Toy parking garage for little boy

You will need:

1. Offcuts of 12mm supawood
2. 25mm diameter dowel
3. 12mm dowels
4. Drill/Driver and assorted drill bits and screw
5. 12mm spade bit
6. Wood glue
7. Nylon cord
8. Rust-Oleum 2X white spray paint
9. Rust-Oleum Chalkboard spray
10. 220-grit sandpaper
11. Prominent Paints clear acrylic sealer
12. Small paintbrush

Here’s how:

Step 1

Cut some 12mm supawood to the size that you want and the shape of the garage. Use our finished pic above as a guideline for the overall shapes. You will need a top, bottom, large and small ramp, as well as some 25mm diameter dowels (or pine curtain rod).

Step 2

Cut the dowels to approximately 150cm in length – this will provide a nice height for most toy cars. It’s also a good idea to paint the dowels before you glue them in place with wood glue. We used white Rust-Oleum 2X spray paint.

GOOD TO KNOW
We should have also painted the supawood sections at the same time – it’s far easier to spray before you assemble everything. We use Rust-Oleum Chalkboard spray to allow a child to draw his own parking areas or designs onto the garage with chalk. Remember to sand the edges of supawood with 220-grit sandpaper before you paint. It helps to make the supawood less absorbent and you use less paint.

Step 3

Once the posts are in you can glue the ramp in place. Cut an angle at both ends so that the ramp buts against the top board and sits flush against the bottom board.

Step 4

Use a 12mm spade bit in your drill/driver to create a hole to mount the 12mm dowels around the edge of the top. You also need to drill a 6mm hole in each drill bit to insert the nylon cord.

Step 5

Use wood glue to secure the dowels in the holes that you have drilled in the top board. Make sure that the holes drilled through the dowels all face in the right direction for threading through the nylon cord.

This is what you parking garage should look like at this stage. Of course, if you have followed my advise above it will already be painted, in which case you can miss out the next step.

Step 6

Cover the posts with masking tape and then use Rust-Oleum Chalkboard spray to cover all the supawood. It gives a nice matt finish and a child can use chalk to draw his own designs onto the garage. Spray outdoors or in a well-ventilated room and be sure to put down newspaper or a drop cloth.

Step 7

Thread the nylon cord through the drilled holes in the dowel posts and tie off at both ends. To finish off, print out parking signs, etc from the Internet. Use clear acrylic sealer – or mod podge – and apply a thick layer where you want to place pictures. Cut out the pictures and place them on top of this layer and smooth down. Go over the top of the picture with more sealer and then allow to dry.

Strips of white paper were stuck down and given a coat of acrylic sealer to make the parking bays, and I thought it would be nice to add a realistic touch with some trees. I used batting – rolled into balls – sprayed with Rust-Oleum spray paint and stuck onto toothpicks to make the trees. Drill a small hole and glue in place.

Here are some close ups of the garage. The entire project was given two coats of additional sealer, but you can leave it as a chalkboard finish and let your son draw his own ideas.