This Federalist candle stand is from a Woodcraft plan my wife found during our last trip to the store. I attempted this because it was a stretch for my skill level in that it required several things I had not done, specifically the tampered hexagon pedestal, the hexagon table top, and the inlay. I also wanted to improve my finishing skills. When I started, I decided to do a prototype out of less expensive wood, so mistakes would be less costly to redo, I chose poplar simply because it’s a stock item at Lowes.

The final project was done with sapele wood, stained with General Finish brown mahogany, and then five coats of GF Arm-R-Seal. I found a local sawyer with a lot of cut offs and over runs.

Lessons learned: (1). I now understand the concept of cutting tampered (2” to 1”) and turned hexagon pedestal. It took three practice pedestals for the concept to finally sink into my thick skull. In fact I am now going to revisit my afghan rack design and tamper and turn those pedestals for future racks. (2). I can now draw and cut a perfect hexagon shaped table top and made new cutting jigs usable for most small sized table. (3). This is my first attempt at inlays. I’ll be doing more inlays on future projects. (4). The prototype poplar stand was a devil to stain and finish, causing me to do a lot of reading of “how to” books. I finally did a couple of wash coats of mixed shellac and denatured alcohol, followed by several coats of GF antique walnut and finally Arm-R-Seal. I think it’s good enough for the Good Will store if they want it, but poplar will probably not be the choice again unless it’s to be painted.

I finally completed the wife’s potting bench after two months of intermittent shop time and the purchase of (and practicing with) a new table saw. I used Woodcraft’s plan # 36 that Veronika found when she accompanied me to one of their retail stores. I found the plan to be very sketchy in terms of instructions, so had to rely on the diagram, cut list, and my own imagination as to how it was supposed to look. I did make a few design changes, like adding crest rail to the middle shelf as well as the top shelf, so items would not fall over the back edge. The top and middle shelf supports are identical, as opposed to a simpler design for the middle shelf support the plan called for. I also added trim around the bin holder to make cleanup of dirt easier.

Common red oak was used, gluing and screwing each joint, and finished with teak oil. I also applied several coats of paste wax to the panel tops. Now it gets to sit in the garden shed for the remainder of its foreseeable life, and knowing my wife’s love of gardening, it will be well used – but then that’s the whole purpose in building the thing. And again as with all my projects, many more lessons learned and my novice hobbyist’s skills slowly added to.

Here’s an afghan rack I built for my wife’s handmade Afghans. This one was fun in that I did the design myself, and got some added skills using my band saw and lathe, and several lessons learned. The wood is common red oak, and General stain. We experimented mixing two different colors of stain until we hit on a combination she liked. I did offer to let this sit on the back porch as a clothes drying rack, but she was generous enough to put it in the living room.

These are two benches left here when we bought the property, as they had rotted wood and several coats of paint on the iron work. Since I have an aversion to throwing anything that might prove useful (much to my wife’s chagrin), I decided to make these part of my last winter projects. I stripped all the coats of paint then finished the iron work with Rustoleum primer and flat black enamel. The wood is common red oak finished with teak oil.