Hey, everyone! Welcome back!

 This week, as I said on my last post, I worked on the box for my ukulele. I found out there's a lot more involved in making it than just putting six pieces of wood together. To build the box, I started with a board of plywood, and drew each part in with a pencil. Using a box-cutting knife, I traced the lines so it would be easier to cut. Then I cut the wood with a regular small saw you can get at any hardware store. After much thinking, I realized the structure needed to be much stronger than I thought. There is the possibility of the wood collapsing into the middle of the box, if it isn't strong enough. So, I cut another two pieces of wood in kind of a "U" shape, to make the structure stronger, as shown in the picture. Then, I realized the other two sides needed support as well, specially the side that will hold the neck of the ukulele. So, I made small triangular pieces to make it stronger as well, as shown in the second picture (the drill bits on top of the wood are to provide some weight so that it helps the glue set better). I glued everything using standard wood glue, lots of it. To make the hole on the top, I used a drill to make various holes around the circumference of the circle, and then I cut the parts that were still connected with the box cutting knife. To get rid of splinters and to make everything smoother, I used this small rock that you put in the drill, specially used for that. Then I glued the top on the structure and waited for it to dry. The third picture shows what it looks like right now. This coming week I plan to work on the neck of the ukulele. Thanks for reading!

Hey everybody! 

Welcome back! Thanks for taking the time to read my blog again. This post is to update you on what I did this week concerning my project. This week, I went out to the hardware store and bought all the materials, including hooks, wall hangers, a wood board, a wooden stick, wood glue, nylon string, toothpicks and wood staining. I looked for cheap but good quality materials, because after all this project is about building my instrument at the lowest cost possible. I also bought materials that were made to do one thing, but in my project they will be used for something else. For example, I bought large picture hangers to use it to tie the strings to the ukulele. It's all about perspective! And since this is supposed to be a cheap project, I suppose I should tell you how much all of it cost. After doing all the math, I got a total cost of $15,10! I looked up on the guitar center website and the cheapest soprano ukulele (which is the size I'm making) cost $40! So I think I can count the "lowest cost possible" part of my project a success. This week I plan to put together the acoustic box at least, and look up the tuning for a soprano ukulele, meaning what notes I should get when I play the strings. Until next week!

Lorena