After finally getting a place to do some woodworking, I wanted to make some small piece of furniture as a test to myself of what I was able to make. One of the things I wish I had was a footrest to our old recliner at the cabin, and as it was quite simple in its design, I thought it was a nice thing to make. I only used hand tools for this project, except for the sewing machine for the pillow.

The design is my own. I started by drawing the outline of the side of it on a piece of cardboard from a pizza box. You use what you have, right? The legs were cut with a panel saw, and I used a Jack plane to smoth the cut

I made mortise and tenon joints for all joints. As I had to make 8 in totalt, I got better during the process. I used a marking gaugue to mark both the mortises and tenons.

My grandfather’s old router plane came on handy to adjust the tenons. He died in 1985, but my father had some of his tools which I could use.

I was watching a lot of Paul Sellers videos to learn a trick or two making the mortises and tenons. The first ones were good enough, but I got a lot better on the last ones.

I rounded of the corners with a saw file and the edges with a Stanley 4 and spoke shaves. I used the spoke shaves to make the round profile of the long sides as well. The Stanley 151 is a new one, and it is easy to adjust, but my grandfather’s old 51 was sharper and more accurate, so I used his for the finish. It is still super sharp from his sharpening as nobody has used it since he died. I very much enjoyed including his tools in this project. I finished off with a lot of sanding from 120 up to 320 grit.

I used dark brown wood dye and water based half blank floor varnish on top of that. Three layers with 320 grit sandpaper after the first and 600 grit after the second.

Here are pictures before and after applying the wood dye:

I had bought some fabric made for use on furniture, and some foam from a boat shop meant to sit on. I also added some extra padding to better hold the shape around the edges etc.

My wife’s sewing machine came on handy, and she only helped me setting it up. I did the rest myself which I am proud of as I haven’t done a lot sewing in my life. Here is the pillow without the padding as that was added later:

I am quite happy with the result as I think it fits our old recliner and as it actually was quite comfortable. Now I need to figure out what to make next…