Here’s a rocking chair I made for my nephew for Christmas. The idea was from a set of plans sold by Rockler for a puppy or kitten rocking chair. My nephew’s nursery has a jungle theme so I thought a monkey would be more appropriate. For some reason, the idea of the seat and rockers being the same color as the monkey kind of creeped me out (like it was a lab engineed chair-monkey hybrid? I don’t know—too much sci fi before bed, I guess) so I dyed the rockers black and dyed the seatback green. The intention was for the seat back to look like jungle leaves. The chair is made out of red oak. While that would not be my choice of wood for an adult rocking chair, I think it works here.
7 comments so far
BobAtl
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49 posts in 864 days
#1 posted 522 days ago
Love it! I have both a great nephew and a great niece I want to make something for and I think you’re on to an outstanding idea! It’s both useful and fun and requires no batteries, makes no noise and does not add to household clutter (three criteria for any gift I give a child). Thanks for posting!
-- Bob, Atlanta
MasterSergeant
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1059 posts in 860 days
#2 posted 522 days ago
Most excellent!!!!!
-- Kelly, woodworker under construction
Tomw
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96 posts in 1399 days
#3 posted 522 days ago
Cool project! How did you create the contrast between the monkey’s face and body?
-- Tom
marter1229
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198 posts in 1682 days
#4 posted 522 days ago
That is a great project.
-- It's all fun, Terry******N. Idaho
paplou
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314 posts in 1515 days
#5 posted 522 days ago
A monkey chair. I like it. How about one for out side hanging on a rope vine. Freak the neighbors out.
-- PAPLOU
Randolph Torres
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295 posts in 1700 days
#6 posted 521 days ago
Now you can tell the kids instead of go jump in a lake to go monkey around. Got to show this to my cuz YO
-- another tip from cooperedpatterns
MattObjects
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15 posts in 549 days
#7 posted 517 days ago
Thanks for the comments.
As has been pointed out to me, the design is based on a pattern sold by Grizzly, not Rockler. I guess I forgot which site I saw the pattern on. Many thanks to those who messaged me with the correction.
The contrast between the monkey’s face and body was made by running a small cove router bit over the line drawn between the face and body to create a channel and then (carefully) staining the two sections, starting with the face. I started using a detail brush to apply the stain but finished using a cloth when I realized that the stain wasn’t even trying to bleed across the channel.
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