Customer Reviews

Toys, Games, and Furniture: Over 30 Woodworking Projects You Can Make for Children

5 star:		(1)
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2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Good points: Cool designs that both kids and adults love.

Bad points: I don't recommmend this book for beginning woodworkers. It will only serve to frustrate you and will discourage you from doing more woodworking.

I'm in the process of building the Advent calender and it's been really frustrating because the plans not only don't represent what the picture shows, but they leave gaping holes in the construction process.

For instance the plans call for dividers that demark all the little compartments and they will ultimately be flush with the shelves. However, if you look at the picture, the solid "filler blocks" on the side of the project do not have any dividers showing but the plans and even the construction pictures show them.

The other issue is that in the construction pictures you see a hand swinging a hammer to hammer in the nails to secure the compartment dividers. Really now? How does one swing a claw hammer at the sides or from the bottom where there is no clearance?

So really, you need a pneumatic brad nailer -- but not just any brad nailer. You will need one that can get into the cracks and crannies of those tiny compartments and be prepared to wrench out many mis-driven nails with pliers.

Also, the instructions tell you to glue in the filler blocks on the side, but with those dividers next to them, it looks very odd and distracting. The project picture is much cleaner, but to match it, you will have to discard the working plans and come up with your own plans.

Also, it looks pretty cool and elegant in simplicity with the natural wood showing, but since the hammering will certainly have you blowing nails through the wood, you'll be using wood putty and that doesn't look very nice with a natural finish. So you'll have to paint the front of the project to hide the poor design and nail holes. I recommend stencils for the doors that have numbers on them for the days 1-24 with some sort of white background. I also plan on using some Xmas stencils for added decoration and distraction/camoflage.

I plan on finishing the project and making it presentable, but it would have been nice to not have to stop and think about the project design when the whole purpose of the book is to tell you how to make stuff and encourage woodworking.

Anyway, after this project I intend on trying a couple of more to see if all of the plans are this way.

All in all, you have to admit, they have really cool designs and ideas but you need to have some woodworking skills to compensate for the lack of information and poor design.

There are beautiful pictures of the finished work- and many of these are projects I would like to make. But beware- the plans in this book are nonexistent, and the directions are skimpy at best. Notice that the positive review came from someone who didn't try to use the book to make anything!

This book has lots of really neat projects and ideas. I was pleasently surprised at how much I liked. I gave it to my dad for Christmas and everyone was putting in their orders before the night was done.