Community Brag Posts

I scoured the web unsuccessfully for months trying to find a cabinet big enough to store everything we needed to store. I wanted something huge and bright and simple, and so I decided to just build away. It's 8'4" long, 18" deep and 36" tall. Topped with a slab of Giallo Napoleon granite and painted a nice plain white. Took me only a few nights to build and paint, thanks to my power nailer and power paint sprayer. Thanks to a great deal on a remnant granite slab, this was just about $400 total start to finish. I winged the entire plan and didn't really use any plans in particular, though I have gathered many great ideas and tips from this site.

I got inspired by Ana to design my own toy garage - so that there would be somewhere to store all the hot wheels that kept piling up! I have no idea what the angle is for the driveway ramp - it was trial and error with help from my husband, but it's pretty sturdy. Between the mitered cut and the copious amounts of glue, it holds the weight of a 25 lb toddler walking up it (though I try to discourage it!).
I used chalkboard paint and acrylics - so that we can draw parking stalls, lanes, or arrows as desired - my son helped with the painting. So far, the favorite activities are sending the cars down the ramp, one after another...

This table was made following the Ana White plan for the 8' table. I stained the whole thing Dark Walnut. I the rubbed Vaseline on the edges and anywhere else that I wanted distressed. I painted the table with a light coat of white chalk paint and sanded it to distress it after it dried. After getting the look that I wanted I applied a clear wax.

Ah behold the allure of a really good set of plans. :) Famous last words, "it looked a lot easier on paper!"

I happened across the wonderful plans for the Farmhouse Table on this site. Then I saw how it only took Handy Andy a mere 2-3 hours to make his out of reclaimed wood and thinking I would enlist my retired carpenter father to help me, easy peasy, right? Well, that was the plan anyway. :)

A couple of things to note, I purchased new fir wood as it was the most cost effective and frankly the least problematic in regards to finding the straightest boards. I did vary the design in that I added the shelf under the table for both storage as well as a footrest for diners. The design I ended up with was a little more complicated and I tried sanding as much of the boards from the beginning as possible in order to try and cut down on the amount of time spent on my knees later. Yeah, that was a nice thought.

Dad and I followed the plan provided, allowing my modifications for the footrest/shelf and I also made my top 45" wide. (I have another dining table that I had hopes of butting them together for large dinner parties if needed and wanted them relatively the same size). I will say that what I ended up with was an extremely heavy table which I transported home to stain and varathane on my own.

A couple of weeks later, well, the project took more than 2-3 hours (heh) but I am really happy with the results. If I were to do it again, I would probably have stained it a tad darker as this was my first staining/sanding/varathaning project and I took a little too much of the stain off sanding. It's okay, maybe someday I will strip off the varathane and restain it. Then again, it took so much time to do the first time maybe I won't!

A couple questions:
I would like to keep my table outdoors, but would like to add low profile metal feet to protect the wood. Does anyone have a suggestion where to look for heavy duty feet?

Second, any suggestions on how to get the spar varathane off my concrete patio? Yikes!

Thank you Ana for the wonderful plans!

This bed was built using poplar, and pine wood. I used poplar for most of the stained pieces that are visible, and the stain is varathanes Early American. This is the fourth bed I’ve built with Ana’s Farmhouse Storage Bed plans, because it breaks down to four pieces, headboard, footboard and two side boxes, along with the drawers. This makes it easy to assemble on site.

Thanks Ana White for the blue print to an awesome storage sofa. I used the similar dimensions except mine is a bit shorter in width (60 inches wide). Now I just need to find awesome pillows to go with it.

Started on Saturday Afternoon around 5pm and finished building on Sunday, sanding on Monday, stain and poly on Tuesday and we ate Thanksgiving Dinner on it on Thursday. All that is left is the wood putty! Not perfect but VERY happy with it :)

I made this table entirely from oak.  It was somewhat more expensive than other projects I've done but my wife wanted a new coffee table so I thought why not go for it.  I found hard wood to be much easier to work with than other wood.  I like how it turned out.  I used "Mom's  Train Table" plan but added two 22 inch deep draws.  A little extra storage is always a good thing!

I have two girls and my youngest was getting out of a crib. I could build another bed or include both girls and build a bunk bed. I chose the bunk bed route with the approval of my wife and got started. I loved the plans from ana-white.com and decided to pull the trigger.
Total cost for bed not including the new full mattress was around $300. A huge savings from the estimated $1,500 from comparable beds on the market. This took me about 2 weeks total but that was a couple hours here and there. I would describe most of the work as beginner skill level but a couple of the steps had challenges but you could figure it out. My girls were out there helping me build and paint so it was also very memorable. Thank you again for all you do Ana.

Bobby

I was really excited when I saw this plan. I needed a side table for my guest bedroom and these are perfect. The plans were very easy to follow - the only thing I did differently was I left off the angle braces. The hardest part of the project was waiting on the paint to dry. I've done a few other projects but this my best work so far...I'm getting better and better with each build. So excited to start something else...

I built this table with cedar and used Cabots Australian Timber Oil hoping it would last a long time on my patio. After 1 summer, it still looks great! I made slight modifications for a comfortable height with the chairs I bought and also simplified the rounded cuts to a 45 degree cut on the bottom. Using glue and screws during assembly made the table solid.

plan supplied by Ana