Monday, January 26, 2015

Got Clutter?

These shelves/holders were made for my older sister from pallet wood. It was a quick project and she painted them with paint she had on hand so mostly free too. The before pictures show clutter because we were moving stuff around to install them before we remembered to take pictures. The clutters not exactly what's going in the shelves but still it does look much better. The utensils were stored in a big cylinder vase next to the stove and the fruit all a little farther down the counter. The salt and pepper/spices migrated around the counter on any given day. I actually make an appearance in my pictures. That's my back in the first one and my hand in the other.



Here's the shelves/holders. The first is for utensils, the second has a slanted front and holds fruit, and the third is a small shelf for salt pepper and spices.




Here they are installed and filled. We added hooks on the fruit holder to hold bananas above the rest of the fruit, in this case apples. We tossed around the idea of writing utensils and fruit on the fronts of the respective holders but my sister ultimately decided against it.

Friday, January 23, 2015

Some signs

Some of my projects lately have hit a snag and while I wait to get a new piece or figure out a solution, I start another project that subsequently hits a snag. So the only thing to do is start another project I know I can finish and leave the other projects to annoy my husband. I picked some signs for my little sister. She wanted them for her kids room. Again I used the trace the text off the computer screen and trace it again onto the boards using carbon paper method. The antlers and arrows had to be drawn because I couldn't find any that I liked, but the tree was also copied off the computer screen. Then I painted it in with white paint. She got the signs idea off of a post on etsy.

Saturday, January 10, 2015

Beer Tote Update

Both of the beer totes are finished now. I got the bottle openers in and attached them to the totes. For some reason for three cast iron bottle openers, they felt they needed to surround them with this much bubble wrap. Needless to say they arrived unharmed.



Here's my dad's again as well as a picture of him after he loaded it with his homemade beer. I painted the screws to look rusted because I had to use my own screws and the only ones that would work were shiny metal.




And here's my husbands. My dad says my husband has to outdo him but my son asked if it was bigger because Daddy drinks more than Poppy. I'm not sure which is the reason but I like the twelve pack as well as the six pack version.

Thursday, January 8, 2015

Throwback Thursday

I'm not feeling too great the last couple of days so I feel it might be awhile until another project is complete so I thought I do a throwback to a project I completed last year. This was one of those one day projects and there still isn't any finish on it. I'm not sure that I'll put a finish on it or not maybe just let the oils from everyone's hands show the use it got. This is a tic tac toe set I made for my coffee table. The kids usually like to play it when they come over. At the time I wanted to use my old bandsaw for something so I used it on the x's to resaw them to thickness and cut out their shape. The o's are made from some discs I got from my grandma's things when she past away. I believe it's just a closet rod that my grandpa cut into disks for her for a project. I'm not really sure of the nature of the project. The actual board I cut lines into with a hand saw. Then I made the side with some hobby wood and the bottom is some hardboard. I made six of each piece but I believe you only need five.

Sunday, January 4, 2015

Beer Totes

It's been a while since I've posted because I pretty much stayed out of the shop the week of Christmas. I have been working on some projects and I can't wait any longer so I'm gonna show them. I got bored and needed a fun project to work on whilst waiting for stain and poly to dry on other projects. It's been kinda cold lately but mostly still sunny so I'm able to do one coat of stain or poly a day because it takes the whole day pretty much to dry. So I thought I'd try making one of The Drunken Woodworker's beer totes. My dad makes his own beer and I thought he could use it if he wanted to take them anywhere for people to try. He doesn't know about it, well he does now if he reads this, because I had to order a bottle opener for the side of the tote. I couldn't find one anywhere in town so I ordered some from Hobby Lobby. I wasn't gonna show him until I installed the bottle opener but I have no idea how long it's going to take for them to come in. Here is the link to The Drunken Woodworker's video about making beer totes. He has a link to the plans there as well. The Drunken Woodworker -beer totes and here's my dad's beer tote minus the bottle opener.



It came out pretty good. I finished it with some clear spray and then put some paste wax on it because I figured it would fill in the grain of the plywood and it'll be around beverages so the wax will help if anything gets spilled on it. My husband saw this and his birthday is coming up so he asked if I could make one for a twelve pack. I didn't really wanna make another one because I usually get bored if I make the same thing twice but he really wanted it and I figured it would be a little bit of a challenge to change the plan into a twelve pack holder. I ran out of dowel for the handle so I used a piece of wood from some bed slats that had broken and gave the handle a little curve. I really like the new handle and I wish I had put one on my dad's tote as well. My husband's tote isn't finished yet but here's a shot of the dry fit. Please excuse the messy workbench.


I'm probably going to have to make more little toolboxes as well because my niece saw my son's toolbox and asked for one. Then I definitely have to make my nephew one for his birthday too because he loves to shadow me when I'm working in the shop. I have time though because their birthdays aren't until April. All this practice making similar items is really helping me learn better ways of building the next one and improving my skills which is always a good thing.