Many people begin building furniture when they realize how expensive it is to buy new furniture. With all the do it yourself plans on the internet, there’s not a lot to building your own furniture. All it takes is a quick search for a plan on your desired build, a quick trip to the hardware store, and possessing the right tools. The cutting, the screwing, the construction and assembly doesn’t take much time at all. For example, one could build what would seem like an intricate king size bed in as little as 12 hours. With the help of another person, this particular build could be built in half the time. A table, however, would only take a few hours to construct and assemble. Common tools that are needed in many do it yourself builds, that most people don’t have, are table horses. Table horses help prop up long pieces of wood that are being cut, and are also used to place various pieces that need sanding on.

A great alternative to table horses are cheap moving boxes. My house, for instance, is full of cheap moving boxes because we just moved. So I use these for all my wood working projects. With the help of these stand ins, I have been able to build many different pieces of furniture that are now being used daily in my house.

I sleep in the bed I built. I eat food at the table I built. I store books in the bookshelves I built. And all these builds have been made for a fraction of the cost. Thousands of dollars have been saved because a few personal hours have been valuably spent constructing these pieces of furniture.

Although the build and the construction is fun, the sanding and staining is no fun at all. Certain wood has to be sanded to specific standards in order to properly take the stain that will be applied. This is a very tedious and lengthy process. A great idea would be having a partner that you could count on to sand and stain after you have constructed the piece. Some people, however, will sand all the wood before they even begin construction.

This makes the staining process a breeze because you don’t have to worry about a nook or corner or crevasse not taking the stain the way the rest of the piece takes it due to improper sanding techniques.