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Assembly of the Nanny Rocker will be completed today. I start out by sanding all the parts for the cradle end of the rocker and re installing them with glue and screws as I go. Before I can reassemble the seat back I have to drive the screws into the rear cradle rails and plug the holes. The spindles in the seat back would be in the way otherwise.
 Once that is all back together it it time to turn my attention to attaching the final part; the rockers. These are held onto the ends of the legs with dowels and screws, so we have to locate where exactly the dowels will need to penetrate into the tops of the rockers. This is most easily done with the help of these little hat shaped devices called dowel centers. They slip up into the dowel holes in the ends of the legs, then I position the rockers under the legs and tap with a mallet from above. The little points in the dowel centers mark the exact center of the hole I need to drill.
 Drilling rockers is a bit tricky because the holes need to be perpendicular to the flat spot where the leg sits, but the rocker itself is one long curve, so it won't sit steady. I get around that by using my largest hand screw clamp. I lay the clamp on the drill press table, adjust it's width to match that of the rocker, then slide the rocker in and level the flat spot with the top of the clamp. Being obsessive compulsive I use a small ruler to measure the distance so I get it just right, but most folks would probably just eyeball it and be fine. Then it's just a matter of getting the spur of the Forstner bit in the dimple left by the dowel center and I'm ready to drill a perfectly placed, flat bottomed hole to receive the dowel that will protrude from the end of the leg.
 Next the rockers go to the router table to have their edges rounded over. But, not everything can be rounded; the points where the legs contact the rockers need to be left square, so I have to watch my lay-out marks and pull the rocker away from the bit at those points, skip to the other side and restart the cut. The rockers are then thoroughly sanded and the dowel attachments are made, and we're ready to go back to the assembly room.
 I used white oak for the dowel pins that will attach the rockers to the legs because white oak is a really tough wood. This piece of furniture will be shipped with the rockers removed to get it into a smaller crate, so I glue the dowel pins into the holes in the legs, but not in the rockers. Flat head wood screws are inserted from the inside faces of the rockers, through the dowels holding the rocker in place. To make the Nanny Rocker ready for use, all that will need to be done is to slide the rockers onto the dowel ends and insert the 4 screws.
 And that does it. Construction is complete. The next step is to begin finish sanding.
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