My son's nursery furniture

Here’s the story. I designed and built all of this furniture myself out of 3/4 maple, and 1/2 maple ply. As your well trained eyes will notice, there is a marked difference in the finishes from one piece to the other. Each one got a little bit better as I learned more and become more equipped. lI built the armoire 1st and it went surprisingly well. Then I went to slap on some MINWAX 225 Red Mahogany stain…

Ouch. Thats when I found out what a nightmare it can be to stain maple. I tried and retried different methods to no avail. I came to lumberjocks to get some help. (the armoire will have to be sanded and redone at some point) I started on the dresser. I tried to implement some suggestions from the LJ community but could not find a way to put a decent stain on the maple by wiping. I had to buy a sprayer.

Rockler had their HVLP sprayer on sale for 80$ so I got one. Sanded the Dresser down again (3rd time was the charm), then went to work on it. I dyed the wood first with transtint to a light orange/brown color, then sprayed the aforementioned Minwax 225, then sprayed on Polyurethane satin. Success! (despite a few dark spots from the first 2 attempts at a rag finish)

Finally, the crib. I wanted this to be the best piece so I waited to do it last. I cut all the pieces, sanded them, and sprayed the dye, stain, and then wiped on 2 coats of GF salad bowl finish (avoiding glue areas). Then I glued the ends together, I used 2 dowels on each side of the panels to connect to and hold in place the sleigh legs to the panels. I have over 100 dowels in the slats and upper/lower rails and glued those up one side at a time. The main rails connect to the end panels with a bed frame connection that I picked up from Rockler. Then after the glue was dry I wiped on 2 more coats of finish and put it all together. I made a little mattress support from some left over materials and my wife and I put the linens on tonight.

The slats and rails are connected with inset brass bushings on the sleigh legs and screws through the upper and lower rails.

This was a frustrating process. I’m happy that it all came together and I appreciate the help from the LJ family!