Finished product. I'm not the biggest fan of MCM, but I think it turned out alright. More importantly, I think they'll enjoy it.

This has some odd measurements and angles, so I took the time to make shop drawings. It stops me (usually) from making stuff up as I go, then finding out that I made more work for myself down the road.

I started with about 20 bdft. of cherry

I ran it through the planer on a jointing sled, using hot glue and shims. This will give one flat face. Then I can flip it and run the other side.

I only have a small jointer, and these boards are too long to easily get a straight edge on, so I had to break out the hand plane to finish it up.

Biscuits will minimize the cleaning up of the panels after glue up

A little work with a plane and card scraper and they're ready to move on to the next step. 

My regular crosscut sled isn't wide enough, so I made one using 1/8" hardboard and some scrap ply. I wasn't sure how the hardboard would do, but it worked fine. 

Trying to line up cuts with a bevel can be a little tricky. I made a mark that is 6" from the cut. This made it easier to hit the lengths that I wanted more accurately. This came in especially useful when I cut the bottom to length, I needed to be pretty exact on that.

The top and both sides are cut. Rather than cut the bottom now, and hope all my angles and measurements are exact, I'll cut the joinery on the top and sides, then fit the bottom to match it.

I don't have a domino, and I wanted more than biscuits in the joints, so I came up with an idea using the biscuit jointer. I covered the no stick pads with masking tape. 

Then I adjusted the fence to 15° and the right distance. Than I turned on the tool and slid it across the board.

It worked fine. I backed the fence enough to get a 1/4" slot, and did it again. I could have made a jig to hold the router, but I think this was easier.

It worked fine for the ends of the boards. I tried it on the face, and it didn't work as well. I should have gone ahead and used the router.

I milled some scrap to 1/4" then cut them into to strips. These will be the splines to go in the grooves of the joints. I crosscut them so the grain will go across the joint, adding strength.

I milled the groove for the center piece on the top and bottom before I mark the final bottom width. I also cut the center to set back from the edges, and milled the tongue to fit in the grooves.

I cut blocks for the sides, to keep them at the right angle. With the center piece in, I could then mark the length I needed for the bottom.

Back to the cut-off sled to cut it to length. Then I cut the joinery for the bottom ends. It went together pretty nicely on the first dry fit.

I gave the insides a coat of dewaxed shellac before the final sanding, to keep the cherry from getting blotchy, which it can do.

I used hide glue for this to give myself some extra time.

After the glue dried, I cleaned up the ends with a belt sander. I give it a small roundover on the edges. Then shellac and final sanding/scraping, and the top is ready for finish.

For the base, I cut the mortises for the cross pieces on the router table while the pieces are still square.

I want to join the leg assembly with a half-laps. It's an odd angle, so I use an angle gauge, knife, and hand saw to set the line of the shoulder.

Then I hog off the bulk with a router.

Clean it up with a chisel

After the half-laps on the legs are cut, they get a taper.

I cut the center angle at the band saw, then glued up the leg assembly.

I trimmed the excess off the lap joints by hand. I then ran it through the table saw to get the angle right on the feet. 

The lower frame gets glued up.

The top is held to the base with table clips and the finish is just wiping poly, finished with paste wax.

The one reservation they had about cherry, was that they wanted it darker, sooner. Cherry will get darker with age, but they didn't want to wait so long. The wedding isn't for a few weeks, so until then, it will stay in a sunny window, and maybe even spend a couple of afternoons outside in direct sun. That should get it a few shades darker. They'll just have to be a little patient for the rest.

Sorry about the huge album. Thanks for looking.