Sunday, May 26, 2013

Life happens

Well, I certainly intended to post something before now, but sometimes as they say, life happens.  Not much progress to report on the project. I haven't had much chance to work on it. My wife had minor surgery last Monday, so she's been recovering. This has understandably left me busy with things other than woodworking.

I did get a bit of shop time in before my wife's surgery.  I was able to remedy the mistakes I mentioned last time. It did involve making a new piece, but it will work.  Much of the project is glued up, but there is still quite a bit to do.  It most likely won't be ready for my anniversary, but Stacey will certainly understand why.  I'll just get it done as quickly as possible.

I did have some requests from friends and family on Facebook to post some pictures of previous projects, so I'll take this lull as an opportunity to do so now.


This one is the doll cradle I made for my niece, Sadie a while ago.  She'll be 5 this summer, which should tell you how long ago it was.  I actually just winged it on the design.  A bit of bandsaw work for the head, foot and rockers, and rounded everything over with the router.  Since I was in a hurry, the whole thing is put together with butt joints and screws.  The wood is red oak, stained with an oil based stain, and finished with water based poly.  I did research child safe finishes before finishing this because, as you can see here, Sadie was pretty young at the time.  My research led me to conclude that any finish is perfectly safe for children, as long as it's cured.  Thanks to my sister-in-law, Stephanie Misner, for the picture.




These are pictures of my son Danny when he was an infant.  The cradle was made using a plan I acquired from my wife's grandfather.  He had apparently built a version for my sister-in-law and my wife when they were babies.  I used red oak again on this one.  The head and foot boards were glued up and cut on the bandsaw.  The cradle actually mounts in a stand, which doesn't appear in these pictures.  I was more concerned with being the doting dad when I took these.  The finish is Minwax Polyshades, which, in case you're unfamiliar with it, is an oil based stain/ poly combination.  I really liked how it was able to bring out the grain of the wood, and create a good film finish at the same time.  I used pretty simple joinery on this piece, too. Screws and glue, with plugs to cover the heads of the screws.  I am looking forward to getting into some more complex, and possibly decorative, joinery in the future.

Well, that's about all I have for now.  Once things settle down a bit, I hope to get onto a more regular schedule of shop time, as well as posting.  As always, feel free to leave a comment.  Until next time...

1 comment: