Well, it's Christmas again; must be time to build a footboard!

I started this blog about a year ago when Jill and I started building our bed.  We did a great job on the headboard, but then things stalled out on the footboard.  That's how projects go.  Most projects spend their whole life living unfinished in my shop.  But this one won't.  It's Christmas again, and I'm dedicating this week to finishing the footboard.  Or perhaps just to make real progress before it sits unfinished in my shop for another year.  Either way, it's shop time!

Our first step every morning this week is to apply another coat of finish to the headboard.  The finish is a hand-rubbed oil finish.  We apply it, sand it in with 1500 grit sandpaper, and then wipe off as much as possible, and let it dry for a day.  After seven coats, I wax it to give it a smooth sheen.  I took this picture tonight after this morning's coat had all day to dry.  It's looking really nice, and it definitely motivates me to finish the project.

And now, on to the shop.

First, a new addition to my shop -- a new bench dog.

 That's a really bad pun.  You can look up what a "bench dog" is.   But in this case, it's a nine-week old Dalmatian that we brought home last week.  Just in time for Christmas.

There are some true new additions to the shop.  Although I used several of them today, I failed to take pictures, so they don't count.  Without pictures, it's like I'm not even getting my money's worth out of it.  But I did get my money's worth out of a wonderful pattern bit that I bought from William Ng (owner and chief instructor at the William Ng School of Fine Woodworking in Anaheim, CA).  William calls it the "Big Daddy" bit.  And it is a big daddy indeed:

 

This big is capable of routing my 2" thick mahogany upper rail to final shape in one pass. 

This thing is a beast.  I get nervous using it, because it can definitely shred my entire hand and forearm in a moment's neglect.  But it is super cool.  Having it in my shop makes me more manly.  Other people want to be me.  Yep, this is the bit to have.

After trimming the upper rail to rough shape, I set up the legs, rails and the center panel for the footboard.  It's coming along nicely.

 

The center panel did give me quite a bit of grief.  The veneer glue didn't hold as well as I would have liked, so parts of the veneer were lifting just a little bit.  I injected some cyanoacrylate (super glue) and pressed it down.  That seems to have worked pretty nicely.  Tomorrow I'll sand out the panel and apply some shellac, and then it's on to final fitting and sanding of everything else before glue-up. 

But now I'm done for the night.