Always time for wood play

Working on two major projects simultaneously, I didn’t have time to play around. So, I made time.

I’m in the middle of a repair and refinish job of an antique cherry end table I told you about a few weeks ago. And while I had thought I could start a cherry slab table last summer, it got delayed (I blame the pandemic) and I’m finally getting around to it at the same time. The Hamler shop is humming.

But all work and no play makes A.J. a dull boy, so when I was asked to build a small Nerf-gun shooting gallery for a local charity event, of course I said yes.

It’s just a basic box with narrow shelves, on which eight targets are balanced. Blasting them with the Nerf gun topples them down behind the shelves and into the bottom of the box. Very simple, but a lot of fun. I had those two other big projects I needed to get back to – one of which I’d put off for nearly two years – but even though the fun project was a minor effort, I still wanted to do it right.

Of course, that absolutely demanded a few hours of play-testing to be sure it worked just right. And when Sally came down to the shop to check my progress on those two table projects, well, she had to join in the testing.

We both knew the other two projects took precedence, but we selflessly continued our testing until satisfied that the shooting gallery was done to perfection – which took pretty much the rest of the afternoon.