Jewelry chest for my wife

Front shot of the new drawers and drawer fronts.

 

Here you can see the joinery I used. I went with box joints again, but this time I used thicker dimensions. The results with 3/8" sides were much better than those with 1/4" sides. I like the contrast between the maple drawers and the cherry case. It should pop even more when I get some stain and finish on the case.

 

One of the finished drawers with red velvet lining. This one also has a padded ring bar at the front.

 

We have STAIN! No finish yet, but I'm pretty happy with the color (and more importantly, so is Leslie!). Cherry is a "blotchy" wood, meaning it's prone to very uneven stain absorption. I learned a trick from The Wood Whisperer to fix that -- seal the surface with shellac first. Then sand smooth and use gel stain instead of regular oil stain. It was a pain in the butt, but I think the effort will be worth it. We'll see when I start applying the final finish.

 

Primary coats of polyurethane are on the drawer fronts now. This is after 2 coats of gloss. I think I'm going to do 1 or 2 more coats of gloss, then switch to semi-gloss for the final finish.

The drawer front on the lower right is cherry wood, just like the other two. However it's from a different part of the tree called "sapwood". I had hoped that an extra coat of stain would darken it up, but alas, it didn't. The difference isn't as drastic as it appears in this picture, but it is noticeable. I may end up re-making it with a better piece of cherry.

 

The front of the case is finally stained. Now that I've got a good feel for how to use the gel stain, the color is deep, rich, and consistent without masking the grain pattern. It should really pop when I start applying layers of polyurethane finish.

 

After 16 years of marriage, she really has that much jewelry. My lady likes her sparklies.

 

I was fixing to say, "You're going to have to buy an awful lot of jewelry...." ha

That's absolutely beautiful, hasbeen.

 

It doesn’t have to be obtained, doesn’t cost extra and you never have to pay time searching for the p90x workout schedule it on the net. It’s there in the hand of the hand.

I have included a photo of me 2 weeks into the insanity workout schedule program to compare with when I started so you can see the difference. Just seeing these amazing results after such a short time has given me the incentive and motivation to carry on and push even harder.

 

Other than the fleur-de-lis on the top, I like it. great choice on the wood. looks very well put together.

Is there a secret compartment where you can hide your dope?