• Loft Ladders

    Two young friends have lofts in their rooms and they were in need of a permanent way to access them. After visiting to take some photos and measurements, we decided on seventy-five degree ladders with treads about six inches deep and eighteen inches wide. We also planned to use 1-1/4 inch thick poplar, to match…

  • Play Kitchen Repair

    Michael and Olivia wanted to give their Uptown Expresso Play Kitchen to Elliott, but a few minor repairs were called for before the hand-off happened. The refrigerator door was missing, and the oven door had a big crack in it! Fortunately and surprisingly, the manufacturer, KidKraft, had some repair parts available … but not quite…

  • Box Joint Jig

    After I enjoyed making the Box Joint Box for Jeff, I decided to make a more permanent box joint jig for the workshop. I wanted a jig that didn’t depend on clamping it to a miter gage on the tablesaw, that would accommodate different thicknesses of wood and that would be easy to make very…

  • JOY Yard Signs

    After almost ten years after making the first two sets of JOY yard signs, Stephen requested another joint effort to create two more sets. One of these sets would go to Andrew and Megan, and the other set would go home with Stephen, as a surprise early present to Katie. The plan was to finish…

  • Kyle’s Salt and Pepper Mills

    When I heard that Kyle could use a new pepper mill, I saw an opportunity to make a custom set of salt and pepper grinders. The hardware kits were available from Penn State Industries and I had some legacy cherry blocks that would be fun to turn. I created a few shape variations in SketchUp,…

  • Table Saw Cabinet

    Sometimes, projects in the shop are simple and quick, often to answer an organizational need. During a major shop cleanup and re-organization, I took down the shelves on the wall to the right of the tablesaw, as they were difficult to access and accumulating scraps that were hardly ever used. One function of a small…

  • Mary’s Mesquite Log

    Mary was saddened when a sudden Arizona storm blew down a mesquite tree in her yard. Not long ago, Mary’s husband Boyd had passed away, and that particular mesquite had always been his favorite tree. As Mary’s friend, Deb asked me if they sent me a log from Mary’s fallen tree, would I be able…

  • Rob’s Music Studio

    With my MIDI controller keyboard at the center of a temporary recording studio in the basement and my Kawai synthesizer in the living room, I just wasn’t playing the piano as much as I would have liked. Linda and I talked about this on our trip to Jack Lake in Canada in the late summer,…

  • Katie’s Little Stools

    Katie asked me if I could make two little stools, based on the one she already had. She also pointed me to a plan for them online. As always, well almost always, I created a 3D model of the stool from the plan, along with a few corrections and “improvements.” From the SketchUp model, I…

  • Smartphone Amplifiers

    Inspired by the walnut inlaid amplifier that Kyle made for Beth for last year’s Christmas name exchange, I decided to make a simplified design, taking advantage of the lessons learned from Kyle’s build. I also took advantage of a piece of 2″ thick white ash left over from Kyle’s Platform Bed build. One of the…