Toy Box

I built this toy box for my great nephew. It’s made from 3/4” pine and plywood. The sides are basic frame and panel construction using stub tenons on the rails, which I have never tried before but they fit nicely. The plywood panels used to be the drawer bottoms in my old workbench that I dismantled. I used Varathane’s espresso colored stain with several topcoats of spray lacquer. The bottom is covered with some green indoor/outdoor carpeting I had on-hand.

Mounting the lid support was a challenge because it was designed for a toy box with the lid sitting on top of the back, rather than a lid that butts up against the back. It took lots of trial an error to position it so that it would open and close properly. To avoid having to fill lots of extra holes in the actual toy box, I built a mockup of the side, back and lid assembly out of scrap so I could mount the lid support in multiple places until I got the positioning right. Then I just transferred the measurements to the actual toy box.

I read a thread on here about different ways that people sign their work – branding irons, carving, handwriting, etc. I decided that if I had a project that my great grandfather built, I would much prefer to have his handwritten signature on it. So, I made a small wood badge to sign and sprayed it with lacquer.

Update: As you can see by the last picture, he loved it! LOL

Click here to see the YouTube Video!

-- Steve in Lawrenceville, GA - http://www.TheCarmichaelWorkshop.com