In August our contractor finished our kitchen addition, remodel and whole house window replacement. Because we went with new flooring all the baseboard in the dining room, kitchen, bathroom and hallway had to be removed so it only made sense to remove the trim for the doors opening onto the hallway. While the contractor and his subs did an excellent job, I elected to do the finish carpentry. I just came in from staining the last of the baseboard. Tomorrow I will begin the two days of applying 2 coats per day of poly. After that baseboard is installed, I have one more window to manufacture casing, finish and trim it out. When they installed the new windows, I insisted they use nailing flanges. Thus exterior trim was required. The new windows were thicker thus new interior trim and casing was required too.
All the doorways and windows are getting stained oak casing and picture frame trim as appropriate.
The things I have learned while trimming out 4 doors and 7 windows with picture frame trim?
1. All necessary surfaces are flush with each other UNTIL you glue the joints and drive the nails!
2. All surfaces that need to be are perpendicular to each other are perfect UNTIL you drive the nails.
3. In our area, it's difficult to find straight oak picture frame trim. You can find oak trim, however, it's difficult to find straight trim.
4. A sharp low angle block plane is a good friend to a finish carpenter.
5. A good finish carpenter is worth his/her weight in gold. I am neither.
In my defense, my wife insisted on a 5 week driving trip for a Grandma fix so it delayed my work. While my work is okay, I am sure a good professional would have been faster and done a better job!