Pictures two: or How Framing is not for me and other miscellaneous stuff

Being a nit picker for scale I often find some things hard to find which satisfy me and my budget.  I have had an eye out for picture frames for a long while and have bought this and that with varying success.  Eventually I decided how hard could it be to make a picture frame in scale and to the size I wanted.  I bought some mouldings from Jennifers of Walsall at a show a couple of years ago and they have lurked in the stash since then.  Time to dust them off

I bought two different styles.  The first is a plain/modern shape just 3/16ths inch wide

The other is a more traditional one.....  1/4 inch wide

.......with a complex profile which turned out to be even more of a pig to mitre

The reverse sides of these was pretty much the same in that they had been routed for you to put in the picture or maybe mirror and be left with a nice flush back - just as in real life.  A lot of frames you buy don't do this.   

I am quite proud of my mitring skills so off I trotted, full of confidence.

My first problem was what to cut it with.  I only have pretty basic equipment.  It was far too tiny and fiddly to use the saw and mitre block (I did try) so without that guide I already had a problem of getting the forty five degree cuts any way accurate.  It didn't take kindly to a knife and even the finest of scissor blades squished the material as it cut.  As you can see here the cuts were pretty dreadful and nowhere near a nice neat 45 degrees.

I cut the template in hopes of getting the lengths right and the angles right.  I didn't manage either. Even after attempting some adjustments here and there it was pretty much awful.

Sorry the focus is poor on this photo.  I glued the corners together best I could and stuck it on masking tape to stop it jiggling around (and coming unstuck) to paint it.  You can see my right side is longer than the left.

As for any gaps in the corners I used my usual method of mixing a little sawdust with paint and shoving that in and then sanding smooth when its dry.

So the finished object is not a thing of beauty and is a mirror,  not a picture as my post heading would suggest. 😉  

It actually looks OK in situ but I have two more back-up mirrors on their way so I will decide then which to use.

Worth noting before I leave that if you ever want any kind of wood pieces or trim for something you are doing this place has more than you could ever dream of:  Wood Supplies

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We live in strange times.....  I currently have a painful unrelenting dry cough with no other cold symptoms or even a high temperature. Day three, yesterday, because I am 74 and have a rubbish immune system I was checked at a local community hospital - BP, oxygen levels, listened to lower chest, looked down throat and told I may or may not have the virus.  There is no way of knowing as tests will only be done if you are admitted to a hospital as an emergency. Apparently that point comes when you are finding it hard to breath when resting!!  

Just a couple of thoughts.......Clearly we will never be able to know the true statistics of the pandemic as there is no testing in the UK until it is pretty certain you have it.  The no test rule seemingly doesn't apply if you are a local MP and his wife both of whom were tested a few days before me in the same unit.  Such inequality will not sit well with many people.  When the worst is over and we are 'released' some months down the line we will be back in a world still carrying this virus (and its mutations) forever and have no way of knowing if we had it and are immune or if we are still vulnerable.  What a mess.

Meanwhile wish me luck.  To be fair I am on day four and thinking I have improved.