Christmas Gifts 2011

My Christmas crafting for 2011 went pretty smoothly. Usually, I'm feeling very under the gun leading up to Christmas Eve but this year I figured out what I wanted to make early and actually got the gifts done at least a week in advance. I wish I could do that every year!

For the girls, I made each of them a pair of fingerless gloves, or gauntlets, out of recycled sweaters and fleece. You can see the Instructables article here. They required a bit of machine sewing and some hand sewing to complete. Here's a tip: when you go to the fabric store around Christmas to buy material, get a number for the cutting table line as soon as you walk in the store. Otherwise, you'll have to wait a VERY long time to get your material cut.

Sarah has always wanted a way to dry washed plastic ziploc bags, so that's what I made her this year. Drilling angled holes with the correct orientation and at the same level around a curved dowel proved to be quite difficult. I eventually settled on this jig. (Some might call it a jury-rig, but it worked.)

I bought the dowel arms pre-cut and I only used part of a 1" dowel for the trunk. However, I needed the rest of the 1" dowel to make sure my jig would work. The base was pre-cut, too, from the craft section at our local Joanne's. I finished it with some urethane I had lying around.

As usual, I really enjoyed the planning and making of these gifts. We exchange our handmade gifts on Christmas eve so that we can really focus on just these gifts. It's always a very special event that we all really enjoy. I'm already thinking about gifts for next year.
Merry Christmas!

Santa's Workshop is Open for 2012!

I've written a few previous posts about my family's tradition of creating handmade gifts for Christmas each year. Many times, the handmade gifts are the favorites of all gifts, including the store-bought ones.

This year, Sarah and I decided to donate a wooden music stand from MusicMakers to my daughter's 7th grade class as a raffle prize. I made one of these several years ago for my daughters so I was familiar with it as I started this one. Overall, the kit itself and the instructions are excellent. I broke the project up into two sessions so that I could do the bulk of the gluing on day one and then pretty much just assemble and sand on day two. This worked out great.


I've been working on a couple other things that I can't share just yet because I don't want to spoil anybody's surprise. I'll check in again after Christmas!

Octagonal Side Tables

I've been wanting to build these tables for a long time. I got the idea from a side table we bought at a yardsale for a couple bucks. We like them so much that I decided to make a few.
I started out with some 1x6s and a 1x12 from Home Depot. Liz and I cut the 1x12 into 11" squares on the table saw. Then we drew the octagon shapes onto one. Once I realized that the angles were all 45s, I figured out how to make a template for the table saw; that meant I didn't have to measure up and draw 6 octagons. Definitely a time saver.
Next we cut the legs down from the 1x6. I'm not sure of the width b/c I just cut them all to the same width on the table saw but they're 22" long.
The next thing we built was a plywood box (from scrap) with a couple stops on it so that we could set the bottom shelf at the right height and have a stable surface to hold things in place while we nailed the legs on. Two 15" lengths of scrap legs let us set the table tops at the right height.
A bit more sanding and a coat of stain and we are good to go.
I didn't keep the receipt from the Home Depot when I bought the materials but I'm pretty sure they cost less than $10 each.
I forgot to mention one of the prime motivations for doing this: it's hot as blazes here and working in the basement for a couple hours was nice and cool!