Repairs
Finally!
Back in 2010 (2010 seems like yesterday- ugh) we picked up a gorgeous birdhouse made by some guy down in Texas and sold on eBay. But, in recent years it fell into such a state of disrepair it needed to be taken out of commission. Although, I'm happy to remind our regular readers, the Texas birdhouse was mended back in 2020, and I made the statement that I'd get it mounted somewhere soon. 2020 isn't as far back as 2010, soooo.... Um - let's get into it!
When Things Were New
When we first got this birdhouse, we had recently cut down one of the main trunks of the birch tree clump in the front yard (and in 2013 the rest of the birches came out). We thought it would be neat to use a piece of the birch tree as a post for the birdhouse, natural look and all. It looked great and worked out well for, I'm not sure how long - several years anyway, before that length of birch finally rotted out.
The Waiting Game
I have no idea why I didn't just put the birdhouse back up right away, but it ended up sitting on the original potting bench for...a while. Yeah, let's leave it at that.
Then, in 2022 we put in new fences and built a new potting bench! And the birdhouse sat on that bench... until today! Go ahead - judge me...I am!
First Things First
This wasn't a complex project at all. Basically the front half of the roof had split into 2 pieces yet again. We're not talking rocket science here so, predictably, I just had to glue the two parts together, and I let the glue cure overnight.
And I cut a small piece of dowel that came from an old clothes-drying rack we picked up at the poor man's flea market on trash night maybe 10 or 15 years ago. A couple drops of glue pretty much made it all permanent!
The early bird gets the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese. - Willie Nelson
Reinforcing the Roof
I have absolute trust in the Titebond glue I used to put the two halves of the front roof back together. However, because this is the second time around, I thought I would reinforce the halves with some simple metal strips screwed to the inside.
HOWEVER! I have a little confession. I'm not nearly as smart as I sometimes think I am. You may ask why I chose this very moment to surprise you with such an announcement. Well, thank you for asking. You see, I needed to drill some screw holes into the little metal strips that I was going to use to reinforce the two halves of the front roof.
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From The Stacks, a random post: Replacing the Sewer Pipe
While drilling the holes, I held the metal strips against the piece of 2x4 instead of using the drill press. Silly mistake because, suddenly the drill bit snapped in half and the half that remained in the drill crashed down upon my index finger and sent the drill bit through my fingernail and into the bone. I'll spare you the gore, but here's a shot from after a couple hours in urgent care...
Wrapping Things Up
After the two parts of the front half of the roof were finished, it was just a matter of connecting the front half with the back half again. A little glue, a couple of clamps and another overnight to be sure the glue cured.
And just like that, the repairs had been made. We decided to leave it with the weathered look, figuring that eventually, the roof would go for good and it would be at that point that we would replace the roof altogether and give it a fresh coat of paint.
The only thing left to do was to attach a flange to the bottom of the birdhouse, so we could put it on a length of pipe.
Its Natural Habitat
We decided to go with a 3/4 inch galvanized pipe to mount the birdhouse. We also thought we'd put it in the same space it was originally in these many years ago!
The pipe came in the traditional silver color which would have been okay. But! It also came in black, which can make the pipe almost disappear, certainly depending on the sight angle.
From this angle, the birdhouse almost looks like it's floating in its natural habitat!
And that's it. After woefully too many years of sitting on two iterations of potting benches, the old eBay birdhouse from Texas is finally back where it belongs. Hey, thanks for stopping by and - see ya' next time!
