First Panel Stitched!

I made some real progress last night.  I finished pre-drilling stich holes, and cleaned up some of the glue "squeeze-out" around the scarf joints.  I figured it would be a lot easier to sand the joints flat on a table than while on the boat!  After the joints were squared away, I moved all the panels back under the table and removed the extra cross pieces I had added for scarfing and layout.  Then, I mounted the three building forms that I had previously cut out.  I took my time getting them mounted to the strongback, making sure they were square, centered, and properly spaced.  

At that point I almost called it a night, but I really wanted to see what the first pair of panels looked like sitting in the forms.  I pulled the panels out and arranged them on the forms, where they fit very nicely.  Then I thought, "maybe I'll put in a couple stitches, just to see what it looks like."  A couple stitches eventually turned into the whole centerline joint.  One tricky part was getting the stitches up through the holes.  After getting a foot or so in from the ends, I started having the stiches come from the bottom up, that would make it easier to tighten and adjust them.  I finally came up with the idea of using a flashlight to shine light through the stitch holes from above, then I could push the wire through the hole from below.  Once I got my little process down, the stiching went pretty quickly.  I can't wait to start adding more panels!