Did you ever have one of those projects that you started fast on and then thought you might never get around to finishing? This was one of those for me.

I made this bookcase (my first) as a gift for my 12 year-old daughter who is a voracious reader. She requested that I build her a bookcase for her bedroom. We went through some design books and websites together and she picked out the style and wood that she wanted. I’m so proud that she had the good taste to pick Arts & Crafts style and white oak!

Originally, I was going to give it to her for her birthday last June, but it wasn’t finished in time, so she got an acoustic/electric ukulele instead. The Uke turned out to be a lot of fun, so she didn’t mind waiting for the bookcase while I worked on a bunch of other things.

I started this project in the last week of April 2012 and finally finished it today (January 18, 2013). Total building time really wasn’t that bad, maybe 30-36 hours or something like that. Now that I know what I’m doing, I think I could knock one of these out in a long weekend.

The bookcase is made of 3/4” white oak and 3/4” & 1/4” rift-sawn white oak plywood. I had wanted to make it out of quarter-sawn boards and quarter-sawn plywood, but I could not get the materials here in Las Vegas.

It is based on a plan from a Woodsmith book. I started by making a full-sized drawing of all of the detail pieces and a cut list. I like to make these on 1/4” MDF and cut out the parts for tracing.

Here’s a look at the panel that makes up the back of the bookcase.

The breadboard ends and corbels were another fun part of this project. I don’t own a band saw yet, so I roughed out the corbels with my jigsaw and sanded them to the final size with my oscillating spindle sander.

Here’s a side view (also showing that I need to get started on a lumber rack of some kind):

And finally, here’s a photo of the happy customer with her new White Oak Arts & Crafts Bookcase. She helped me put the first coat of Natural Danish Oil on it. I hope she’s willing to help me again when it’s time to move it into her bedroom because it weighs more than she does. :)

I made this picture frame for my Sister for Christmas. It fits a 16”x20” mat for an 11”x14” photo.

The frame is made from Cherry and finished with three coats of Watco Danish Oil followed by two coats of Bee’s Wax polish.

It’s Arts & Crafts inspired, with the mortise and tenon joints, but I didn’t work from any plans. I cut all the pieces from the same cherry board. I think it looks pretty good with a few of my photos from the family farm in Upstate New York.

The last photo shows several of the Christmas Presents that I made from wood this year. Each one was a great learning experience for me.

Updated 12/17/12: I made a chain to keep the Cook Book / iPad Stand upright and it’s working beautifully. I couldn’t find exactly what I needed off the shelf, but I was able to make it using a few inches of jack chain and a small hook latch found at Home Depot.

The dimensions of the stand are 10”H x 12”W x 11”D when open. 10” x 12” x 3.25” when closed. I thought this would be a convenient size for an iPad and most cook books. It also folds down flat to store in a kitchen drawer.

Side view showing chain:

Folded flat:

I also took a few more photos of the finished book stand in use (the book is going with the stand as part of the gift):

12/16/12:
I made this cook book/iPad stand as a Christmas Gift. It’s made of some rift sawn white oak that I had left over from a bookcase project and three small hinges. I’d like to find a small chain to prevent it from opening all the way, but I put some strips of self-stick cork drawer liner on the bottom to keep it from sliding and that seemed to work when I tested it. The finish is Watco Danish Oil. I’m going to give it a coating of bee’s wax and buff it up before I wrap it up for Christmas. I love how the bee’s wax with orange smells.

I like quick projects like this that I can take from start to finish in a day or two.

These were a lot of fun to make. The woods I used were Walnut, Alder, & Cherry. I finished them with five coats of Minwax Marine Spar Varnish in clear gloss. The net bags are rubber, which is easier on the fish for catch and release fishing. They are laced to the frames with 200lb braided Dacron line. I made the net retainer lanyards myself using 550lb Paracord and some knots I learned by watching YouTube videos.

I built these planter boxes from plans in Woodsmith Magazine’s Outdoor Furniture book. I like the way they turned out and apparently, so do my friends and neighbors who kept stopping by my garage to see my progress.

I have already been hired buy one neighbor to build a toy box in the same style.

This project was also great practice making mortise and tenon joints. The three-piece legs required a lot of dado cutting, but simplified the mortises quite a bit. The only problem that I found with the plans is that they didn’t include a cut list or shopping list for the project. I had to go over all of the drawings very carefully to make my own lists. I modified the plans a little bit to allow me to use some 11/32 bead board for the panels just because I wanted to use them up.

Here’s a creative way to use up some scrap wood, cardboard, and extra white paint. It only took about ten minutes to build.

We hosted a pool party on Saturday night for my daughter’s 12th birthday. We decided to have the pool party in the evening as the temperature is over 100 degrees every day here this time of year. Once the sun goes down, it’s pretty comfortable to be in the pool. I got the idea to host “Dive-In Movies” for the kids.

I used some long Douglas Fir cut offs (about 2”x2”x12’) and two 4’x8’ cardboard sheets that were left over from a plywood order that I had delivered to the house a few months ago. A few minutes to lay it out on the grass, and screw it together, roll on some white paint, and we have a big movie screen for the back yard! I weighted it down with five, 5-gallong buckets of water and it held up to the 13mph winds that we had all day.

It’s not built to last, but it served it’s purpose very well. It’s still standing, and I think I’ll leave it up until it falls apart or the novelty of watching movies in the pool wears off.