Community Brag Posts

My sister wanted a step stool for her grand-daughter via her daughter-in-law. Like our mother and grand-mother before us, we stood by the sink with our hands in the wash water "helping" with the dishes. She asked it I could build a stool. After searching through several plans, I came across this vintage step stool and changed it up a little for the personal touch. I added the cartoon characters to fit with my great-nieces theme and she now has something that she can "brag" about as she grows.

Octagon picnic table! Built exactly to plan. This challenged my carpentry skills but I managed to pull it off all by myself. Great plans easy to follow and a great design! Would build again!

I saw the plans on Ana White website and and used them to put this together. I changed it slightly to fit my needs. I made this for my in-laws and it was a lot of fun to do. Hardest part was using blue tape on stain and paint.

I built these doors for a very good friend of mine who actually helped me get started turning my new love for building (after finding Ana's site) into a way for our family to make some extra money.

It took me a little while to wrap my brain around building something without using my Kreg Jig. I used a router table set up with some raised panels bits and put the whole thing together with glue and nails! Wonderful experience!

For the finish, I used a vinegar solution to give the cedar wood an old barn look. I think the final result turned out great and the final step was a clear coat sprayed on out of a rattle can.

The seesaw is like a dinosaur: the extinct relic of the playground, still held in awe by kids the world over. No longer available to the public in its original form, the original seesaw is the perfect DIY project. My older daughter had been asking for one for a couple of years, and after finding the plans on Ana White’s website I was able to build one cheaply for about $50 in wood and screws. This was the perfect weekend project, and I was able to use up some leftover paint and fabric to create this nice addition to our yard.

Check out my blog post about this seesaw here:
http://sandiegocountypropertymanagement.com/diy-kids-seesaw/

Made from 2 pallets, 2 x 6 x 8, leftover trim from my house, wood branch from my backyard. Attached shelf with pocket holes.

Accents:
-Handpainted lettering; painted prior to glazing entire piece
-Finials made from 4.25 inch spray painted and glazed clay pots and saucers coated with Valspar clear finish and attached together with epoxy; buttons attached to pots with E6000 adhesive
-Buttons attached mostly with small screws; a few with holes too small for screws were attached with epoxy
-Plastic flowers made from mayo and water bottles and lids; sanded, primed, spray painted, coated with Valspar clear coating; attached with screws
-Faucet knobs sanded, spray painted, glazed and attached with screws
-Plumbing pipe filled with plumber epoxy puttty; insert screw into putty before it hardened, then screwed into wood
-Gardening tool hooks made from pant wire hangers with a few beads attached; wire simply wrapped around tree branch

Not sure that I will use pallet wood again since difficult to pull apart pallets, uneven and some split boards could not be used, and required tons of sanding for those boards that could be used. I think I paid more for orbital sanding pads than the cost of buying new wood. Will use pallet wood for other non-furniture projects not requiring a perfect finish.

We built this bed for the lil neighbor girl as a gift for Christmas. It turned out better than I expected! The Plans were amazing and easy to follow... It is the first project that I used my Kreg Jig! I am so excited to build another one for my daughter now! We decided to pre-finish all the parts after we cut them to ensure proper sealing of all the ends, just in case of any sap or what not. Special thanks to Ana for all of these plans and Ideas! You truely rock!

Very easy garage shelving

My first real wood project with no help from my father. I wanted to make this for my mother for christmas and I got it done 2 hours before church. I recently purchased a kreg jig r 3 and put it to good use. I made a few changes to the plan that helped me achieve the look that I desired. First, through trial and error I adjusted the kreg jig to be able to drill pocket holes to secure the shelves without the need to go back and wood putty the scrww heads that normal would have been exposed on the outer walls. There is a picture of this set up that I uploaded. Also, when byielding the drawers I made two changes. From what I could tell, the plans called for 1/4 inch plywood for the bottoms of the shelves and that is the way I made them at the beginning. However I was not happy with the appearance of the plywood on the nice face boards I was using for the drawers. So I decided to rip down the two side pieces and the back piece of the drawers ( should be 1 - 5 1/2 inch back piece and 2 - 5 3/4 inch pieces ) but I left the face Plate the full inch and a half that way the plywood wous not show from the front. The last change I made on the drawers was I made 2 pocket holes on each side piece to attach the face to the drawers that way the nail holes would not be showing from the front view. While these steps might not have be necessary , it worked for me. Thank
you very much for the plan my mom cried when she opened the box for the first time.

We really wanted to give our 2 year old a play kitchen for Christmas. We also didn't want to spend the money on the likes of the Pottery Barn set, and weweren't sold on the lesser-expensive options. Fortunately, a quick internet search led me to Ana White's website and plans for this play kitchen. As someone who has never built anything before, the plans seemed very doable. All of the brag posts were also inspirational and sold me on starting this project. I worked on this an hour or so after work for a couple of weeks, and then a few longer nights running up to Christmas Eve (always a bit of a procrastinator!). As neither my wife or I know how to sew, we decided to turn the space underneath the sink into a cabinet. The paint color was left over from painting our kitchen and family room, and we decided to stain the stove and counter tops. Overall, we are very pleased and proud with how this turned out, and our 2 year old loves playing with the set!

Well this was definitely the most challenging so far because we decided to modify the kitchen island plans to incoporate the tilt out trash bin. Very pleased with the results. Extended the back of the island to accomodate a 11" deep trash bin. Slim trash cans fit perfect. Found a gift wrapping bin for half price after Christmas and it is a perfect fit and 13 gallon bags fit great.

The x's were definitely a challenge because it changed the angles and it would have been best to just mark it with the board before finishing the whole box. 

Now we just need to paint the cabinets and change the countertops and paint the kitchen walls. Not happening anytime soon, but at least the island is done.

I built this new workbench for my garage to accomodate my table and miter saw and to add some stowaway storage and I cant tell you how much I love it, especially with being able to pull the tables out to make an outfeed for the tablesaw. I altered theplans a bit to shorten the entire length by nearly 1.5 feet and instead of the board mounted tool space I added my bench vise to this gap and use shelved underneath for storage. The plan was simple to follow and allowed me to build a bench that all of my neighbors talk about now! Thanks so much Ana!