EASEL

We all want the best for our children, even when their creative endeavours seem to overtake every surface in the house. How do you know when it’s gone too far? Well, when you start writing cheques with a Day-glo pen or get the cold shoulder for accidentally sitting on your finger-painted portrait, it’s time to bring some of your own skills into the act. To help out, we’ve designed an easel to help focus your kids’ expressive energy. It features a dry-marker board on one side and a corkboard on the other.

1 Use a router and edge guide to cut the mortises in the easel legs. Then, readjust the bit depth and rout the panel grooves. Use a table saw to cut the tenons on the rails.

2 Cut 6 mm plywood to size for the easel panels. Cut the 3 mm-thick cork a few centimetres oversize, and apply spray adhesive to secure it to one panel.

3 Press the cork in place and trim excess with a utility knife. For the white marker board, we bought a framed board from a home centre and removed the frame.

4 Bore pilot holes for the 6 mm threaded inserts in the outer edge of each leg. Use a 6 mm Allen wrench to drive the inserts into the holes until they’re flush.

5 Bore screw holes for attaching the trays. We used an angled block as a guide for accurate hole position and angle. Rout recesses in the trays and secure them to the frames.

6 Support the easel frames so they lie flat, and install the hinges at the frame tops. Then, cut the brackets to size, bore holes for the knobs and install the brackets.