Two Projects for My Mom, a few years apart.

  Since I am old I lived and wood worked before Ikea eliminated the need to make your own book shelves. So.. when I was a high school student in the 1970's I went with my Mother to Beaver Lumber (long extinct) bought some particle board pre-cut shelves and a couple of 2x6 boards and made a book shelf for our rec room. This book shelf still lives in my Mother's basement and looks as good as it ever did, I think.

  I knew that the shelves had NO strength and so each shelf is supported in at least three places, after all these  years the shelves are as straight and true as they were the day I put this together in the drive way of my house. You can't see but across the back is a half sheet of 1/4 construction plywood providing stability against racking.

  To make this a piece of furniture sort of, suitable for a basement recreation room anyway I even glued trim to the edge of the shelves.

    This is why I like wood. Jeez, this is over forty years old.  And appears to have aged better than its maker.

   I was visiting my Mother today bumming dinner and I brought her a gift from my shop.

  The last time Mom visited she saw the tissue box I make for us said she liked it.  You should only tell a wood worker you like something if you have a place to put one in your home. This is a cool little box with mitred corners.  I knocked it off with my sliding mitre saw, care in measurement means good corners.  The wood is from a very old chest of drawers that I took apart at the beginning of March. 

  The wood is cool, it is filled with worm holes. 

  

  Some people would think the holes were creepy.  I think they give the very ordinary box some real character.

 I am not going to do project pictures, because good project videos have already been done by excellent wood workers who are also good video producers. 

    Watch Izzy Swan make a box using tape to clamp the corners, that is exactly what I did.  

Izzy Swan is one of my wood working heroes.  I love his mechanical projects. 

  I hope my American and British friends had a good long weekend and everyone has lots of projects planned for their summer.

cheers, ianw