Something Blue, Borrowed, Old, and New

Found on the curb.  This one is a little out there but I'm going to use it for my gramophone.

Cleaned it up a bit

Painted in some super bright blue chalk paint

Sanded, clear coat of wax followed by a dark coat of wax (24 hours in between each coat)

And a new knob

Good as new, before and after picture

In it's new home.  I like that it has storage underneath for my records.  For sure is fancier than having them sit on my fireplace.

B's Desk

For Christmas, I wanted to make my son a desk where he can study and do his school work.  He's in kindergarten this year and surprisingly they do bring a lot of work home.  He has been asking to have a desk in mom's office so....I drew up some designs.  Granted, nothing ever turns out the way that I plan but it's good to go in with some sort of idea. (not sure why they are sideways...)

We stopped by Lowe's to pick up some lumber.  B got to pick most of his own stuff out.  I also found that a near by Sutherlands, sold a different brand of chalk paint so I think I'll try it out.  Here's the color he picked out.

Let me tell you, I had every intention of working on this thing and with the holiday craziness it didn't appear it would get done in time.  My dad surprised me with working on it this weekend.  It's off to a great start and he did such an amazing job.

Changed our minds on the top.  Decided to give it a 1/2" overhang on either side of the desk so we cut it 23" long.

Then, routed the sides for both the top back piece and the main lid (not shown in picture).

Attached the top back piece with screws and used wooden buttons to cover up the screw holes.  How cute!!

Tonight, we'll be working on hinges and attaching the legs.  Need to do some sort of support structure underneath the desk.  Benton picked out what look like stair spindles for the legs and I have my doubts on how well they will hold the desk up, it's pretty hefty. Then I'll do some light sanding and on a mad dash to get it stained/painted/poly tomorrow!

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Alright, the legs aren't going to work.  I'm going to keep these on for now but they are definitely getting replaced after Christmas time... They will be shorter and square....the top just doesn't match the bottom.  Also, just a forewarning, the paint job may look a little crazy but I'm not done yet.

All built

After doing a light 220 grit sand, I went ahead and taped off where I was going to stain.

In dark walnut of course...

Removed the tape and painted in the new brand of chalk paint.  Overall, I liked the coverage but the paint seemed really thick.  Not sure if it had been sitting on the shelf for a while or that's just how it is.  I may have to add a little water when using it on the next pair of legs.

Yes it's pretty blue right now...

On the agenda tomorrow is polyurethane,  Some sanding on the chalk paint and some clear and dark wax.  Apart from the legs, isn't it just darling?!?

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Okay, finally back to the desk.  So I scrapped the legs and picked up some 2x2's from Lowes to use instead.  I did a light sand on the top of the desk because I'll be putting another layer of polyurethane...I used a satin finish last time and didn't like how it looked so I'm going gloss this time around.  Since this was custom made in my dad's workshop, we branded it...turned out pretty cool.

I messed around with layer the chalk paint with 2 different blues, I wish I would have done this to the top part of the desk too but it was fun experimenting with it at least.

Then did my coat of polyurethane with clear and dark wax on the new bottom legs (which are about 6" shorter than the original legs and made a huge difference).

After it dries I'll take a picture of it since it will be going in our now "shared" office.  Hopefully school work will be a little cooler with this new desk.

Stairs, can't get the paint off to stain? No problem...

I tried pretty much everything to get this paint off the back of the stairs...I mean there are layers upon layers of paint!  I could have tore everything out and replaced the boards, which I still may end up doing someday but I for sure couldn't continue to look at this.

So, I did a similar project in the past for my front door, faux staining it is.

The first steps were pretty similar, sand it down to make it as smooth as possible then it's painted this ugly orange color, you can refer to my other post for the name of this paint to view the brand of paint click here.

After 2 coats of the orange were dry I did a coat of the Minwax gel stain.

Let that dry for a few days and put on another coat of gel stain in the hopes of making it appear darker.  Then I put on one coat of polyurethane that I used when I redid my wood floors.  Lastly, I repainted the white trim.

