light fixture.

This is not an idea that originated with us. I have seen several tutorials for this online, but never could find the right glue. I did find some puzzle glue, so I decided to try that.

I used one of the boys' bouncy balls and then gooped up the jute as I wrapped it around the ball. I let it dry for several days and then deflated the ball. It kept its shape... I was shocked. It has been hanging in our office for several months with all the heat and hasn't melted. I have been very happy with it.

When we hang it in our forever house I will cover the cords with something like we did in the boys' room.

I think we are going to have a lot of fun creating things for our forever house in the years to come.