DIY Salvaged Frame

Quick post here to show you that I can browse Pinterest just like the best of them.

No, I didn't slather mason jars in chalkboard paint and then turn them into light fixtures. I'm not that far gone.

Actually, my friend Annie, who is a true artist and a whiz at decorating her house with found objects, inspired me to complete this project. A few months ago our neighbors threw out a HUGE frame in the alley, and I salvaged it because I saw potential and also I love free things. And then it sat in my basement and I forgot about it, until Annie showed me an old frame she had transformed into an easily-changed picture display frame. She had used already-in-place nails to mount lines of sturdy wire across the width of the frame and then mounted photos using clips. I liked the idea and knew my massive frame would work beautifully, so I got to work.

(It helps that I saw the same thing at Marshall's for around $60 and immediately recoiled at the cost-to-effort ratio.)

First I found a can of yellow spray paint and painted the nasty faux-oak. The paint couldn't reach into the huge cracks and creases of the frame, but I actually like the effect of the black cracks on yellow surface a lot more than just plain yellow. Then I measured gaps at 3-4" intervals on each side and marked where I wanted lines of wire to hang. I then painstakingly screwed eyelet hooks into each marked spot; next, I twisted sturdy wire through each hook. Finally I gathered printed photos of our family and hung them to the wire with fancy paperclips and mini clothespins. My husband hung it for me in our tiny hallway between our bedroom and bathroom, where it is the first thing you see when you walk through our front door.

Previously I had a large canvas hanging there, but it hung horizontally and didn't mimic the shape of the arched doorway very well. I like this a lot better, and I love the pop of color it lends to the hallway. Plus I love seeing all those people we love and cherish.

Baby H is here to be your faithful guide. He and I have had some very serious discussions about not petting the pictures too much. Honestly, he wants to kiss all the faces, which is what happens when you raise your baby to be Orthodox.

I know this project isn't earth-shattering or original or maybe your cup of tea. That's totally okay. But I really like it, and I'm proud of myself for accomplishing something outside of the normal laundry/housework/diaper duty/teaching/trooping through snow routine. Also, this is my blog, so I can show any and all overdone projects that I want. #winning

And it's worth mentioning that at the very center of our photo web is a picture of the couple that started it all. This picture is from our college Christmas banquet from Christmas 2004.

Now go and make something of your own! Extra points if you can also use something discarded by your neighbors.

Hot Husbands Building Tables

So we wrapped up all of our Christmas break craziness of building and painting and getting high (on paint fumes, duh) and ended up with a beautiful girl's room, a beautiful new dining room table, and four sick kids, three of whom needed antibiotics and multiple trips to the pediatrician's office. I'm not saying all of these events are related, but I am saying that crazy people who do insane projects are less likely to stress out their children and make them susceptible to bronchitis and ear infections. Maybe. I don't know, because I am not a chill person.

Anyway, that's what I get for bragging about dodging the stomach virus. We also got the Polar Vortex and Chiberia and whatever else you want to call wind chills of 50 degrees below zero, and now everyone is officially sick of winter in mid-January. You know what we really need? Hot husbands who build us hot tables.

Lucky for me!!

I, of course, forgot to take a "before" picture, so I quickly shuffled through my camera roll and found this photo from this past summer. We were hosting King Peter's birthday party, so please don't think balloons, streamers, and seven children are part of our normal days. Focus instead on the black table:

And those messy bookshelves! It was a busy time, people.

As you might remember, if you've been around here long enough (this blog is over 5 years old! WHAT), I got this table and its four chairs way back in college and painted it black in 2009. I was really happy with the painted table for quite awhile, until our kids multiplied and then got huge and then our extended family multiplied and suddenly we were eating in shifts or off of our laps in the living room. Despite the black table's 11- or 12-year run (including its original country look), it was time for a change.

So The Professor decided to tackle the making of a farmhouse table for my Christmas present this year, and I settled on this design. It's actually an Ana White plan, and according to my husband it was pretty straightforward, aside from one or two minor editing mistakes that required an extra trip to Lowe's for lumber. He used untreated pine (sure, it's soft--but this is a rustic table being used by kids; divots are expected and perhaps even encouraged), a couple of coats of dark walnut stain, and three coats of polyurethane, and after a couple of days of hard work he had nearly miraculous results.

It's, um, rather large. Actually huge. He made it something like 16" shorter than the original plans, and we probably could have shaved off 6" more (if you sit on the end near the window, it's a tight fit), but man, it fits everyone. It's solid. Here's as close a shot of the pedestal legs as I could get from the side:

The similar table from Pottery Barn that Ana White was trying to copy costs around $1,500. We paid around $200 for supplies, including some replacement blades for borrowed saws.

And the view from the kitchen:

I hope you noticed that I got my bookshelves in order. They need sprucing up every 4 months or so. I think the books breed at night.

My next request of my husband is that he build one matching bench for one side of the table (also found at the Shanty 2 Chic link.) I'd like to retire the Windsor chairs, as their legs are technically too wide, as well as the cheapo ladder-back chairs, and find a crazy assortment of vintage chairs I can paint in various colors. (The two green chairs actually belong in our office/sewing room. We're forever carrying chairs around the main level.)

I do wish I had a good shot of what our table NORMALLY looks like, which is covered in paper, markers, and various art supplies until not even an inch of tabletop is visible, but you'll just have to imagine four happy children enjoying enough room to get creative and not having to jostle one another for elbow space.

In conclusion, I have the hottest husband ever who has done a very dangerous thing in building me a table...

...because, of course, now I think he can build anything.

Mwahahahaha.

UPDATE: He scooped me! My own husband scooped me. He's started a blog, and here's his own take on building the table. He gives some good specs on the measurements and materials, in case that interests you, plus a couple better angles of the table itself.