And here's the before and after.  Not perfect, but it will do for now.

Dream Catchers

For Christmas, I made a couple of dream catchers inspired by a photo I saw on Pinterest, DIY Crafts Now.  I got all my supplies at Michaels.  They have these metal rings for a few bucks (comes in a pack of 3) and then I just grabbed some beads, feathers, string and some suede ribbon.

So you take your stings and beads (if you want them) and make a series of tied loops on the outer ring and pretty much just keep weaving until you get to the middle.  You have to pull the string pretty tight.  Then I attached my string of beads, that hold the feathers, on to the bottom of the ring.  Then you wrap the outer part of the ring with string or on one I used suede.  Last step is adding the feathers and the hanging piece at the top.

There were of course some trial and errors haha.

Another, lots of feathers

I think they're lovely

Colonial End Table

Good thing he never looks on here, I can show you this weeks project for Jared's Christmas present.  He's a history buff so I'm making him an end table to go with his American Flag Coffee Table.  This table will have 13 stars, not really any room for the stripes since it's smaller...but hopefully people will get the reference.  I also read a little bit about this flag, this site I was looking at has a timeline of all the flags from the United States so I thought it was pretty cool and that I would share it with you US Flag TImeline.

So here's some pictures.  Here's what I started out with.

Beginning stages of putting it together after making some cuts.

I HATE ANGLES

All put together, can't wait to start painting!

Spray painted the top blue, I used painters tape around the edges because that part will also be stained.

Stained the bottom in dark walnut.

I used a large lid from a cooking pot to try and make this circle as "circular" as possible.

The stars aren't super even as far as spacing goes...but that's what makes it unique, right?

After the top dried I put some dark wax on the top (Valspar brand), to take the color brightness down a couple notches.

Here are a couple other views

Nothing light about this table...

Last one

B's Fort

It's been a while since I've done a project since buying the house.  So, Benton has been begging for a new fort...the one we had in the backyard, you may recall, was really wobbly!  I ended up tearing it all down (kept the wood to build something with in the future).

Before

And tearing it down

So lucky to have my dad by my side to help.  We went to Lowe's and picked up some 4x4's that were 6' long.  It was pretty tricky getting the base structure to be level because not only was it on a slope but the storage shed behind it was uneven so it made looks VERY deceiving.

The original plans for this fort were gathered from the handmade hideaway, I made some changes and alterations since I was using scrap wood and things.  But, if you haven't checked out their plans I would definitely recommend them because they are easy to read and the houses just turn out darling. The handmade home

All we really had planned for the day was building the frame, so I was pretty happy when we already started the flooring.

This thing is definitely not going anywhere

It made me so thrilled when Benton came home and stood on top of it, he said, "mom, this is REALLY sturdy"....music to my ears.  Lots more to come (walls, roof, slide, swings, trap door, ladder) but it's a start!

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It's about time to jump back on to this project.  With this lovely warmer weather we've been having I finished majority of the deck aside from 1 board (because I need a wider one) and the trap door space that I still need to frame out.  Then I'm on to walls!  I decided from viewing a couple other projects that I'll be using cedar fencing and 2x4's to make the walls.  I should probably throw in a couple windows in there and maybe a cute little spring door or something.  Here's where we are now...

A couple other things on my radar (it's nice to list them on here so I don't forget all of B's ideas):

• Swing set addition
• Deck railing
• How to attach the slide
• Climbing Rope
• Ladder
• Mailbox

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I thought my weekend plans for building the wall frames was ruined due to bad weather.  Fortunately, I'm a super lucky girl and my dad took off half a days work to help me build the frames in his workshop.  We first stopped at Lowe's for a bunch of 2x4's.  I think we got 14 2x4x10s and 4 2x4x8s.

Dad gave me a good lesson on framing and I feel pretty confident with my new found skill.

We got them all put together pretty quickly and loaded them all up in the back of his truck to take back over to my house.

Loving my cute little window frame

Benton got home and was super excited to see some progress happening.

This weekend on the fort we got the roof started. Surprisingly building the rafters wasn't too bad. We went with an 8/12 peak, and may have cut one too many birds eyes but that's alright. 

Dad also scared me standing on top of what should have been the trap door (that I hadn't finished yet at this point) he put two 2x4s over it and was standing on top of a 5 gallon bucket. So to sum up this story short, I made the trap door today. 

My Lowe's companion...

Starting to put up the siding using treated pine fence pickets.

Attached the swing set using some of the old brackets that used to belong with this playset.  I attached them to a 4x4 I had lying around and anchored that on to the base of the fort with 8" long 1/2" carriage bolts, I used two of them and this thing isn't going anywhere.  I also anchored the other side of the swing into the ground using quick set concrete.

Swing set is finally attached.

Where I finished out this weekend, worked on the walls some today.  Need to fix the shutters, I didn't quite finish those.  Also anchored the slide in using carriage bolts.  The ladder up front is from an old play house that used to be in the backyard.  That will be removed, it's just easier for me to use it instead of the ladder to the trap door.  In the next few weekends to come, here is the plan...

• Finish the walls
• Complete the shutters and build a door
• Finish roof
• Make the railing (I decided to use 2x4's and 1/2" conduit for the railing)
• He still wants a rope involved somehow so I'm going to need to think on that one for a bit

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Just a few more things left to go, if only it would stop raining!  I finished putting up the siding, got the tin put on top...it's going the wrong direction from a drainage standpoint but for the sake of saving dollars, I'm good with it.

I used a roll of window screening, some wood glue and nails to put the door together.  I plan on putting a criss-cross in the bottom window frame.  I also picked up hinges for a gate, they are pretty heavy duty and not really necessary but they matched the shutter hinges so...why not?  I reinforced the swing set again with L brackets.  I've also finally come up with a plan for the climbing rope...I just need to figure out how I'm going to get a 16' 4x4 home safely....

Still need to finish

•the front door 

•the railing (this is going to take the longest because I have to make a gate to be able to access the climbing rope)

•the beam with climbing rope (the rope is on it's way, I ordered an 8' rope from Amazon)

If the weather holds up I think 2 more weekends should do it!

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Okay, it may not look like it...but I spent all day on this thing.  Granted, I had to take a trip to Lowe's and then another trip to Sutherlands but here's where we're at.

Oh yeah that's right, I also made a stop at Hobby Lobby and got the Man Cave sign and the door handle (which was originally brown but I spray painted it a flat black).

I wasn't real sure what I was going to do about the gate in the railing but I think this will work out okay.

He was pretty pleased with the progress when he got off the bus.  Now we are ready for the conduit to finish off the railing.  And lastly is putting up the super long 4x4 for the climbing rope and we should be all set.  I'm sure he'll want to paint or stain it soon...but mom is ready to start on her kitchen.

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Another day of work down and the conduit railings are up!

I used 1/2" conduit and just made 3 railings.  I determined the spacing due to the swingset...it just had to go on that way.  I also used the conduit clamps that have a screw in each end.  It really didn't take long and was kind of fun to put up.

Video tour

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The final piece to the puzzle has arrived.

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My dad was going to help me get a 16' long 4x4 home...but I have not patience, so why not strap it down to the top of my car?!?!  It's safe to say no one was driving particularly close to me.

My little man hard at work building a "truck"

Digging, digging, and more digging...

We got rained out today and that post is entirely way too tall.  Looks like I'll have my work cut out for me tomorrow because that thing is already anchored into the ground.

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Well, today I took some steps backwards.  I had to take the gate down because it wouldn't shut now that the rope post is up there.  I had to take the top off the rope post, cut it and lower it down.  Also, re-cut the conduit on the gate down to size.  I know that doesn't sound like a whole lot but it took a while and I'm happy to report that I'm finished!

The rope looks so much better now that it's at the right height!

A couple more views..

And then just to remind you of OLD RICKETY that we had in the backyard before versus what he has now.  Must always have a before and after.