105 – Oh For Keepsake!
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Its that time of year again: HOLIDAY PROJECT TIME! So this year, I decided to make a few little keepsake boxes, thanks to some advice from The Great WOODini. I also took inspiration from a box Nicole keeps on her nightstand and developed a new design that is much more practical for the average woodworker to make. The boxes feature a secret locking pin. Once removed, the lid slides off on a sliding dovetail. And as always with these holiday gift projects, you can modify them by trying different sizes, shapes, and wood species to make your own one-of-a-kind box. And since they are so easy to make, its no problem batching out a bunch of them in a single weekend. If you decide to make some, please send me pics of your variations.
Topics Covered:
- Creating sliding dovetails
- Using a dowel-centering pin to locate holes
- Cutting a recess with a pattern bit
- Sanding end-grain
And here are a few pictures of the final boxes:


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Circle Templates – $32.99 This template set has been incredibly useful for numerous projects including these keepsake boxes and the Contemporary Clock Project from last year. |
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GRR-Ripper™ Adjustable Push Block – $59.99 The GRR-Ripper is the fancy push block you see me using in this video. Incredibly useful and gives you ultimate control of the workpiece! |
Holiday Projects on the Brain
I’ve been spending the last few days contemplating some small and relatively simple projects for the holidays. One thing I knew I wanted to make this year was some kind of keepsake box. No hardware, no metal, but I want the box to still “lock” in some way. So here’s what I came up with after a day in the shop. This is still a working prototype and I will probably create a couple different versions.

As you can see, there’s a secret peg lock. Once you find it and lift it out, the lid slides off on a sliding dovetail revealing the contents. Believe it or not, I made this in just a few hours in the shop. So this is a very quick project that would be perfect for the holidays. Think I should do a full episode on it?

















