Ocal Ham Beque

There is a common problem that every DIYer or woodworker faces: drilling multiple holes to the same depth. While it seems simple, it can quickly become frustrating when you find yourself with uneven holes.

Using masking tape on the drill bit is a popular solution to act as a depth guide. People place the tape around the drill bit and use the end of the tape as a flag to indicate when they reach their desired depth. It sounds simple, but after drilling several holes, the tape can rip or slide up, causing the holes to become deeper and deeper.

Here’s the Simple Solution to your drill depth problems — a Sharpie!

How to Use the Sharpie Technique

Here’s how to make drilling holes even every time:

The Sharpie hack is straightforward yet effective for achieving consistent drilling depth. First, take a Sharpie and mark a line on the drill bit at your desired depth. Ensure you make a clear and visible line while ensuring it is straight. To do so, align it with the tip of the drill.

Once you mark the drill bit, insert it into your drill. When you begin drilling, you can see the black line, indicating that you’ve reached your desired depth. This technique works for both twist bits and spade bits.

With this Sharpie hack, you can achieve precise and consistent drilling depth every time, making your DIY projects or woodworking so much easier and more efficient!

The Advantages to the Sharpie Hack

There are several advantages to using the Sharpie hack over masking tape as a depth guide. One of the most significant advantages is the permanence of the line. With the tape, the line is constantly changing, causing the depth to be inaccurate. The Sharpie line, however, will never move.

Another advantage of the Sharpie hack is how easy it is to use. Marking the drill bit takes only a few seconds and requires minimal effort. There is no need to struggle with cutting and placing strips of tape perfectly or worrying about the tape getting in the way during drilling.

Finally, the Sharpie hack allows for precision and accuracy during drilling. The black line is very easy to see, making it easy to know precisely when you’ve reached your desired depth. This precision saves time and prevents mistakes and mishaps.
These things make for a more efficient and successful project!

Tips and Tricks for Optimal Results

While the Sharpie hack is very simple, a few additional tips can help you get the best results possible.

One tip is to use a clamp to secure the workpiece in place before beginning to drill. This is to prevent any movement or slipping during drilling. Movement from the workpiece can result in the inaccuracy of depth.

Another tip is to check the alignment of the drill bit before drilling. This is to ensure that it is straight and centered. This will prevent any drifting or wandering of the drill bit.

By following these additional tips, you can achieve optimal results with the Sharpie hack. These will ensure that your drilling depth turns out perfectly every time.

To Sum It Up

The Sharpie hack is a simple but effective technique for achieving consistent drilling depth in your projects. By marking a line on your drill bit, you can easily see when you’ve reached the desired depth while avoiding the inaccuracy and frustrations of masking tape.

Additionally, the permanence of the line allows for the exact depth every time. And following additional tips and tricks will result in perfectly drilled holes.

Try the Sharpie hack in your next project and see how much easier it can make your drilling experience!

Further Reading

Yesterday, I shared three ideas that I had for creating an extra-long countertop to span my 19.5-foot wall in the studio, and y’all had some super creative ideas for me! My mind has been reeling with all of the different ideas, and in the end, I’ve decided to use hardwood flooring to create the countertop.

There were a few reasons that I decided to go with this option. First, I’ve done it before, so I know it will work. I used 3/4-inch red oak hardwood flooring to make the countertop in our walk-in pantry.

So there will be no guesswork or trial and error with this. I’ve already done it, and it turned out great, and I have my old blog posts to refer back to so that I can refresh my memory on the process. You can see how I made these countertops here.

The second reason I decided to go with hardwood flooring as a countertop is because the result is a durable solid wood surface at a fraction of the cost of butcherblock. I’ll probably go with unfinished maple for the studio countertops, and that runs about $6.30/square foot. That’s about $283.50 for the long 19.5-foot countertop, and then I’ll need to buy plywood for the substrate. But even with that, I’m still looking at less than $500 for a 19.5-foot wood countertop.

The third reason is obvious — no straight seams or joints. This was my main concern with using butcherblock or sheet laminate. Whether I have one seam or joint in the middle, or two offset seams or joints, they would bother me either way. I just wanted something to appear as a solid, uninterrupted surface.

