Community Brag Posts

I started creating the furniture for my new craft room by making the Easy Three Cube Benches I found here.  I modified them so that my cats could lay on top and look out the windows.  The cube benches gave me the confidence to design a printer stand.  Using Ana White's technique of "build the box" and then add the rest, I designed a custom printer stand I am so very proud of!  After the printer stand, I moved on to the final piece that would complete my craft room, a modular desk with plenty of workspace to complete any craft I want.  I modified each module a little to keep with the theme design of the room.  I created three modules.  The last one being a bookcase that is a modification of the Modern Craft Table bases.  I used better quality Oak plywood for the desk top, and good pine and whiteboard plywood for the modules.

We built this farmhouse table a few months ago and absolutely love it. We modified the plans a bit based on another brag post and went with a replica of the Restoration Hardware table. I also built the chairs for the table based on the Parsons chair plans

Inspired by outdoor sofa plan I saw on the Ana White website... wanted to customize by using larger cushions (29" wide) adjusted the plans for wider cushions and more relaxed sitting posture so pushed the back support angle further back by 4 inches. Added legs since we were wider. My wife is super pleased and build came out really nice. Thanks Ana for the inspiration!!

My 11 year old is a girlie girl and has been asking my wife and I for the American Girl Star Armoire cabinet for 2 years. I found a similar plan here on Ana-White's Plan page. I decide to use a little nice quality wood (Aspen) instead of just a clear pine wood. It turned out nicer than even I could have expected.

My daughter got this for her 11 Bday this past Sunday and has already filled the cabinet with all her special AG Dresses. I added my own twist by putting a 1/4" Chalkboard back on it so she can use it to play school with her AG Dolls.

I have a couple people interested in making one for them for Christmas. :)

My next project will be one of the bunk-beds featured on Ana's website.

I loved the idea of building a washer and dryer pedestal for extra laundry basket storage underneath! Sashua's is beautiful so I took her idea and modified it a bit to work for me. My washer is very, very heavy and I was worried that if there was no support under the weight in the middle, it would start to bow and sag. The original plan also put the washer too high for me to have been able to use without a step stool. So in my modification I screwed cleats into the 2X4 frame of the laundry room wall, placed the 3/4" plywood on top of it and screwed it in. In the front, I used 4X4's as the two corner leg supports and then added two 1X6 supports in the front center, creating three laundry basket bays. I placed it directly onto the floor as opposed to building the bottom base. This saved me money since I was able to buy half the lumber and also allowed me to lower the height of the platform while leaving enough space for my baskets. The top of my platform is approximately 14 1/2" high, which is just low enough so that I can see into the soap filling compartment at the top of the washer. Being that I'm only 5'2" I would have needed to use a step stool to use my washer at the original 19 1/2" plan height. I framed the top edge of the platform with 2X2's, to ensure that my washer or dryer never walked off the edge. Finally, I added some trim along the front edge and around the legs and that's it!

Ana sized her plan for 2-6 year olds, but a friend asked me to build this for her 9-year-old granddaughter as an art table that would live outside, on their covered patio. I made the table top 28x48, and set the top at 28 inches off the ground. The bookcase part is 42 inches tall, in keeping with the "rule of thirds."

In light of the larger size, I decided the legs needed some braces, so I added a cross brace at the bottom and some curvy side braces.

I considered adding some cupboard doors to keep the dust out, but decided to leave it open so it wouldn't become a haven for spiders. Doors don't really keep dust out anyway, the way the wind blows around here.

As shown, the birch ply top has natural stain on it. I'm going to finish the top with spar varnish. For the rest, I'm going to primer it, and deliver it with a few pint cans of water-based outdoor paint in basic colors so the girl can paint the rest of it herself. 

Thank you, Ana, for another enjoyable project!

Nesting Grill Station

Built these window box planters with cedar fence pickets, for the trim I just ripped down some pickets to keep costs down. These look great on the local coffee shop! The brackets were found on Amazon. 

I needed some organization in my small closet, which originally only had one rod and one shelf. This is what resulted, and I made it from scraps from other projects, which is why the closet rods are mismatched...they'll be covered up with clothes hangers soon anyway. I had to buy the drawer slides and one more set of closet rod holders. I had some copper pipe straps and decided to use them as pulls on the drawers. I plan to make some crates out of cedar fence pickets to fit the shelves.

I just got the Kreg Micro Jig and used it on the drawers, which were made out of 1/2" plywood. I prefer to make drawers by using the table saw to create overlap rabbets and then use the nail gun to put them together, but it was 15 degrees outside today so I opted for the micro drill. It went pretty well...definitely caused less splitting in the 1/2" plywood than the regular kreg jig.