Learning Blocks

Submitted to Community Chat

I love creating things for other people. Veterans, family, and friends are a big target of my work. The principal at my Wife's school knows all he has to do is hint.

My Granddaughter is about 17 months old. Time to start on the PhD (piled higher and deeper). So, this is actually the project times four. The tray holds forty-nine blocks in a 7 x 7 grid with just enough slop to get them out without frustration. Each block, about 1 1/4" x 1 1/4" x 1 1/4" has six sides. That is 294 facings in one set. So, there are upper case and lower case letters, punctuation marks, 0-9, and math operatives in this mess along with some spaces. This gives you the ability to spell out a lot of words as well as sentences. Math is not a problem with this set.

The blocks were first sealed with three coats of polyurethane with sandings between each coat for smoothness. I hate end grain. Then each block was hand stenciled in a predetermined, logical sequence. Then the real fun. Each item was hand painted (is still being hand painted) with acrylic paint. Then another two or more coats of polyurethane with buff sandings to maintain smoothness while sealing the blocks.

Why four sets? One for Granddaughter’s house, one for our house, one for the other Grandmother’s house, one for the next door neighbor’s three children.

TIRED OF PAINTING FACINGS AT THIS POINT. I can do about forty-nine facings a day and there are 49 x 6 x 4. More than 50% complete at this point.

Why the trays? Kind of keeps the set together. If you do not have some way to account for the total after play I assume they will drift.

Thanks,

Rex