The quarantine took us all by surprise. Life was turned upside down it felt. A coping mechanism of mine kicked into place quickly- “this is just temporary, it won’t last forever” were things I began telling myself. This mechanism works well most of the time but for COVID-19, it began to bite me in the butt pretty quickly with my new work situation.
I began seeing clients from our spare bedroom using a virtual platform. Since this wasn’t going to last forever, I simply set up camp at the foot of the bed using a metal folding chair. However, even I figured out within 2 weeks that the posture I had sitting hunched over for several hours was going to lead to some back pain.
Next, I switched to an old butcher block island Juan and I had lying around. This came with a whole set of issues itself such as needing a taller chair and not being able to pull the chair underneath it to sit so again left leaning forward (the island has a wooden platform underneath for storing items). During the next month, I developed severe neck pain limiting my ability to turn my next from side to side. Juan encouraged me to build myself a desk but I was insistent I could make it work since it was “just a temporary measure”.
A month after that, I bruised the ball of my foot after having my bare feet resting on the wooden lower platform for 3 hours straight. After hobbling around the house for almost 2 whole weeks, and realizing more and more that things were going to be like this for a while, I decided it was time to build a desk.
This decision was helped along a little when we found out Emma was going to be starting school and would be doing so virtually. Perfect! A two-for-one project! I decided to make designing it a little more fun and got Emma involved. I let her pick out the style of desk from a few desks I thought I could build and even let her pick out the wood- she chose red oak. This build was somewhat simple since I decided to use pocket-hole joints instead of mortise and tenons. Emma even got excited about it frequently asking me about my progress. I will admit during the finishing process, I even felt myself getting a little sentimental and her starting school on a desk that I was able build for her!
What did I learn?
– pocket-hole joints are easier/faster for me than mortise and tenons but not as strong and not as “pretty”
– If a child picks out a milk stain for her red oak desk, go with it. I second guessed this and went with just a clear protective coat but kind of wish I’d given her milk stain a try
– Don’t forget if you initially cut a board “a little long” that you need to go back and cut to the appropriate link before assembly- the desk is currently too tall and will have to have the legs chopped off this weekend by about 2 inches