And the final reason is that it can be built in place. There are several countertop options that require being built elsewhere and then being put into place. And example would be the butcherblock-style countertop that I made for our hallway bathroom.

That countertop is made of solid pine 2 x 3’s glued and screwed to each other, and then cut down to size. I had to build it upside down (using my front porch as a work bench), and then once it was assembled, I turned it over, cut it to size, and then brought it inside and set it in place.

Now imagine doing that with a 20-foot-long countertop. 😀 Yeah, that would be impossible.

So DIYing my own butcherblock countertop using this method was never an option for the studio. I needed something that could be built in place, and never needed to be picked up and carried and set in place.

The winning idea, and the one I felt the most confident and peaceful about, is building a countertop using hardwood flooring over a plywood substrate. And now that I’ve decided on it, I’m actually quite excited about it. I just need to decide on the specific wood species that I want to use. I know for sure that I don’t want to use red oak. I’ve had my fill of red oak since that’s what our hardwood flooring is throughout the house, and that’s what I used on the pantry countertop. In order to get that countertop the color it is, I had to bleach the wood to remove the red/pink undertones. I’d like to be able to skip that step by selecting a wood that doesn’t have that red/pink undertone. I think I’ve narrowed it down to white oak and maple.

In other news, I’m finally going to start painting the checkerboard design on the floor today. I’ve got everything prepped, taped, and ready to go. So by Monday, I should actually have this portion of the floor finished and ready to show you!

I’m so excited to see actual progress in this room! It’s been a long time coming, and it’s so fun to finally see my vision come to life.

So much remodeling progress has been made since my last update here on the blog! It’s wild to think how far we’ve come from the demo of the space that began early March to the floor, sink and cabinets being installed to all that’s recently happened over the past two weeks.

It’s coming together just as I pictured it and while there are still a lot of details I’m excited about that they will finish or bring in over the next couple of weeks (can’t wait for BEATRIX!) every day we’re getting so much closer. Before we know it, we’ll be cooking on our new kitchen.

I thought I would do a post to catch up with where we are now as the last two weeks have been really exciting! The last few days there have been been fun developments, too, so I’ll share a peek at those in today’s post as well.

You might have seen some of these updates if you are one of our newsletter subscribers since I gave a sneak peek awhile back. 🙂 I also post sometimes on Instagram so if you like to get the behind the scenes you’ll want to watch my stories, too! If you’re not on my email list you can subscribe HERE to stay in the loop of our progress and get up to date links to all of our decor posts and resources in future newsletters!

The contractors installed the French doors which look AMAZING! All of the contractors and anyone else who has visited always comments on them because they just add SO MUCH to the room. The door is beautiful with the sidelights and transom, it’s a real statement feature on that prominent wall in our kitchen! Plus it made an unbelievable difference in the room by bringing in the natural light.

They also got the marble and soapstone counters in and they are even more stunning than we could’ve imagined.

Everyone will try to talk you out of real stone, if you have them you probably have experienced the same thing! It’s understandable, they want to inform you of what you need to know in order to make a decision so I’m glad they do. But I find if you listen to them but also to your own heart and home when you’re decorating or renovating, you’ll come up with the right decision for you. I’m so glad that for our “forever home” I listened!

Of course, I was happy with our quartz in our past two kitchens, it can be beautiful, too! In fact, we chose quartz for those homes because my husband didn’t want to have to be cautious with counters, but we’ve had a change of heart in this home and for this season of our life.

Real stone isn’t always the right choice for every person or every home. But for me real stone just creates an experience I want to have in our home. It has a richness that is more than just a pretty material. I find that the real stone is something I FEEL when I’m in the room. It’s an organic element that brings a sense of history and character that you really can’t achieve with a manufactured countertop.

You can read THIS POST on why I chose these materials for this kitchen! You can also see a post HERE about the quartz counters we had in our last kitchen.

So much has happened here in the past week! They’ve been focused on trimming out the doors, as well as casing the openings between rooms. Previously the openings between rooms were just drywall, so adding cased molding gives it an extra finishing touch! We already had the contractors make the two openings taller and wider, which really opened up the rooms so they are less choppy (without removing the sense of them being their own space). It also allows light to flow through more easily.

