Community Brag Posts

My husband says I have impeccable timing with all of my projects – I say there’s never a bad time to start a project! Case in point – my farmhouse table. I was five months pregnant visiting my parents in Idaho (I live in Arizona) and I decided that it was a good time to finally build the table I had talked of for two years. There’s no time like the present, right? My dad questioned my ability to get the table back to AZ safely, but I threw caution to the wind and would figure it out later! I built the table and matching bench out of hard maple and followed plans based on the Pottery Barn Benchwright series. I had never worked with hardwood before and there was definitely a learning curve. Luckily my dad had some experience with hardwood and he was able to lead me in the right direction. I pieced together the table top and bench top, and then assembled the legs, but kept them unattached from the table top. I built a wooden frame to transport the table to Arizona and attached it to the top of my car. In the heat of an Arizona summer, I proceeded to finish the table by staining it with an espresso stain from Minwax and then attaching the legs. Finishing projects like this always take more time than I anticipate and this table was no exception. After days and days of staining and days and days of drying, I sealed it with a wipe on poly. I lost count of how many coats I applied, but I know it was more than 15. Yes, 15. Wiping it on doesn’t apply a thick layer, so I did a lot of layers. I had to protect it from my 4 kids! I finished just a few weeks before I had the baby. Timing is everything. :) To see more details on the project check out my blog at lifewithfingerprints.com

Thank you for the plans!  Love the shelves! 

My friend's daughter's both love American Girl Dolls. I have made them the bunk beds and the Farmhouse bed. But they really wanted a couch. I made them one using some of the elements from the Farmhouse Bed. I used a blue paint with a pickling whitewash stain on top.

I did have a hard time getting a good photo of the finished project.

Two hours and done!

In order to make this island a little beafier I used 4x4 wood for the X as well as the the top and bottom braces. Top is made up of glued up 1x3 maple wood. It looked really good raw, but decided to stain it to give a more uniform look. I bought the rustic handles and the bottle opener on Amazon.com. I used lag bolts and washers for the finishing accents...similar to the pottery barn island. Painted them with Rustoleum oil bronzed paint and then dabbed it with a paper towel to give it a rougher finish to it and then sprayed the casters as well. This was a fun project and are getting a lot of use out of it. Thanks goes to Anna for the plans and inspiration for this island. Rich

This organizer is perfect for an entry way! Hooks are at the hight of my toddler so he might learn one day to keep his coat of the floor. Few things are different from Ana's . I do not own a tool to make pocket holes so I had to improvise a bit and I used an old yoga mat instead of pin board. Thank you for this one!

I built this bar for my mom to use i her dining room. I altered the plans for the X Style Desk to build this at bar height. This was my first time distressing anything and was pleased with the outcome. i used one coat of Minwax Dark Walnut stain and two coats of Minwax clear satin finish. White shellac Based primer, brown egg shell paint and Green egg shell paint for the base and sanded for the distressed look. I used dimensional pine lumber from the home center to build this with.

This is The Traditional Wood Toddler Bed. Built straight from the plans. Worked out great and my daughter loved it!

This table is perfect for our screened in porch at the lake house. Everyone seems to gather there so we have rockers and casual seating. When we want to eat out there we just open the table and move it to the center.

We have considered buying a cedar-lined chest to store blankets, towels, etc. for many years.  However, we couldn’t find one that came close to matching the Knotty Pine bedroom set that we had in our master suite. 

Hence, our design criteria was quite simple; match the bedroom set and have a chest sturdy enough to support our Beagles as they peer at the squirrels outside the window.

We used plans / ideas from several different chest designs which were readily available on the internet.  Most of those plans were using hard woods such as oak.  Those plans called for a hard wood framing with ¼” oak plywood for the panels.  Since we needed to use Knotty Pine to match the bedroom set, we used 1” Knotty Pine for framing and Knotty Pine ¾ ply w/ Kreg Screws and copious glue to strengthen the construct.  We finished it off with locally available 3/8” cedar T.G. planks.  It is very heavy and very strong!  This project was done entirely w/ Kreg Screws and no router rabbeting for the panels.

We learned the following while doing this project:

·      When using soft woods, always put the power sander on the wood before you start the sander.  Otherwise, you can get scratching / sander burns that don’t present themselves until staining begins.

·      While very strong, ¾” plywood is very heavy!

·      When using plywood, it is recommended that you stain both the visible and non-visible sides of each piece where glue is not to be applied.  Otherwise the chance for delaminating increases dramatically.

60 hours work and $350 to build.