Day 68 –Tuesday, December 14 – Now, I’m an artiste:

Goals: Try out my paint pen on the inlay board

Music: Percy Faith’s “Music of Christmas”.

My Sharpie extra-fine point gold paint marker arrived, so I couldn’t wait to try it out on the inlay board. I was hoping and praying that the gold was opaque and non-metallic so that it would match what was on the board already, and I was praying that the point was fine enough to get the detailing to look right. Imagine my surprise and delight when it succeeded on both counts. I spent about one hour doing the detailing, entirely by free hand, and entirely with my mind’s eye – no stencils, overlays, copying of something similar, or anything like that. Mrs. S was not impressed, but I’m quite happy with the result. Here’s a sample:

Before

After (sorry, slightly out of focus)

The only thing I have to do now is “age” some of the new mother-of-pearl pieces and then seal the board with urethane or some other clear coating. The sealing part is going to have to be trial and error, but since I just need something to get me to a uniform appearance, I think urethane is the way to go, but I may try lacquer as well. I think lacquer may give it more of an antique look with its slight yellow tint. Well have to see when I do the test piece.

I haven’t had any response to my inquiries about the untunable pin, but it doesn’t matter because I’m unlikely to have time to work on the piano tonight or tomorrow or Friday, due to having to work late, my piano lesson, and working as a casino dealer at a Christmas party, respectively. I will have the weekend, though, so hopefully my consultants will weigh in with their opinion pretty soon.

The big development today was that I found some replacement parts that I need on e-bay, so I snapped them up and sent an inquiry if he has any more of the parts that I need. I’m hoping he does and he sells them to me at a reasonable price. We’ll see.