Scarf/mitten/hat Rack - Daughter's 1st Woodworking Build

My daughter is home-schooled, so when she expresses an interest in something I tend to go a little overboard.

: D

About six months ago she mentioned that she was interested in woodworking. I was fortunate when I was younger to receive training in drafting and woodworking, so I was pretty excited about her new interest. I still dabble a bit, but have loads to learn, so Yay! we can learn loads together!

I built a workshop for us. I built a pristine(for now), tiny woodworker's workshop within my friend's not-so-pristine(for now), large shop. (I'll do an Instructable on the whole process in a few weeks.)

This scarf/hat/mitten rack is our first project together in the shop.

Awwww.

We wanted a mixed-medium piece, so decided on red oak, soft maple, copper and whatever clothespins are made out of. : D

We had long pieces of copper pipe that were nice and straight, so cut 7 of those to just under 7" each.

Then we used 2-3 grades of steel wool to reveal some of their inner glory.

After about 3 minutes of that we put on our dust masks.

It took us about an hour to do all 7.

We then cut six hat pegs out of the soft maple. It is a nice, tan color.

We cut them into equal lengths of 8" and sanded. We later changed them into descending lengths for visual interest.

(I think that is "The Year Without a Santa Claus" playing on the laptop...

I'm Mister Green Christmas

I'm Mister Sun

I'm Mister Heat Blister

I'm Mister Hundred and One

They call me Heat Miser,

What ever I touch Starts to melt in my clutch

I'm too much!)

She really enjoyed the hand-sawing.

Lucky girl. Wish I had a Gyokucho Razor Ryoba Saw when I was 15.

: D

We then pre-drilled the holes into the pegs and where they would go onto the maple, added some glue and drove some nice hardened steel flooring nails through it all. I really like them for their decorative look.

I attached a piece of pine onto the back for stability and as a spacer against the surface I'd later be attaching this to.(either a wall or preferably a door) It also served as a nice clamp jig!

After that was dry is when we changed the lengths of the hat pegs, and sanded the edges smooth.

We did some math(woo hoo!) to figure out the exact spacing of the copper pipes.

We lined those up with the same grade as the peg tops.

I believe we used a 5/8 forstner bit; it was a hair larger diameter than the copper pipes.

I showed her how to clamp down everything, use a backer board and to use the drill press safely and with confidence.

This is my friend's drill press out in his shop, so we got to just blow the sawdust all over.

I later got in trouble and had to clean it up.

"I was just about to go vacuum all of the sawdust out of your nuts and bolts."

Boy, my new Shop Vac sure is strong.

Oops..

: D

We wrapped one edge of the pipes once around with masking tape and fitted them in snugly with a rubber mallet.

She decided the clothes pins/mitten holders looked best lined up with the hat pegs. Any more than 6 and it would just get too crowded in there. We glued them down and went up to make and eat dinner.

I wanted to be able to hang the rack over the door to utilize the space.

I had a stash of over-the-door hangers from some mirrors.

I removed some clips from the hangers so that they would lie flush with the backer board, and give me a second screw hole.

We love how it came out!

This puts a small dent in our ridiculous amount of hats/scarves/ mittens.

I think we will make 2 more of these. I don't really like to do anything twice, so we'll come up with a slight variation in materials to achieve the same goal.