Barn Wood Buffet

My husband and I have been inspired by Pinterest. We see projects made from trash, and our imagination runs wild. I have always been a trash-to-treasure kind of person, but I never got into big things. All of mine were small hand crafts. Now that I got my husband (the one of us who owns a gazillion tools) hooked on Pinterest, we've been brainstorming together. We're trying to get our rustic-style house fixed up to put on the market so we can move closer to his son's school, and we've been doing many odd jobs ourselves. If you don't have a neatly laid out furniture arrangement, though, the house is just not going to show as good. So... we decided to take that matter into our own hands, too. Since we can't afford to go out and buy all new furniture, we're making it. We located a barn that was falling down. We searched until we figured out who owned it, contacted the owners, and got permission to take some of the wood.

We got the wood (and one sheet of rusted tin) to our house and stared at it for a long time trying to figure out what to make.

We came up with the idea, my husband drew it out and figured the measurements, and we began building.

Clearly, he's so good to patiently teach me what to do, and he not only allows but encourages me to use his tools.

We used new wood to supplement the old barn wood. We wanted the inside to be solid and sturdy with the new wood, and we wanted to save the old wood for the part that would be seen.

After getting the face and frame built, we cut old boards for the sides.

We took it down off the sawhorses to put the top on it. The boards we used for the top had other boards nailed into it that we had to remove so it would fit. We wanted to keep the look of the old rusty nails, though, so we cut each of them off on the other side.

We used a pocket jig to attach the frame of the doors together. Before attaching the boards, though, we used a router to cut a slot to hold the tin.

I used tin snips to cut out the tin, brushed it down with a wire brush, and sealed in the rust with spray polyurethane. Tim then attached the doors to the unit.

Drawers and I don't get along, so he built all the drawers and installed them.

I cut the tin for them, routed the area of the tin, attached the tin to the drawer fronts, and installed the pulls that I got 50% off at Hobby Lobby. He then put the fronts on the drawers.

And.... Voila!

We got it moved inside and put a few items on it. You can see some of the fresh cut edges. We'll have to weather them to make them match the rest of the wood, but we were so eager to get it inside that we decided we could do that once it was in.

You may recognize those shelves above it from a previous post. We placed it in our breakfast/dining area under those shelves, added a shelf inside each side of cabinet of the buffet, and filled it with all our small appliances that were cluttering up the kitchen. It's amazing what a difference it makes in our kitchen/dining area. 

All toll, we spend about $35-$40 dollars on this piece. It could easily sell for $800 or more. It took a lot of time to build, but we definitely had quite a bonding experience through it. We will without a doubt be building more barn wood furniture together!

Stay tuned for our new/old barn door dining table that we are in the process of building.....

Valentine's Day: Third Day ~ PEZ!!!

This weekend we had my stepson at our house. Of course I had to let him in on the fun. If he was with us more he would have gotten 14 days, too. I decided to include him while he was here, though, to keep it festive without going overboard and smothering him with 14 gifts at once.

Valentine's Day: Second Day ~ You're My Favorite Goober!

The second day of Valentine's was Goobers, because he's my favorite Goober.

Valentine's Day: First Day ~ You Rock, Valentine!

I decided to do 14 days of Valentine's this year for my hubby. I went to the store at the end of January and bought a small gift for 13 days. When I say small gift, I mean a piece of candy, sucker, gum, or whatever else I could find which I could use it's name to create a cute saying. Every day I will give one to my husband. On the 14th day I will have an actual gift for him.... probably a new tool.

The first day of Valentine's was.... You Rock, Valentine!

Valentine's Day: Card for the Hubby

Ok... So this one gets a little personal. This is the Valentine's Day card I made for my husband last year. I likely won't reveal this year's until after he gets it. I don't know... we'll see. Since I decorated both the outside and inside, though, I decided to put pics of both on here. Yes, you'll be able to read the personal message that I wrote inside to him. But I don't reckon it's anything so personal that should be kept private.

This card was made on white cardstock using scrapbook paper, ribbons, stamps, felt, and markers.

Front:

Middle:

Back: