Community Brag Posts

I built this for my sister in law this Christmas from Ana's plans.  I can't wait to make a second one for myself!  The overall build was easy and I would consider myself a beginner level.  Sadly, I didn't get a picture of the final product before I gifted it, but I distressed it to allow some forgiveness in the white paint detials and hand-painted decal on the top.  It turned out great and they loved it!  

Made this out of a ton of scrap wood I had laying around. On the downside it made the project more difficult, but on the upside all I had to buy was hinges and handles...

Since my daughter turned 5, she has joined the ranks of those children (un)fortunate enough to have 2 bedrooms to furnish. In approaching her 6th birthday I asked her mother if there was anything she needed for her new room at her house, and she suggested a new table to do colouring/craft etc at. I was actually searching to buy a table and chairs, and was decidedly underwhelmed by the selection and the quality/cost ratio on offer. 

Thankfully I stumbled across the plans for the Clara Table, and it was precisely what I was after. I have made various tables before, for garden and dining, and have always gone with reclaimed wood and a rustic style, but for this I did just use the plans as-is, and I bought new pine timber purely for the convenience of it. 

The table is simple to build, I already had a pocket hole jig, and the table itself took about 90minutes to build. Most of this time was spent sanding off the foaming glue I decided to use between the planks used for the top. If you are considering using this sort of glue, or indeed any glue, I'd say it isn't necessary. I had neverade a table top of this construction before, and went for the belt and braces approach. In my opinion it's totally unnecessary, doesn't add much security, but adds plenty of time to the project. If you really want, I'd go for bog standard wood glue, but by the time you screw it onto the legs, it's solid as a rock anyway.

It is mentioned to set the aprons back a way, to avoid splitting the legs. I did this, by using an off-cut of the 3x1 as a spacer on the face of the aprons as I screwed them in. Worked a treat, set the aprons back, but not all the way, and gives the illusion of a little more heft to the dimensions.

I then painted the top with chalk based emulsion, distressed and did the signwriting to personalise it, finished it with wax and my daughter was more delighted than I ever thought any child could be by having a table daddy made for her birthday, and at a fraction of the cost of a shop bought one of far lower quality.

Am.so.pleased I stayed on this website, and have already lined up the matching chairs for her as my next project!

Thank you for inspiring me to get back to making things again...it's been a while!

The timber cost me about £20, and the biggest expense was all the paint tester pots for the top!

My first real furniture DIY project.  My wife has been asking for a farmhouse table for a couple of years and I found Ana's site 3 weeks ago.  By reading the plans the project seemed simple enough to give it a try.  I modified the plans to shorten the table to 72" to fit in our dining room.  I bought lumber from Lowe's and lumber costs for the table was approx $65 and the bench was right around $20.  My wife loves it and I have had multiple requests to make more tables for other family members.  The project took a week to complete working a few hours each evening after work.  Stained with Rust-Oleum Ultimate in Kona and 4 coats of a Rust-Oleum Polyurethane in Satin finish. A big thanks to Ana for the free plans and for my new hobby of furniture making!    *EDIT*  The table and bench are not as dark as the pictures show. 

Dining Room table and benches tops built from reclaimed Douglas Fir and table and bench bases built from 4x4 posts.

I'm still getting to know my Compound Miter Saw, so I wanted to get another small project under my belt. Not to mention I had a whole other picket and a half left over from yesterday's project. This just seem to be the perfect project to do. And needed since we actually needed a few more planters.

Great plans allow for versatility and easy customization. Put the whole thing together in a day w/ one other person. My set up is 16' long - 5' on the side shelves and 6' for the workbench. Added a pegboard and fluorescent light under the top middle shelves. I'm also designing a slim drawer to go under the workbencheck area. Thanks a bunch!

I modified the dimensions slightly and opted to not mount the fold down doors as I figured they would always be open anyway.  I built this mostly from solid red oak save for the bottom panel and the middle panel, which are plywood.  I crafted the top out of 5 pieces tongue and grooved with mitred corners on the front.  I also tongue and grooved the doors with glass insets.  I finished it in Minwax red cedar under poly.

Check out the details about how we build the bed on my blog: http://www.brightgreendoor.com/2013/05/diy-ana-white-jr-loft-bed.html

Although nothing about it was difficult, it was time consuming, and consumed the greater part of two weekends.

We followed the plans on Ana White’s blog pretty close, other than narrowing up the stairs by a few inches due to a furnace vent that would have been in the way.

We bought all of our boards at Menards which came in just under $100 including the large piece of plywood. I spent chunks of time throughout the week getting all of the boards sanded. Then we spent a Saturday getting all the boards cut to the proper size. Then it was a week full of giving all the wood 2 coats of Bulls Eye primer and a top coat of high gloss cabinet paint.

I also installed the Ikea Kvartal track system around the inside of the bottom bunk. I used leveler clips from Ace to hang Ikea curtains that I altered.

My boys were SO excited the whole time we were building it and love it. My little one calls the whole bed his “top bunk”, even though he sleeps on the bottom. They also have dubbed the area under the platform the “hideout” and think they are invisible when they are hiding in there.

I adjusted the measurements to make it longer and wider. I also looked the original Pottery Barn trunk and tried to copy the multi color finish. I had so much fun building this!

I modified the plans slightly to go taller so it could fit a standard propane tank. I also added a hinged lid based on an image I found on Pinterest that did something very similar. I still need to sand and stain it next weekend.

Like others, I had a little trouble keeping the fence planks from splitting when screwing them to the 2x2 legs, since there was about an 1/8” gap between. I tried to find some scrap to fill in the gap and didn’t overtighten the screws. The lid was made entirely of 1x3”.

Using the "Y Truss Round Table" plans, I created a 48" table with metal accents.