Next to Me

Hi all, so My baby girl was due on the 14th of January. I decided to make the next to me she would (and is) spending her first six months sleeping in. I decided on walnut and maple for the frame and ash for the bars and slats. I sourced a mattress online that was eco friendly and easy to get sheets etc for and based the measurements off that. I then measured from the floor to the top of our mattress and used those measurements for the height. Frame had to slide under the bed to make sure that she would be as close to our mattress as possible and there was no way she could slip down between the next to me and our bed. I decided on a Z frame for this purpose and then took to Fusion 360.

I have an established workshop out the back. I used Makita MLT 100 table saw. Bosch professional sabre saw. Hand chisels, no. 7. no 4 no. 51/2 hand planes. Triton thicknesser and evolution mitre saw. the wood i used was dark walnut and white maple for the frame, this i bought from a local wood supplier, and spalted Ash. this was local from my father in law. i milled this on the table saw myself which was an arduous process but well worth it. I created a cut sheet from the fusion 360 file and used an angle finder, speed square vernier calipers etc to mark out mortice and tenons, and half lap joints. There is no hardware used in this, the tennons are wedged and glued and there are some brass dowels in the halflaps but these could just as easy be wood dowels. the brass is for aesthetics more than structure

I searched for a next to me mattress that i would base this design on and i came up with the The Little Green Sheep Natural Crib Mattress to fit Next to Me Bedside Crib - 50x83cm. I then measured from the floor to the top of the mattress of our bed. I then decided on what wood i wanted to use and decided on a Z frame in order to keep stability and also allow the crib to go under our bed and make sure the next to me fit right in beside our own mattress. this ensures there is no gap for the baby to slip between the bed and the Next-to-me.

I designed this on Fusion 360 and created a blueprint and cut list. I decided on maple and walnut for the wood and used brass dowels to pin the half lap joints.

I used the cut list instructions to cut the wood to the rough dimensions and then used the thicknesser to square all the cuts up. The ash I used came from two half logs that my father in law had cut on his farm and had left out to dry in the elements giving a lovely spalting to it. I milled this using a jointing jig for the thicknesser and then cut the slats out of it on the table-saw.

The next step was to cut the half-laps and mortice and tenons into the maple and walnut and to roughly assemble the frame. I used an angle finder, steel rules and a t-square to measure, mark and cut all of these out. I used the mitre jig on the table-saw to cut out the half laps and cleaned all the cuts up with a good sharp chisel. likewise i used the mitre jig on the tablesaw to cut the tennons and cleaned these up with chisels. The mortices were gutted out with a pillar drill and cleaned out with chisels. this was not a straight forward process with lots of offering the mortices to the tenons and shaving more off as required. I also used a router to cut the blind mortices for the upright ash bars. The slats for the mattress sat into two slots on either side of the base with spacers between them made from the off-cuts of the slats themselves. These are all made from ash for the durability, aesthetics and the flexibility and bounce of the ash.

Each piece was sanded to 360 grit before gluing and assembly. Maple tenons were wedged with walnut and walnut tenons with maple. the half laps and blind mortices were pinned with brass dowels and superglue. I used titeboond 3 wood glue for all wood assembly. I finished with 4 coats of pure boiled linseed oil. she has been sleeping in it since her birth and is now 12 weeks old.