03/30/2012 - Basket Finish Work

I am really good at waiting until the last minute to finish things up. I think it is quite a skill really. I had the weaving done but needed to cover the corners and attach handles on all 12 baskets before my brother-in-law arrived to pick them up at 4pm.

Reclaimed Material: rubber inner tubes
 Other/New Material: screws, staples
Tools: scissors, drill, screwdriver, ruler, marker

How I did it: I dropped Zoe off at school and started cutting strips to cover the corners and started stapling them onto the baskets...then ran out of staples, grrrr. I ran to the hardware store and got the staples and met the most unhelpful employee there. The screws I had for the handles were not going to work so I asked him for help finding something similar. After his lack of assistance, I managed to find the screws I needed on my own, the hurried home. I finished the corners then measured 24 pieces of inner tube for handles. I measured and marked the hole placement for the handles -- 48 in all and drilled the holes. I had to poke the screws through 4 layers of rubber for both sides of the handle (I tried a hole punch but the screw heads were too small). I screwed in the handles by hand...of course I couldn't find a flat head drill bit, so it was all by hand. I finished this by about 3:45pm and thankfully Mark didn't arrive for another 40 minutes, so I had time to double check each basket to make sure the weaving was straight, etc. Phew. That was quite a day...and I still had to meet a 5pm deadline to submit my art pieces.

What I would do differently: NOT WAIT UNTIL THE LAST MINUTE! It was a stressful day and when I let myself wait until the last minute I run into problems like running out of supplies or not being able to find tools. It all worked out but I was pooped by the time 5pm rolled around.