Coat Rack

We have a coat closet right across from our front door, but it houses all of Jared's "Army junk" as I refer to it, and we started tossing our coats on the couch as we walked in the front door and it drove me nuts to see them there! So I decided I needed to make a coat rack. I had seen one before that someone had made from an old fence post, but I had no spare fence posts hanging around so I headed to the Home Depot. I found all of the supplies I needed which were a newel post, some shelf supports, and metal coat hooks.

Next came paint. I mixed some white paint with varnish and did two coats on both the post and the "legs". The great thing about these shelf supports is that they already have the hardware attached so I just slid them on to screws that I put into the post. I wish I had thought to take a picture of them so you could see how they work. I have seen picture frames that have this kind of attachment where there is a whole large enough for a nail head to go through on the bottom and then a narrow slit above it so that the nail slides up and won't fall out. Can you picture it?  Lastly I screwed in the hooks.

Here's a close up of the top.

And the finished product. Not bad for a total cost of about $40 huh? You could make it for cheaper if you have a spare post of some sort because that was the big expense at $30.

The Suitcases!

I can't remember when or where I saw that someone had used a vintage suitcase to store craft supplies. They had covered it with some crazy craft paper and made it virtually unrecognizable as an old suitcase, but I had better plans. I then became obsessed with finding old suitcases. I looked in the KSL classified adds pretty much daily until I finally found a set that I fell in love with! I begged my husband for them but he just didn't understand the appeal and by the time I talked him into it the suitcases were gone.

Little did I know that my wonderful sister and mom were in cahoots and had gotten the suitcases for me for Christmas. I was so happy Christmas morning when I got them.

Here they are in all their retro glory!

If I had the right decor I probably could have just left them mustard yellow, but they just didn't fit in my house this way. Here comes the spray paint. I got white spray paint specially made for plastic and waited for it to be less than 70% humidity and more than 35 degrees outside which was kind of hard in Washington during December. Finally the day came! I had already taped over all of the hardware, which was the most annoying part, and was ready to go. I probably could have gotten away with two coats of paint but I did three just for good measure.

 What a change huh?! They still looked a little stark to me so I used some silver metallic acrylic paint to antique the edges and around the hardware. I tried to get a good picture to show this, but I just couldn't get one so you'll have to use your imagination. Then I bought some round wooden legs at JoAnn's for around $5 and painted them with the metallic silver. Now I have the most unique looking end table that holds all of  my craft paper, my ribbon, and my paints. Every time I look at these they make me happy.

Bookshelf

A while back I saw this picture on the wonderful Pinterest:

 I was immediately reminded of these black storage shelves that I had. Obviously this photo is from the Internet, I forgot a before picture.

So with my birthday money I went to the Home Depot and bought some really awesome spray paint that gives a hammered steel look. I spray painted all the pieces for the shelf and then assembled it.

Next I bought some sheets of MDF and used my jigsaw to cut them so they would fit on the shelves. I contemplated painting the MDF, which I still may end up doing, but as of now I like the simple look.

 I might add that all I made the covers on all the books, made the decorative balls, painted the suitcase, and recovered the lampshade. But my favorite thing is the blue floral bag on the middle shelf.

Here's why:

I love music, but hate the look of my iPod stand. So I cut a hole in the back of this bag and threaded the power cord though it. Now I can use my remote to turn on my music but now I am the only one who knows were the sound is coming from. Well I guess you know now too :)