Woodworking Family Life Style: inspired

Ive been trying to come up with another piece of furniture for the display window of our shop and while looking for inspiration online, I came across this cubby organizer from PB.

I wanted to make a much larger version and also try to keep cost down and then I remembered that we had this pile of old pine lumber in storage that we had come across in the pile with the large walnut slabs.

Since it was going to be rather large, I asked my hubby to help me with this one. And after several redos, heres what we came up with .

We made a 4 foot x 4 foot box and then cut each center divider and attached with a nail gun. After than, I attached a piece of bead board to the back. I wanted to put some kind of number plates on the front of each cubby. I would have liked metal but since I didnt have that and wanted to keep cost down, we ripped 1/4 thick pieces of wood off the extra scraps of wood and I cut them down to 1 1/2 inch pieces and sanded them down to look like this.

I attached them to the front of each cubby with wood glue.

Then I took some caulk and filled in all the gaps and holes to prepare for painting.

I painted the entire cabinet ultra white by Valspar then took my sander to it to distress it quite a bit. I wanted it to look pretty rough. Then I stenciled the numbers on the front of each wood label with black paint.

Total cost for this project was $15 for the bead board. Everything else, we already had. Yay!

Heres how it looks.....

It was hard to actually put this piece in the shop. I loved it so much I wanted to keep it for our home. But I cant wait to fill it with items from our store.

And it does look great in the window.

Speaking of windows.....the sign is finished and heres how it looks....

I really appreciated everyones suggestions and since symmetry is something I sometimes have to have, we decided to put it all on one window while the other window will be used for display, but Im not revealing that side just yet. :)

Have a great day!

Diana

Sunday, April 17, 2016

Anthropologie Inspired Gift Tags

I always take inspiration from Anthropologie during the holidays. Their gift wraps and tags, as well as, holiday decor are so happy. But the prices, not so much.
I recently came across their holiday wooden gift tags and became completely smitten with them. I love using nature in decor and even better that its something that comes from your own backyard.
I knew these would be ridiculously easy to make so I went looking around in the backyard for a log, preferably a dead one that was already somewhat dried out. I found the perfect one about 1 1/2 inches in diameter and used a miter saw to slice it into 1/4 inch slices. I used a drill bit to make a small hole in the top and threaded a piece of twine through it. Done.

I made homemade vanilla this past summer to give away as gifts for Christmas and I thought these would look cute on the little bottles. And I cant wait to use them on my gifts.

Note: I tried making these with some logs that my hubby cut fresh off a tree and the wood was still so wet inside that I didnt think it would work. I was worried they would crack during the drying out process. I didnt coat these with anything. You could probably seal them with polyurethane if you wanted. But I like them natural.