This was a fun project. My wife and I were expecting our second child, and my shop was pretty well setup to do something major. I say major because this project involved lots of classic joinery, with no mechanical fasteners (except for how the crib sits on the pedestals.)
My only regret about this project is that I didn't have my shop setup to make this for our daughter when she was born. I'd have loved to make her something and then hand it down to her brother. Instead, I made her a wonderful Noah's Ark Toy. She has started to have an interest in woodworking and we will make something together.
The cradle was from a plan that I found online. I wanted to make a crib, but finding crib hardware in Canada is impossible. I came across the cradle plan on furnitureplans.com. It's all mortise and tenon joinery.
I made the crib from red oak. I had honed my skills with my jointer, planer, tablesaw and bandsaw on my daughters Noah's Ark project. I was ready for this. It's finished with three coats of amber shellac and resides in our sitting room upstairs. My son was not a sleeper. He slept about 45 minutes out of every 2 hours for the first 9 months of his life, and thus didn't spend much time in this cradle. It was still fun to make and maybe it will be handed down to grandchildren.
Here is the link to the photo of the construction at picasaweb. Cradle Project.