The opening between the entry and living room also got new trim work (above), so it will all look really nice and finished.

Another exciting development is they began adding the tongue and groove beadboard to the walls as well as v-groove tongue and groove to the kitchen and dining room ceilings. I always appreciate the texture and character that classic painted wood paneling adds to a home. We’ve had wood walls (some painted, some not) in every home we’ve ever lived in and added more painted paneling to our last four homes, too.

Paneling is a classic look that feels like home to me. If you like this style, too, you would probably LOVE this book, it’s one of my favorite home design books (written by an architect so it’s just lovely all around). You can see my photos of the inside of the book in this post.

We have so little wall space in the kitchen and dining room so we decided that rather than chopping the space up even more with different wall colors or other wall treatments, we’d soften the whole look and install wood paneling on all of the exposed walls and ceilings in those rooms. Then we will paint them to match all the cabinets and trim.

Today or maybe next week they’ll add the crown molding around each room which will tie it all together and give it that seamless, cohesive look. There are still a few other architectural details to come that will really be lovely so I can’t wait to share them!

They will also begin painting prep Monday, so that means we’re really on the home stretch. Before we know it, we”ll have hardware and appliances, too! I’ll have lots more to share in my next update!

You can catch up on all our remodeling posts HERE.

Last Updated on April 27, 2023 by Kristi Linauer

Note (4/27/2023): Hey, all! I’ve been a bit under the weather for the last few days, so I’m going to take there rest of the week to relax and recuperate. Hopefully, I can get back to work soon, and have progress to share with you next week.

I’ve mentioned repeatedly lately (because I’m just so excited about it) that I’m finally starting on the last interior room of our house (my studio), and when this room is done, I will have officially finished all of the interior rooms of our home. And every time I mention that, I get a lot of questions from people asking me what I’m going to do with my blog when I’m finished with the studio. It seems as if a lot of long time readers are thinking that once the studio is finished, I’ll be closing down the blog.

Well, that won’t happen. Let me assure you that while I’m almost officially finished with the interior of our house, there will still be plenty to do after that.

Let me give you a quick rundown of where things stand as of today, and where things will be heading.

The Studio and Studio Bathroom

This room is a big project, and includes not only the main room, but also the studio bathroom. I would really like to get this done by mid-August of this year (our 10-year anniversary of purchasing this house), but I’m not placing bets on me actually meeting that goal. That’s less than four months away, and there’s a ton of work to be done in these rooms.

The Hallway Bathroom

Just because the inside of the house will be officially finished after I finish the studio, that doesn’t mean that I won’t go back and make some changes to some rooms. I recently had a person ask me in a comment, “Don’t you ever get tired of redoing projects that you’ve already done?” My response was, “Perhaps you missed the name of my blog.” 😀 No. I will never get tired of redoing, tweaking, trying out different ideas.

So with that said, I’ve previously mentioned several changes I want to make in the hallway bathroom.

Those include (1) new countertops, (2) new accent tile, (3) new sconces, (4) new shower curtain, (5) new plumbing fixtures, and (6) new vanity color.

The Guest Bedroom

There are still several changes I want to make to this bedroom, most of which I’m pretty sure I’ve already mentioned in previous blog posts.

The main project in here will be the walls. From that view above, I love how the room looks. But I don’t ever see the room just from that view. I see the room from this view…

And after living with the room as it is for over two years, and actually using it as our temporary bedroom, the walls just feel unfinished to me. So I’m going to continue the hand-drawn flower design around on the upper part of the other two walls, and then add white wainscoting to the bottom of all three walls.

In addition to the walls, I also need to build a frame for the bed. The original pretty wood frame that I use in here ended up not working out when we switched our regular bed for an adjustable bed at the suggestion of Matt’s physical therapist. So for two years now, the bed has also looked unfinished, and pretty much looks like it’s floating. You can kind of see what I mean in the picture below…

And finally, I’m just not sure if I’m a yellow person. I tried it out in here because I just happened to have the yellow velvet on hand and decided to use that for the windows. And while I think the yellow looks nice with the blue, I’m just so much more of a pink/coral person. So that might be getting a change, but I haven’t decided for sure yet.

The Kitchen

The kitchen was the first room that I remodeled after we bought the house, so it’s been a while!

