| Blog series by Kevin | updated 51 days ago | 11 parts | 1933 reads | 53 comments total |
Part 1: Baby Furniture Adventure Begins
My wife and I are expecting our first child to be born in the first part of September. I am going to attempt to build some baby furniture for him. I have never built any baby furniture and would love to get some ideas, suggestions, input from those that have. I think we have decided on building a crib. We haven’t decided on whether to build a convertible crib or just a regular crib. My first question is that when you change the convertible crib into a full size bed, what do you do...
Part 2: Designing a Crib
I want to send out a special thank you to Randy for sending me a set of plans. But, I chose to do things the hard way and design my own crib. I did use Randy’s plans for the critical dimensions, but other than that, it is pretty much my own design. I used SketchUp for the design. I think this crib will be a little unique. I wanted a crib that would be easy for my wife to change the sheets, adjustable mattress height, and an adjustable front slide gate. The crib will be made mostly...
Part 3: Selecting and Preparing Stock
We went through and picked out some lumber last weekend. My dad came out and helped me get all of the pieces planed down and cut to rough size. The Sycamore slats are cut to size, the rest is just close. Waiting for final dimensioning to give the wood some time to move if it is going to. Here we are preparing it. Yeah, I know, forgot my safety glasses. I’ve been trying to do better at this now that I have some prescription safety glasses. Here...
Part 4: Ready for hardware
Well, I think we have everything ready for the hardware. Unfortunately, I changed my mind on the type of hardware I was going to use at the last second. Ordered some completely hidden hardware for the front gate and it won’t make it here until Monday, after the long weekend. Next time I really need to get my hardware here earlier. We have everything cut and dry fitted. All sanded and ready to be put together. I think we are going to get as much of the finishing done prior to assembly...
Part 5: Setbacks/lessons learned/question
Well, I must say this has been a learning experience. Unfortunately I had to make a mistake to learn from it. From now on I will never attempt a project without having the hardware ahead of time. Not a big deal sometimes, but on a crib, it turned out to be a big deal. I designed my crib myself, and halfway through building it, decided to change hardware types. Of course, the legs were already cut for the original idea. Last night I started planning down some more Walnut to make two new ...
Part 6: Inlay question - almost done
Sorry, no pictures on this one. I know that is a “no no” in blogs, but I just need a quick answer and I’ll get some more pics on this week yet. I have most of the crib finished and hope to complete it this weekend. I have put off what i consider the most challenging part until then end. Not that i am afraid of a challenge, just would hate to mess up this piece. On the back (longest side opposite of the sliding gate) I have a piece of walnut. It starts out at the legs a...
Part 7: New pieces cut for hardware
Since I changed my mind on the design and had to get new hardware, it only makes since that I would have to make some new pieces. I first tried sitting the plastic slide portion in the front legs and the pin in the gate. This did not work with my design. Two legs and two gate pieces no good. Then I decided to install the hardware as suggested and put the pins in the legs and the slides in the front gate. To do this, the front gate would have to be 1 1/4” thick. My is only 3/4”....
Part 8: Inlay complete and most of the Poly is done
My Dad and Grandma came out this weekend. We spent most of the day Saturday looking at baby stuff. You know how Grandma’s eat that up. Consequently, we did not get the crib done this weekend. Oh well, we still had fun. The Inlay – my biggest fear. It wasn’t too bad and was completely horrible all at the same time. I “cheated” on my inlay. I was planning on using Mark’s method and do a lot of the cutting by hand. However, in the interest of time and for t...
Part 9: One Man's Junk contest question
If I don’t get a lot done in the next couple evenings, this will be a mute point I know. But, I was wondering if you guys would consider my crib able to be entered in the contest. I’ve never entered anything yet and thought it’d be a neat side note to the crib story. The lumber is all from my wife’s uncle. Him and his father milled it 20 plus years ago. We helped him haul a bunch of good quality lumber out of a place he rented to his farm. After that was finished, h...
Part 10: Final Pics
Well, we are basically finished. There are a couple spots that we still need to put some more Poly on, but the crib is basically finished. Enjoy. Well, that pretty much doesn’t for the crib. I had a lot of fun (and frustration) on this project and am looking forward to the next. There was a lot of lessons learned in this one that is for sure. This was, after all, my first piece of furniture since I was 11 years old. And much more challenging than that one ...
Part 11: Crib in the house
I just thought I’d post some pictures of the crib in its place all decorated. Thank you to those that followed this build.
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Blog Series
- Acquiring new tools - 4 parts
- Baby Furniture - 11 parts
- Delta Unisaw - 6 parts
- Home Remodel Projects - 1 part
- Knotty Pine - 5 parts
- My Workshop & Tools - 1 part
- Remodel the Shop - 3 parts
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