Community Brag Posts

This was the nursery armoire design we used. My husband modified it slightly. Beautiful isn't it.

I had left over wood from previus projects and needed an entry bench. The closest i made my plan inspired by the spa bench.

This was the second double x bench that I made.  It was very simple to make.  It took me around 3 hours to build it and another 2 hours to sand, stain and paint it (this does not include the  1 hour between coats that I allowed them to dry).  I used Annie Sloan Old White Chalk Paint and General Finishes Java Gel stain.  Annie Sloan Chalk paint does NOT need a topcoat if it is being used outside.

Modern farmhouse side table. I chose this as my first project for woodworking class!

My husband built the table and it was the first time he has built ANYTHING! I stained and varnished it and made the runner. We are so happy with it!

A couple of years ago I used Ana White’s plan for a faux fireplace, the grandchildren always love hanging their stocking on it for Christmas. But I always wanted to dress it up a bit. I didn’t even attach it to the wall. It was plain, it really needed something.

Look what I did to it.

I added a hearth and faux bricks.

I wanted to build something to keep my sons dugout organized. I took helmet and bag measurements and used Ana's free design tool to make 2 units to fit. He has 12 players on his team an it all worked out great and was a the perfect fit and solution! Each unit is 96" long, I had my local lumberyard rip 2 sheets of 3/4" outdoor rated plywood to 11.25" strips and then I made my cross cuts based on Ana's design drawings. It was built and painted in a couple of evenings and then we added the numbers and names to take it to the next level, can't wait to surprise the boys with it at practice tonight!

FREE DESIGN TOOL

I've been building furniture now with help and inspiration from Ana's site for about two years and in that time I've snapped many pictures of my projects. I was always missing something and I couldn't quite figure out what that was and how I can change it. Some of you have seen my pictures on here and always, there is the light blue back ground of my exterior garage wall.

I recently teamed up with a local photographer and she helped inspire me to jazz up my pictures by adding props and she suggested that I make a back drop to shoot my projects in front of. I had no idea how I was going to do it but with some brainstorming with her, I came up with a pallet backdrop.

Easy enough right? It really is! All you have to do is use a reciprocating saw (like a Saws-All) and put your blade between the top boards and the boards they are connected to to cut the nails. I recommend cutting them instead of trying to pry the boards off because a lot of pallets are constructed using a twisted nail and they are very hard to pull out. I ended up breaking many boards in the process!

I also added some neat trim boards that we had lying around that were also weathered and it gave the backdrop a little more dimension. The object wasn't to make it perfect so I purposely cut the trim boards at different lengths and then nailed everything to the repurposed 2x4 boards that you just separated from the top boards.

We wanted a bench at the foot of the bed to help our squatty dog Kirby get up and down from our elevated bed. When we saw the plans for the dog crate we decided that we could make a crate for our Boston Terrier Petey who needs to be confined overnight AND put a reinforced top on it to provide seating space. We knew it could not be taller than 18" (the same as our living room couches) so Kirby could jump on and off comfortably, and that we didn't need to make it as big as Ana's plan since Petey is half the size of Ana's lab. Our crate/bench is narrower. Every bit of this piece was made with wood either repurposed from an old playhouse or scraps from the cedar pergola we built in May. We had the hinges and the screws on hand already. We drilled holes in the lid to tie a cushion on top eventually. The lid comes off completely for ease of changing out dog bedding. Petey loves sleeping inside and will go in for naps even during the day when he has the run of the house. Kirby and our other dog also like to nap in there. You can just see the white of Petey's blaze in the pic where Kirby is peeking in.

Thanks for fantastic plans Ana!!  My 12yr old son and I knocked these out in an afternoon.

He learned new skills and we got a key project done.  The best thing was his statement of "these are awesome!!"  

LOVED how these turned out! Thank you so much for the plans! They were so simple and easy to follow. I’ve used so many of Ana’s plans for different projects and am so grateful! These chairs truly are very comfortable and now I don’t have to worry about them blowing in to the pool!

pacable

The hardware store didn't have untreated 4x4's so I used pressure treated wood since I was going to paint it. I adjusted on the plan and picked up bed rail hooks so I can remove the bed rails to move the bed easier. I used a chisel to inset the bed rail hooks. It worked out perfectly.

My husband created this table as an anniversary present to me! I painted my present with a creamy white for the base and he stained the top with ebony.

Using the instructions (with some slight redesign to accomodate the wife's requirements) I built two Versaille planters. The timber I used was offcuts from the local timber yard (£18) plus some bits off of old pallets. The nobs on top pf the legs were wooden drawer handles (£10) Screws and paint from the workshop. The overall size is a 21inch cube with the height increased to 23inches with the wooden knobs.

Thanks for the basic info it made the job so much easier.

Well, I could say that this is my biggest project for now... I spent about 4 full days to make it. Nothing difficult it seams, but having near zero carpenter skills, it's rather difficult, you know.

Not much place for posting photos here. If you're intrested in making somthing like this, you can visit my blog link. Although my blog's language is russian, there are many step-by-step photos and all the dimentions too (sorry, in metric).

At last, there is ready SketchUp skp-file there, so if there is any interest to this bed, I belive that photos and skp-project will help you to modify my project to your needs.

We really loved the plans that were given. The space that we had to utilize was smaller than the pallet so we had to take ours apart and cut each board and rebuild. We LOVE it and were so glad we found these plans. They helped tremendously and transformed our little corner from somewhere the kids just stacked book to a nice family library.

Followed the plans listed, and it went pretty well. We purchased our lumber from Lowe's & as many of you have experienced it was difficult to find good lumber. 

The only major issue I had was due to quality of lumber. I noticed when I went to install the 2 (1×12) panels for the base, the frame wasn't square. So some heavy sanding and cajoling got the base pieces locked in.

Had a lot of fun building this with my wife. She gets complete credit for the color, ans finished look. The table was treated with preconditioner for oil-based stains which brought out a lot of the pine yellows. The finish is actually 3 different stains: Minwax weathered oak, dark walnut, and classic grey...applied in that order. The classic grey was a light coat to help bring out a more naturally weathered look. It was sealed with three coats of polyacryllic and a light hand sanding with 400 grit paper.

The build itself only took a couple hours. Then about an hour and a half of good sanding. With all the finish work & allowing stain to dry this project took a little over a week.