That doesn’t mean that I’m ready to completely remodel it again. But I have some things I want to do in here. For example, how long now have I said I want to get rid of the dishwasher? A long time! I still plan to do that, but that project has yet to move up to the top of the priority list. It will eventually, though.

I also want to get rid of the concrete countertops and replace those with quartz. I don’t know when that will happen, but I’m so done with concrete countertops. They served their purpose when we couldn’t afford a higher quality solid surface countertops, but after almost ten years of dealing with stains on concrete, I’m done. I long for the day that I can get rid of them.

The Addition

I know we’ve talked about this for so long now that it seems like it will never happen, but it will. Every time Matt and I start to think it’s time, something happens (like the economy crumbling, or banks collapsing) that makes us very unsure about doing something so big right now. But it will happen. And once it does happen, I’ll have a family room, bedroom, and laundry room to finish.

The House Exterior

I’ve focused quite a bit lately on our front porch, and there are still projects to be done to finish that up. I need to finish up the painting, reinstall the tape lights, and finish the stone skirting.

But there are so many more exterior projects to be done! When I was cleaning out the sunroom a few months ago, I came across some corbels that I bought years ago to make window flower boxes for the windows on the front of our house. That still needs to be done!

I also still plan to build a pergola above the breakfast room windows (which are almost completely obscured by this plant that keeps growing back).

And then I still need to build steps and finish up this area by the side studio door. This is an old picture, taken way back when we had that concrete pad poured, but that’s still all that’s there. There are still stacked cider blocks serving as steps to this door, and I need to build steps to match the style of the front steps.

And then there’s the carport. This thing is still not finished. It’s useful just as it is, but it needs to be finished. This is an old picture, so thankfully, the shutters are no longer there. 😀 They were installed on the house long ago. But the rest still looks pretty much the same. It needs to be painted, and it still needs a finished ceiling and lighting.

The Yard Projects & Landscaping

Even once all of that is done, I still have an acre of land that needs landscaping!! Don’t forget this beautiful landscaping plan that Matt bought me for my birthday last year.

I honestly feel like I could work on that for the rest of my life and never get it finished, and never run out of things to do. There’s no way I could get bored with that landscaping goal.

Then There’s The Small Projects

As if all of those things weren’t enough, I’ve been saving ideas for artwork and small projects that I want to do and share and teach people how to make for literally years. While I lost a whole lot of them when my external hard drive broke, I still have so many ideas saved in other places (Pinterest, Instagram, my laptop) that I’ve been collecting for years and just waiting for a time when I can spend more time on those small, fun projects. I could probably spend an entire decade or two just doing small fun building projects, art projects, sewing projects, etc., and still not get to the end of my creative ideas.

All of that to say that even when the interior of our house (as it stands today) is officially finished, and the studio is done, there is no shortage of creative ideas that I have, and things that I want to do, build, and create, that I can share with you. But yes, once I’ve done all of that, then it’ll be time to shut down the blog. 😉

Addicted 2 Decorating is where I share my DIY and decorating journey as I remodel and decorate the 1948 fixer upper that my husband, Matt, and I bought in 2013. Matt has M.S. and is unable to do physical work, so I do the majority of the work on the house by myself. You can learn more about me here.

I hope you’ll join me on my DIY and decorating journey! If you want to follow my projects and progress, you can subscribe below and have each new post delivered to your email inbox. That way you’ll never miss a thing!

We’re adding a tiny cottage to the back of our home for my parents! If you missed it, I gave an update with photos of the progress on the addition in this post.

Today I wanted to share a design mood board for their kitchenette. They have chosen the cutest things for their space! I’m so glad that their tiny cottage will not only be functional for them, but so adorable, too.

Languid Blue Sherwin-Williams cabinet paint color

Beadboard walls

Butcher block countertops

Floors (same as ours, European white oak)

Oven with Air Fryer

Automatic Espresso Machine

Classic Retro White Fridge and Freezer

Faucet

Under Mount Bar Sink

Electric Cooktop

Blue and White Square Tile

Ceramic Wall Subway Tile

Classic Retro Under Cabinet Range Hood

If you missed it, I gave an update with photos of the progress on the addition in this post!

You can find all of our renovation details + update posts here.