Pat Murphy, owner of Home Environments in Spokane, Wash., took his woodworking hobby to the next level when he drew his niece's name for a Christmas gift exchange. She was expecting her first baby, and as Murphy pondered gift ideas, he recalled a 20-year-old teak hot tub that he had just gotten and transformed it into a cradle for his niece.
"All the hot tubs we get back are ones we sold 20 or 30 years ago, so they are just the best possible material you can get as far as redwood and teak and cedar," says Murphy. "It's all clear, vertical-grain stuff. You can't find that kind of wood hardly anymore. So it's really nice to work with and easy to tool, and you can make just about anything. It's pretty forgiving for a rookie like myself."
Murphy says his father has a 30-year-old tub at his house that's not holding water anymore. "I told him, 'You better be looking over your shoulder because one of these days, that's going to be gone. It's going to be in my shop.'"