I seriously forget how much I enjoy building tables, so when a dear friend asked about a sofa table I jumped at the opportunity.
This project was about as simple as they get when it comes to tables. Four, double-tapered legs, with a straight apron and beveled top.
The most difficult part of the project was routing the bevel on the ends of the top, but with the help of a hand plane, that was adjusted in no time.
Nothing is worse than sitting down in the middle of the couch to watch your favorite show and suddenly realize you’ll have to stretch across to an end table to set your drink or snack down.
Wouldn’t a moveable little tray table be the perfect item right about then? I did too, so I made one just so I can keep from pulling something while sitting around doing nothing.
Miter joints are beautiful, but sometimes they can benefit from a little reinforcement to help keep them together.
Even though there are mechanical options such as biscuits, dowels, and possibly even screws or nails, a potentially eye-catching option might be to cut slots across the joint and insert a spline.
For a recent project, I needed a jig to cut splines in narrow stock, so rather than building a big sled like I’ve seen elsewhere, I grabbed some scraps and put together something I’ll be using for years to come in a matter of minutes.
“WHERE’S MY KEYS?” is probably the most common question asked in the Vanderlist household, next to “Did you say TACOS?”
Since scrap wood projects are some of the best, especially with something as beautiful as the figured maple I used for this project, I was pretty excited to find a great use for it.
For certain, this is a project that can be knocked out in no time at all, and is a great idea for a housewarming gift or for that person who loses their keys the second they set them down.
With the shoe bench built and in place, it became obvious really quickly we needed some more organization in the back room.
Once again I grabbed some stock from the maple stash and decided to build…a box…a box to store some wicker baskets that will hold all sorts of items that seem to just get put somewhere I usually can’t find them.
For this project we kept the joinery super simple using nothing more than a biscuit reinforced butt joint, and to add a small detail to it, I cut, shaped and added an applied moulding to the front edge.
Quick, easy and super simple!
I have a bandsaw capable of resawing most of the stock I work with, but occasionally I have pieces wider than it can accommodate.
While I have an auxiliary extension for the bandsaw to increase its capacity, it’s time consuming to install, and even then it’s sometimes more of a hassle than it’s worth.
In about the same time it would take to set everything up (even with the extension already in position) I can easily resaw thick material using a combination of my tablesaw and a rip-style handsaw.
I’ve had mixed results using this combination before, but here’s how I do it now, and given the great results I’m getting, I’ll continue to use going forward.
There’s nothing like scratching two things off your to-do list with a single effort. In this case it’s replacing a real eye-sore of a project (that wasn’t as helpful as originally thought…see “The Good, the bad and…It’s Ugly”…,) and also another way to use up some old stock that’s just been taking up space for far too long.
This version of a shoe bench is great not only because it can store more pairs than the old one, but in addition you can actually sit down while you’re putting them on. So perhaps it’s actually more like scratching off EVEN MORE items from the list!
In addition to all of the above, this was a great opportunity to push myself on joinery as I used one of my least favorite joinery techniques, the angled half-lap.
Who doesn’t have a hodgepodge of wood species sitting around their shop? For certain I do, and sometimes I wish I could swap one piece for another to create a project. In reality, we already mix species in a number of our projects anyways, so why should this one be any different?
Sure continuity is important, but sometimes we can make allowances and just work with what we have. In this situation, the combination of a beautiful, highly-figured tiger maple top combined with the more utilitarian knotty pine rails and poplar legs come together for a great piece of simple furniture that gets used everyday and no one seems to notice (probably because of all the clothes thrown on top of it more than likely…)
This version of a bed bench is a super simple design not only in materials used, but with joinery and “details.” All three components are joined together using a modified butt joint (pocket holes) and the “decorative angles” for the rails and legs are laid out using the most basic of math (if you can even call it that.)
Anyone who plays games involving dice there’s two things you always encounter; 1) they inevitably go flying off the tabletop, or 2) someone claims you threw them in a way that meant you were cheating. Aside from building a gaming table with raised sides like a craps table in Vegas your options can be limited on how to fix the problem.
poplar dice tower and tray with dice
A quick little project I built to help keep the dice in play is a “Dice Tower and Tray.” I made mine out of scrap poplar taking up space in the lumber rack and it only took a couple of hours on a Saturday afternoon.
It’s easy to be inspired in the kitchen to make something, and I’m not just referring to food either (okay, maybe I am just a little.) Items for use in the kitchen are popular projects, not only with our spouses but often with family and friends.
My wife Samantha has a long list of things she’d like built to help her keep things organized in the kitchen, and at the top of her list is to get rid of the hideous plastic utensil organizer we’ve had since we first moved in together 18 years ago.
Old, plastic and has got to go!
So on today’s episode we’re building a custom utensil organizer for our kitchen cabinet drawer. One that not only holds the crazy number of forks, spoons and knives we own (I have no idea how we’ve accumulated so many) but also all of the extra things that I couldn’t tell you exactly what they do. This is a custom-sized project, so I won’t share a plan for it, but after watching I’m certain you’ll be able to build something very similar for your kitchen drawers if you were interested.
The new, tiger-maple utensil organizer
It all comes together using two of the most basic joints in the woodshop, the Rabbet and Dado, and given the number we use, you should become quite proficient in setting them up and getting great results on your next project.
A huge thanks to the folks at Bell Forest Lumber for providing the beautiful tiger-maple for the project from a donation to the show several years ago. If you haven’t checked them out previously for lumber, you should definitely take a look, I have yet to not like anything I’ve received from them.
For years I’ve been saying I was going to build a new workbench for the basement workshop, and after just as many years of not doing it, it’s finally happened!
The old and the new side-by-side during construction
The “design” of the bench is simple, and the dimensions are perfect for a smaller shop like mine considering the goal turned from making a monster bench like we’ve seen in magazines, or elsewhere and instead turned to constructing something that would simply help me build projects easier than ever before.
Already hard at work!
Today’s episode isn’t a construction video for “HOW I built the bench” but instead it’s a “TOUR” of its simple features, materials used in the construction, and a little bit about how I determined the dimensions and joinery.
Items mentioned in the video:
WoodRiver Tail-Vise Screw – Amazon.com
Veritas Tail-Vise Screw – Lee-Valley
Workbenches: From Design And Theory To Construction And Use – Christopher Schwarz
If you’re wondering about the episode I mentioned regarding building the plywood top for the old bench, you can find it by clicking here to visit episode 290.
