Cubby Base {Building}

Happy December!!  Have you done your holiday decorating?  Do you want to hear a shameful true blogger confession?  I haven't done any decorating.  In fact my porch still has Thanksgiving pumpkins on display! My husband and I have been too busy working on some fun gift projects! Starting with this new plan today.  A little cubby base from Ana White.  Perfect height for my daughter to play with her present.  Which is also another plan that I will show you on Thursday.
Any ideas of what it could be?

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Ana White: The Handbuilt Home

I'm so excited today! For two reasons.

One: My boys all went back to school today! Love having them home all summer but sheesh they were so bored the last week or two. I think we were all sick of summer (or maybe just me the Mom? LOL).

Two: My friend Ana White wrote a totally awesome book called The Handbuilt Home! The book has 34 furniture plans.

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Katie Nightstand with Shelves {Building-Ana White}

Hi friends!  I'm so excited to show you how I built the nightstands to go with my brother's new headboard.  They wanted something with lots of storage since the nightstands are going to double as bookshelves.  Ana was so great (as always) and wrote up some awesome plans.  It still amazes me how talented Ana is!

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Ana White Chaise Lounges

You ready to see my summer office?  It's this nice cozy spot in my backyard.  Notice I didn't say quiet.  My backyard in the summer is anything but quiet.  It's barely controlled chaos of a bazillion kids.  But at least now I can supervise the water wars and games of tag from my new Ana White lounge chairs!

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Ana White Picnic Table {Building}

It's finally warming up and feeling like spring here in Washington. It hasn't rained in days and the sun has been shining. I've been working on a bunch of fun outdoor yard projects and I'm so excited to show you my awesome new table!

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DIY Ana White Twin Bed {Rustic aged finish}

There is some major crafting, building and cleaning out going on at my house!  My parents are here visiting and my Mom has great crafting and sewing skills.  You better bet there was a pile of unfinished stuff just "left out" in the craft room for her in case she got bored.

Today I'm going to show you how my son's dinosaur room is coming along.  His bed is an awesome Ana White  plan!

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Laundry Room Update {Ana White Laundry dressers}

So excited to show you my laundry room update.  Remember how the laundry room looked last summer?

I had my family command center with all the art supplies and chore charts.  Worked so great for months.  Then my craft room got all finished and nobody used the dresser anymore.  So the dresser got hauled out to the garage (and is getting repainted for one of the boys rooms!).  I decided Ana White's laundry basket dressers would be the perfect solution for that spot.

Three laundry basket dressers, four baskets high fit perfectly where the dresser was.  Totally a better use of space too.  I am TERRIBLE at folding laundry.  I usually make a pile of clean laundry next to my bed that I'm going to fold someday and have a hard time getting to it.

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Book Bin {Handmade Holiday}

One of the things I love about building gifts is that you can afford to give something nicer than you could afford to buy. My family chooses names and I have my brother who has 4 kids. So my husband and I built them all bookbins.  We used Ana White bookholder plans and built the large book holders.  I spent $18 on wood so each book holder is about $4.50!

They turned out so cute.  I personalized them with vinyl letters cut out with my silhouette machine.  I even added a little magnetic strip that I got at Ikea to my nephews for cars and trains (the matchbox cars have to be completely metal for them to stick).  Now they will have a little spot by their bed to keep their favorite books.

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Kids Art Table {Handmade Holiday}

My goal this year was to have a desk for each of my kids.  I really think it inspires creativity and encourages art activities if kids have their own special spot. So we built our preschool daughter a little art table using Ana-White kids table plans.

The only changes I made to the original table was adding 1x3 stretcher to the bottom of the legs for additional stability.  We had to buy a 2x2 for this project but everything else was scraps.  The top is all 1x3 and 1x4 scraps.  Total cost for E's art table was $3 for the 2x2.  I would guess that if you had to buy all the wood it would be $10-15 which is pretty great deal for an all wood table!

I painted the table with 2 coats of Dover White from Sherwin Williams.

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Easy Log Coasters {Nesting tables}

My husband and I just built some new nesting tables using Ana-White plans.  LOVE them!  I needed something to protect the newly painted finish from my messy, messy family.  So I made some almost free coasters.  Free-my favorite word.

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