Category: Maker
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Today’s Functional Print: A Custom Birdseed Funnel
We have a birdfeeder that looks like a barn, and you refill it by pouring birdseed through the chimney. This is prone to spilled seed, and a regular funnel often clogs with the larger sunflower seeds. To solve this, I designed and printed a custom square funnel: It’s square to both create the largest possible…
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I Made Some Karate Belt Racks
A couple of years ago, a friend of mine needed a karate belt rack for her son who had begun racking up the belts in his karate class (pun definitely intended). The racks available on Amazon were of suspect quality, so I made one for them out of maple. Two years later, she has another…
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Cooking Around the World: Machboos and Maamoul, the original M&M
Bahrain is up next in my challenge to cook the national dish of every country, and I made chicken machboos plus maamoul cookies for dessert. The chicken machboos was not too different from the many chicken and rice dishes that serve as national dishes for other countries, but it used some more fragrant spices like…
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I Built a Folding Dog Gate
I built a folding dog gate to stop our labradoodle from walking on the carpet when her paws are muddy. It’s based on one my wife saw on Pinterest, but this specific design is mine. I modeled it in SketchUp first to make sure that I had the hinge layout correct. I wanted it to…
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I Built a Mid-Century Modern Nightstand
When I was tasked with making a 31″ tall nightstand for my mother-in-law that would fit in a 9″ wide space next to her bed and provide drawers and a shelf. I decided to use the opportunity to try a furniture style I haven’t tried before: mid-century modern. From what I can tell, “mid-century modern”…
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She Thinks My Tractor’s Sexy Now That It Has a Fresh Coat of Paint
I repainted a toy pedal tractor that we bought off of Facebook Marketplace to give to my son for Christmas. Actually, I repainted a toy pedal tractor TWICE because the cherry red spray paint that I used the first time never dried, so I had to scrub it off with mineral spirits and sand the…
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I made some picture frames (banana for scale)
I made some picture frames for my sister to put her daughters’ school photos in. I’ve included some bananas for scale. The frames are walnut with red oak inlay and a chamfer around the inside edge. The inlay strips were added after the frames were assembled. I finished them with a couple coats of clear…
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COVID Christmas Ornaments
Inspired by a picture my wife sent me of almost this exact same thing, I made some COVID-themed Christmas ornaments for the family members I won’t be seeing at Christmas this year. You can make your own too, if you have an X-Carve; the Easel project is right here.
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Today’s Functional Print: Adjustable Shelving Leg Inserts
In today’s adjustable shelving news, I’ve printed an insert to join two vertical sections of a boltless adustable shelving unit. The part looks like this, pictured next to an original: To make it easier to print, I split it into halves and nested the parts, printing four full inserts at a time: The shelving unit…
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Box with a Vengeance
My son needed to bring a box to school earlier this year for holding valentines, and he asked if I would make him one, so I made him one. It’s walnut with a maple inlay, and it has a slot in front so that valentines can be put in without opening it. This was my…
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Shake, rattle, and… Oregon???
I made these baby rattles for some friends and family who were unfortunate enough to give birth outside of Oregon. The bodies are maple, the beads are walnut, and the holes are filled with sweet sweet Oregon air.
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This pear bread is the best banana bread I’ve ever made.
The great taste of a banana bread-type quick bread without the mushy spots or occasional bitter aftertaste. From Taste of Home. Also, this site is a recipe blog now.
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Whoever named the fireplace, good job
This was the fireplace in our living room. It never worked properly since we moved in, since the previous owners didn’t use it once in twenty years. Fixing it would have cost as much as replacing it, and in order to replace it, we would have had to tear out the surround, and in order…
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The name’s Bed. Murphy Bed.
Remember that scene from Full House when Jesse gets trapped in a Murphy bed? Well, I do, and I realized that if John Stamos ever visits my home, I wouldn’t have a Murphy bed for him to get stuck in, so I built one: I used this hardware kit and set of plans from Rockler.…
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Cornhole: The board so nice, I made one twice
I built a set of cornhole boards. If you’ve never heard of cornhole, it’s a game where you throw a bag of corn through a hole. It is widely considered to be the inspiration for every major modern sport.
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I Turned One Desk into Two End Tables
I got this old desk for free. Once I got it home, I realized it was too big to fit anywhere in our house, so I left it under a tarp in my shop. A year later, I was cleaning up my shop and found a giant desk under a tarp. I decided to either…
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I’ve Got Bees!
Previously, I posted about about having hives. Not content to stop there, I have filled the hives with bees! I bought three nucs and moved them into my hives on a dreary Saturday. (After taking this picture, I added another five empty frames to fill the rest of the space.) The nucs were positively buzzing.…
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I Built a Custom Closet System
My daughter’s closet was just a 4′ x 5′ space with two hanging bars and a shelf, which was not an efficient use of the space. If I had taken a “before” picture of this project, you would be able to see that, but I didn’t take any pictures until I had ripped out the…
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Turning Billy Bookcase into William Bookcase
Years ago, when we were young and poor, my wife and I bought a Billy Bookcase from Ikea. It looked like this: Now that we are sophisticated wealthy adults, we wanted — no, needed — something classier. So, I painted Billy, gave him a face frame, and added moulding to the top and bottom. I…
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This Desk Used to Be Pink. You’ll Never Believe What Color It Is Now!
White. It’s white now.