Ethans Pirate Bed (insignia)

All pirate ships need a insignia and I love octopuses.  So I chose that as his theme/insignia. 

This is the one I found that I liked.  I made myself a template so that it would be the same on both sides.



So this is how I got it on.  I just taped it on and traced it.   I know cheap but I wanted to go fast.

All traced out and ready for paint.



Yes that's a real beard.  I think besides the decorative piece on the top of his boat this was the next time consuming but worth it.

I absolutely love how this looks and turned out.  That's all I have to say about this.



Ethans Pirate Bed (the lid)

 So at the front of his bed I wanted to have a storage space for toys, blankets, etc.  Well I first wanted to make it a hinged lid but his room design and the idea I had did not work.  I liked what I came up with a lot better and it looks neat.



This was my attempt.  The wood was warped funny and it wasn't structurally sound.  I also wanted it kind of hidden.  So I scrapped this idea.

This is my second and better idea.  I laid a piece of wood across the top and glued and nailed it down.  I then made a shelf system inside for the lid to sit down on that way it was flush with the trim and hidden.

After I had painted it, it was loud just being red.  I wanted to add some octopus decals on it so I thought one would be good here.  I drew this out on some 1/8 wood then Traves scrolled it out for me. 

I wanted it bold so I painted it white.  It looks awesome.



A little close up. I did not actually just draw this out I found a picture I like and copied it.  So thank you artist man for being so awesome.

What it looks like all said and done.  He always is getting in it which is funny because I thought he'd almost never get in it.  So I'm glad I came up with this idea.





Ethans Pirate Bed (the helm)

 Every pirate ship needs a helm(a steering wheel).  I was going to try and just buy one but after looking at allot of them I figured it wouldn't be to hard to make.

I tryed to make it as easy as possible because if he busts anything on it I want to be able to fix it.  So this is what I came up with.  First I made 2 outer circles.  Then I made 2 inner circles.  At first I bought a dowel for the handles but ended up using a couple of broken shovel handles I had.  I then placed 1 inner circle and 1 outer circle down on my table.  I then spaced out my handles out on top of them.  Then I place the other inner and outer circle on top making a sandwich if you will.  Got out the nail gun and nailed it all together.





This was the result.  Turned out pretty good I thought.  Note: I put in a dowel in the inner circles to make sure they were lined up right. 



Now as you can see I mounted it kind of high but that was because I was adding a decorative top on to cover it sort of.



Here it has the decorative piece on and I got all the nail holes filled and sanded. as you can tell the wheel is still a little high than the decorative piece but you can see what I was going for.



Here it is all finished.  I think it is one of the best parts and so does my kid.  Every night he has to park his boat before he goes to sleep. 

Game Night Trophy 2011

So to go along with my last post the Game Night Trophy. So I am a competitive person. So usually those around me are as well. To up game night I made this trophy. We don't play for it every week just the first Saturday of every month. That way we don't get completely burnt out. Now if you know me you know that I collect odd crap. I've been trying to get rid of allot of it for awhile but I still have some odds and ends. So I grabbed a bunch of it and slapped it together to make this freaking awesome trophy.

So this is some of the things I had laying around.

I toyed around with the layout for awhile. I added allot and took off allot.

This is the back.

On the back we put who wins. At the end of the year the person with the most wins gets the trophy. Makes you want to play right.

Gave the trophy a freaking awesome name. Mostly for laughs but common who wouldn't want to win it with a name like that.

This is it all done. It was fun to play for. I ended up winning it. Booya

Game Night Game Table

So last year I wanted to bring my family and friends closer so I started a game night. We actually started a few years back playing darts but in the winter we would stop because of how cold it is outside. Anyways so I started game night. So at first we would play in my kitchen at the counter which would hurt our butts sitting on bar stools for so long. So I decided to make a game table. Lucky for me somebody at work tore out this piece of wood that worked perfect.

So I made it as big as I could at first I didn't know if I wanted round or a octagon shape. Traves and I decided on the octagon.

This is to show you how big it was.

Cut out I think it was awesome.

I router ed the edge with just a 1/4 round bit.

Now I just use what I have so I used this old sheet to wrap the outside boarder. It worked pretty nice I will eventually change it.

Traves pocket jigged the boarder together to make it easier for us to move during assembly.

So I was going to paint the middle but I ended up putting some green flannel in the middle I again might go back and change that.

This is the only picture I have of what it ended up looking like it might be hideous but it is awesome. We now have more game players so we have moved back to the kitchen to play but it was still fun to make.

Garretts Toy Box

This is a continue of the last post. I also got my nephew Garrett to get a gift for. He love Legos. So what goes good with Legos. A Lego toy box. I've seen one like this and have always wanted to make one so I was happy I got to make one for him.

All I did to make it look like a Lego was cut a 2" dowel into 1" tall pieces then screwed them onto the lid

I put door hinges on because I know how rough boys can be with there toys.

All I did for the handles was screw a giant duplo Lego on. It looked pretty good.

Put some heavy duty chain in as a lid stop. Again I know how hard boys are on things.

I was going to put his name on it but I liked just the plain look.

It was a hit. Every kid was swarming it. Garrett kept just opening it and closing it. He really liked it.

Katies Toy Box

So my wifes family has grown quite a bit since I met her. So instead of getting every single niece and nephew a gift we draw names to make it a little less stressful. This year I got my little niece Katie. Now I could have just bought her a doll and been good but lets face it thats lame.
I made it simple but girly

I uses a vinyl cutter to make the lettering

To make it nice and easy I just made a box then cut it on the table saw to get the lid makeing it a perfect fitting lid. She liked it and it was better than just a doll from the store.

Merry Christmas Katie