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Birdhouses and feeders are great projects to build that are quick, easy and make great Christmas gifts for that birdwatcher on your list. They are also great projects to make with children. I plan on making one with my daughter when she is old enough. A few weeks ago I made this one (early when the family was still asleep). I used this plan The Chalet by Real Bird Homes. There is also a video on YouTube that shows how to build it. I like this video because it's just a regular guy out in his shop. I particularly like how he burns his way through the entrance hole with a very dull hole saw. You won't see that on any of the woodworking shows.

Here are the pieces cut to size. I used the cutoffs from the 45 degree cuts to make the diamond shaped addition to the front. As I understand it, the double thickness at the entrance hole helps to deter predators. I'm not sure about that but I think it looks nice.

With glue and brads I attached the piece to the front. I clamped it to my drill press, with a backer board, and drilled the entrance hole with a 1 3/4" Forstner bit (look no burn marks).

This house has several nice design features. There are drainage holes in the bottom, vents up under the eaves and a side cleanout. Here I used two 6d galvanized finished nails to act as hinges for the side cleanout.

On the back side, I used a deck screw which is all that is needed to hold it in. All other sides are glued and nailed with brads.

...and here's the completed birdhouse ready for finishing. Some birds (like bluebirds) are very picky about where they nest and will not take up residence in a house that is finished with certain types of paints or stains. A good resource on birds and birdhouse plans can be found here, 50Birds. Make it fun.
DSR

Hey Little Buddy!

Last April my wife Susan and I were into Wal-Mart getting ready to check out. Up front near the registers they had hauled out three skids of various space heaters that they were trying to get rid of. The price was right, they were all between five and seven dollars. Most were electric but there were a few propane heaters. One was the Little Buddy heater. I was looking it over and  Susan thought that it might be a good little heater for my shop. I wasn't so sure. I said, " I don't like the idea of constantly having to buy the 1 pound cylinders to run it". You only get 5.5 hours of heat from one cylinder. There was another guy there, grabbing several heaters, who overheard me and said that he was pretty sure that you could buy an adapter kit to run it off a 20 pound cylinder. So, for five bucks I said why not, it retails on Amazon for $64.99 . When I got home I did some online research but could not find an adapter kit for the Little Buddy. However, I did find a refill adapter for $15.72 on Amazon. This was even better because it was really designed  to run off the one pounders. So now, when I run out of propane, I take off the cylinder, refill it from a 20 pounder screw it back on the heater and I'm up and running again in about 5 minutes, sweet. As far as performance, this little heater throws off some serious heat. I haven't used it in my shop but where it has become very useful is for camping. We have an old pop-up and it has a small furnace but it's a pain to fire up and really doesn't put out as much heat as it should. Now on those cool mornings I just fire the Little Buddy and it takes the chill off in no time and it takes up very little space. 

As far as my shop goes, I added this propane heater, also made by Mr. Heater. I found it at VIP Auto for only $60.00. At first I couldn't figure out why it was so cheap. It retails on Amazon for $193.00. However, as I discovered, this is an older discontinued version that has the old style propane connection. No worries though because all of the new tanks are backwards compatible to the older style.  It puts out between 50,000 and 85,000 btu and works great. Last year I froze my butt off trying to heat my shop with a kerosene space heater. This unit gets the shop up to temperature in less than 10 minutes. One downside is that it is loud. Of course, when you heat a shop only when you are in it, you create huge swings in temperature and humidity. Combine that with cast iron tools and you get.....rust. Unfortunately , I am not ready to add full time heating to my shop so I have a bunch of scotch brite pads and a can of butcher's wax.

DSR

The Call of the Cull

I  go to Home Depot two to three times a week. It's close to my work and I can often pop in on my lunch break. I generally prefer Home Depot to Lowes for several reasons. Oddly enough, I like Home Depot because it's dirtier and messier than Lowes (says a lot about me doesn't it?). Lowes is always neat and clean. It's like a home and garden "boutique". I sometimes feel like I'm under-dressed in there. 

Another BIG reason I like Home Depot over Lowes is because they have a cull bin. The Lowes that I go to do not. Over the years I have gotten some pretty good stuff out of there, dirt cheap. Some of it has become part of projects in my home. Good sized sheets of white faced peg board, 1/4" oak plywood, wide pine boards, melamine covered particle board (that stuff comes in handy) are just some of the good finds.  I bought 52 of the 4' 2x4s (.51 cents each) that are going into knee walls above my garage.....someday. At 8' long those 2x4s are useless but at 4' many of them are good enough for my purposes. I have to admit I buy some of this stuff without a clear idea of what I'm going to use it for. That's a bad habit when you have limited storage space. I also have noticed that the deals aren't quite as good as they used to be. Sometimes they have orange ($4.01) painted on the ends of 4' lengths of firewood. You never know. Just the same, no matter why I am into Home Depot or what I'm buying, I always check out the cull bin. I'm like Ulysses being drawn to the Sirens. I just can't resist the call of the cull.

dsr