Teachers Christmas/appreciation gift box

My sons kindergarten teacher deserves far more than this box. Probably should’ve gotten her a medal as well. He gives her hell. Along with the rest of the class.

I had resawed some africanish mahogany or something close enough that I really don’t care and it needed to be used. With the obligatory curly maple.

I wanted to try mortise and tenon on the legs and apron instead of butt joining. Worked out great.

I also wanted to try some carved elements. I could use a couple more gouges but it came out better than I could’ve hoped. If I did it again I’d cut a mortise and dado into them and turn them.

I tried pore filling by rubbing the pad with a bit of pumice instead of lightly applying the pumice with the tapping technique I watched just about everyone else do. I used one drop of shellac with the DNA every time I refilled the pad. It worked great for me. Enough shellac to hold it in the pores, but not enough to where build up wouldn’t come off easy. It cut down pore filling time for this very porous wood to a fraction of what it should be.

I decided before finishing that I was gonna burn the rest of this species when I was done. I decided after finishing with BLO, garnet shellac and wax that I was going to resaw more of it. The tone and finish is exactly what I wanted.

I also wanted to try flocking. It would’ve been a much easier process if I read the instructions before finishing and taping everything off with craft paper. It had to come off so I could apply shellac to the inside of the flocked areas. Which I painstakingly avoided getting shellac into. Lesson learned. I also learned not to apply the rubber cement stuff too thick or it’ll drip into the corners and won’t dry in 24 hours. Came out good in the end.

I wanted to try gold leafing some maple knobs. It was a pain. I don’t know if the size I got isn’t good or what but the leaf did not want to stick it. Forget about burnishing. Once I got it to look decent, after one full strip of both knobs and resending and reapplying the size and leaf, I dipped it in lacquer and spun the excess off in the drill. I like how it came out though.

In the end, I tried some new things that worked out great as a whole. Daddy likes. By africanish mahogany I really meant alder.

Edit: I think I forgot to wipe on the camera lens :/

-- Shooting down the walls of heartache. Bang bang. I am. The warrior.