The Lost Project
Back in 2008, Lisa and I were living in Maryland in an end-of-row townhouse we bought only a couple of years earlier, just after we got married. One of the reasons we got married in the first place, aside from already being together for almost four years at that point, was so Lisa could have her name already changed to make the paperwork for the new house less of a headache. We were growing tired of my apartment by this time anyway, and wanted a place we could call our own. This isn’t really germane to this story, but it gives a little context.
I had desires of putting together a small workshop in our basement so I could start making things for around the house at some point. I started with a few old power tools my dad gave me that he no longer used, like his old Craftsman table saw, a small bandsaw, and a few other portable power tools. They weren’t the best, but they would at least allow me to get started.
After a short time, I’d grown tired of the older tools and wanted some better ones so that I might start making proper furniture, and allow me to work with larger sheet goods. The jobsite table saw was simply too small and under-powered at times, plus it couldn’t accept a dado stack (at least not safely). I sold most of the larger tools to someone at Lisa’s work and I bought myself a new table saw. It was a Jet contractor table saw and it offered a few better features than the old Craftsman, specifically a much better rip fence. At this point, I started to go down the rabbet hole of power tools, a place from which I have yet to return.
At any rate, we had just finished fixing up our dining room the way we wanted it and Lisa wanted one more thing to allow her to display her decorative plates and bowls. We already had two corner hutches, but they were already full with other things (they didn’t have a lot of space in which to display things anyway). She tried searching online and in furniture stores around us for a shelf that would allow her to properly display her plates and bowls. After an exhaustive search, Lisa couldn’t find anything. She told me specifically what she was trying to find, and I told her I could make something, that way it would be EXACTLY what she wanted.
Lisa loved that idea and laid out all of the dimensions that she desired and I drew up a crude sketch of what the final piece would look like and she was thrilled. She didn’t much care what material the shelf was made from, but she did want to finish the piece herself. To make things simple, I suggested just getting a decent pine board from Lowe’s. Off we went and a short while later we were back at the house with our pine board.
Now, I certainly don’t remember EVERY little detail of this build, as it was nearly 15 years ago now, but let me just say that I had a rather bad experience with this project. Cutting the board to length was not an issue as I had a power miter saw to get that job done. The biggest problem I encountered was when I was trying to route the two grooves in the top which would prevent the plates/bowls from sliding forward and falling from the shelf.
The first TWO times I tried to route the grooves, I was using my handheld DeWalt router (the same one I still have to this day). I had a straightedge firmly clamped to the board and when I went to run the router along the straightedge, somehow the router walked away from the straightedge and I started cutting a wavy line. One board ruined, and I was not too thrilled.
I went back to Lowe’s and grabbed another board. I went back down to my shop and set everything up again. Everything was clamped into place and I attempted the cut the grooves again. I was making sure to apply proper pressure against the straightedge and started the groove again, and just like the last time, the router started moving away, causing another wavy line. I was beyond furious by this point. Another good pine board was ruined.
I was absolutely livid. Plenty of four-letter words were coming out of my mouth by this point. I shut the router off, took the pine board, and slammed it against one of the wooden deck posts outside my basement shop. My thinking (or lack thereof) was the board was going to shatter into pieces and appease my anger. Instead, the board obviously held its ground and just vibrated horribly, pinging my hands like getting sawed off at home plate on a foul ball. My hands were numb for quite a few minutes after that.
After getting my frustrations out in the only way I knew how back then (I was quite the hothead), I decided then and there to stop messing around with trying to route the grooves with the handheld router and to pony up the dough and get a router table instead. I ordered a router table, stand, and lift plate from Rockler and would proceed with the project again upon its arrival.
Once I got the router table all put together and dialed in, I set it up to cut my grooves AGAIN. I ran a test piece through to ensure it was going to work and it came out perfect. I ran my THIRD pine board through and everything came out wonderfully. I adjusted the fence slightly and ran a second groove just as Lisa wanted. With the grooves done, I did the roundovers on the top to finish it off.
Next I cut out the two braces that would support the shelf and provide a place to hang the shelf on a wall. The cross-member connecting the two braces was cut to proper length and holes drilled to accept the coat pegs that Lisa wanted for some of her plates (some had ribbons from which to hang). The cross-member was attached to the braces with two screws that were countersunk and filled with wooden plugs.
Next came attaching the brace/cross-member sub-assembly to the top. I opted for just one screw each through the top and into the braces, again filling the hole with a wooden plug. Before I screwed the braces into place, I went back to the router table and used a t-slot bit to make slots from which the shelf could hang on the wall via two screws. With everything put together, the piece was essentially done. All that was left was the finish, and Lisa was going to handle that portion.
After Lisa applied her finish of choice, the project was complete. From afar, the finished piece looked decent. If was perfectly functional in all the ways Lisa wanted, and she was quite happy with how it came out. I, on the other hand, was far from thrilled.
This being my first real woodworking project that didn’t utilize plywood exclusively, I had absolutely no idea on how to properly prepare a project for finishing. I did little to no sanding on this thing, and it REALLY showed. I mean, I never even sanded away some of the pencil marks I made when laying out the pegs. There was glue squeeze-out around some of the pegs that the stain only enhanced. The braces weren’t pulled firmly together by the screws either, leaving a small gap. All and all, it was a really sloppy, dare I say, piss-poor job. However, Lisa was happy, and that was all that mattered to me.
The shelf hung on our dining room wall, proudly displaying Lisa’s plate and bowls, and I paid it no mind anymore. A few years later, in 2012, we moved to a rental house in Florida (LONG story there), and we never bothered hanging the shelf up as we didn’t want to put holes in the walls and have to fill them later.
Another five years passed and we finally moved to our new house in 2017. Lisa wanted to display all of the plates and bowls she had on top of our kitchen cabinets rather than the shelf, and I was definitely all for that. The shelf has been relegated to sitting in the closet in the room with our gym equipment.
I often thought about remaking this shelf many times, now that I’ve got a bit more woodworking experience and access to much better materials, but there really is no need anymore. All of Lisa’s stuff is displayed elsewhere and the shelf is no longer needed, so why make another one?
I almost want to make a new shelf just so I can destroy the old one and never have to look at it again. Alas, I’ve yet to do that. Perhaps, one day, Lisa will acquire more plates and/or bowls to display and another shelf will be needed. Until such time, I think the old plate shelf is going to continue to live in the closet, away from everyone.
