Today, I made the box, and cut the lid from the base as shown in the photo above. With the blade set to a height just less than the thickness of the sides, I leave a bit to trim with the knife, actually separating the two parts after they are removed from the saw. Tomorrow I will put a piece of veneer on the top, add some mechanical fasteners to the corners for strength, sand and install the hardware. We now have 6 making days left until Christmas.

If you think about it, with all the advances in knowledge that have taken place over the years a huge number of the "correct" answers upon which children have been tested have later been proven wrong. Oops! But what if we were to look for "creative problem solving" in our assessment of student performance, instead?