While I was building a bookcase for our son's third Christmas, I had a lot of "free time" out in the shop while I was waiting for glue to dry. So, I decided to build him another gift, one that a three year old might appreciate a little more than a bookcase. I decided to build him a wooden toy barn to store is toy farm and construction equipment in. And, I figured that I might as well build him a barn that he would reconize. So, I built a 1/12 scale model of the Rolling "M" Workshop!
The barn is entirely made of "scrap stock" left-over from previous projects. I made an attempt at keeping everything in preportion (1 inch = 1 scale foot), right down to the minature sliding doors and minature cupola on the roof. The frame is made of 1/2" x 1/2" pine strips held together by 18ga. brads. The siding and roof are 1/4" luan plywood glued onto the frame. The trim is 1/2" wide 1/16" think strips of pine. The finish is the same white and red Olympic solid color stain that we used on the real barn. Each side of the roof is hinged to allow access to the interrior. To allow for the roof openings, I used rafters and a ridge beam, instead of trusses like the full size barn.
This project has been a lot of fun to build and I think our son will have just as much fun playing with it!
Here are some snapshots of the barn under construction:
