Lap Desk Divider

I've been slowly working on a shaker style pine lap desk.  Yesterday I cut and shaped the second divider.  The main center divider is removable.  This smaller divider is fixed.  The two pieces that make up the divider are joined together with through dovetails.  This  project is a great exercise in honing your hand tool skills.  The carcase of the desk is joined with dovetails, as are the dividers and the small drawer is joined with through and half blind dovetails.  

Lap Desk: The Saga Continues

I'm slowly working on the lap desk.  I've  cut and shaped the center divider

and finished the bread board ends on the lid.  Next I have to build  the small drawer.  The drawer will be assembled using through and half blind dovetails.

Bread Board Ends

Yesterday I cut 3/4 inch wide tenons on the lid of the lap desk.  The tenons are only 1/8 inch thick.

I used the table saw to cut the 1/8 inch mortises in the maple bread board ends.  The mortises are 3/4 inch deep.  I use stop blocks to help me cut the mortises on the table saw, plunging the piece onto the blade and then moving it along until it hits the other stop block. The maple end boards are over sized.  I'll cut them to size on the table saw.  The bread board ends are pegged with 1/8 inch dowel pegs.  I drilled three holes into each end and pegged the ends with the dowel pegs.  The bread board ends are glued only in the center of the tenon to allow for wood movement.  The holes in the tenons are elongated to allow for wood movement.

Shaker style lap top

Today I started working on a pine shaker style lap desk.  I started the main carcase of the desk quite a while ago.  The top and bottom of the desk is made out of quarter sawn pine.  The case sides are glued directly to the bottom.  The quarter sawn pine is very stable so a simple glue/butt joint is very sufficient.  The corners are joined with dovetails. The center divider is removable to accommodate a modern lap top computer

That's a wrap'

Today Jeff and I finished shooting the new episode of the show.  This episode's project is a planter box, like the ones I made for Lynch's package store only made to fit the rail of a backyard deck.

The project and the shoot went well.

Yesterday we went to a flea market.  The top floor of the old dutch barn has the beautiful arched beams.  My poor picture doesn't do it justice

' Castles in the air'

On Saturday I filled my son's sand box and moved it outdoors.  It was such a beautiful day that I couldn't wait to paint it.  As you can see it was a big hit with my son and Mom.  The best compliment is seeing a project you made being used.

New episode

On Friday Jeff and I starting shooting a new episode of the show.  The project for the show is a planter box like the ones I made for Lynch's package store only modified to fit on a deck.  It feels good to be shooting the show again, it's been a while since we put out a new episode.  The simple plywood box  is made up of four sides and a bottom that fits into grooves and dados in the side pieces.  The box is then framed  with pieces of 1" x 2" pine and then decorative molding is added.  A piece of corner round is added to soften the corners. 

My son Quinn asked me quite some time ago to build him sand box so he could play with his trucks and knights and dragons outside.  It's taken a while but this week I built his sand box for him.  He loves castles, dragons and knights so I built him a sand box in the shape of a castle.  The frame of the box is built using pressure treated 1" x 6" boards for the frame and fir 4" x 4" post.  I attached the frame to the legs using dados, glue and lag bolts.  All of the material I got from the cut off bin at Home Depot so it was very inexpensive.  I used some scraps of plywood to create the dentil molding.  I made a simple jig for my miter gauge on the table saw and cut out the notches using stack dado blades. I made faux windows by cutting the shapes out of some pine scraps.  First I ran the board over the table saw blade to create small grooves in the boards.

The bottom is a piece of 3/4" plywood housed in the sides by a 1/2 " x 3/4" dado.  I attached fence post caps to the post to give it a real medieval castle feel.

I'm going to paint the castle a terra cotta color.

I had a blast making this for Quinn.  I didn't even get a chance to move it off the bench before he was playing in it.  All that is left to do is to fill it up with sand and move it outdoors.