Community Brag Posts

Ethan and I did a little project last week.

It’s been windy and cold outside and we’ve been running out of indoor activities. We made Valentine decor, heart-shaped food, colored, met friends at museums and toddler-rock’n-roll-playing coffee joints, played trains and kitchen and dinosaurs, read a hundred books.

One super fun source of indoor entertainment we’ve never successfully completed is building a fort.

When I was young, I was the fort-making queen. My parents had this incredible 80′s-style glass-and-metal table with huge leather and wood chairs (it was insane), each piece weighing what seemed like a million pounds—PERFECT fort building materials. Blankets, pillows, books, and toys made a wonderland of imagination for me and my friends. I remember supporting corners of blankets with this heavy old clay jug and other skull-crushing items that could have crashed down at any wrong movement. How we make it through childhood is beyond me.

I guess our furniture selection is just not fort-worthy. At least, not in the sense that doesn’t pose the risk of a chair toppling on him, undoubtedly leading to suffocation and/or a concussion.

So a few minutes spent reading Ana White’s website, a little trip to the hardware store (where a visit to the “big saw” was requested only to end in wimpers of “no saw, I’m scared!”), about $25, and a little sweat later, we had a perfect little “fort” with no chance of injury, one that doesn’t need to be disassembled…ever.

We had everything cut down at the hardware store. Paint was leftover from Ethan’s train board, side panels made from Target tab-top curtains I’ve had since college. Really.

It was Ethan’s first construction project so I started him off right—with sanding.

When everything was nice and smooth, we had lunch and the Peanut hit the hay while I took out the “big mama bit collection” and started drilling. As usual, Ana’s plans were very well illustrated and straightforward…we used her oven door plan for Ethan’s kitchen and it worked perfectly.

By the time Little Man woke, we were ready for paint. I wondered if painting with a toddler was the smartest idea…but we just went for it.

He did GREAT. Thank you Ikea for the $2 smock.

As I’d feared, the (almost) finished product was about four feet too tall. It was massive in our living room!

So a few days later the Hubs helped me cut it down with our chop saw. So much for making things easy by having all the wood pre-cut. I guess Ana’s house is much bigger than ours.

My next task was hemming, narrowing, and velcro-izing the panels. With a much shorter tent, my trusty old curtains were way too long. Plus, I wasn’t so sure about Ana’s suggestion to staple curtain to tent…it seemed much too permanent What if we want to add a stamped pattern? Or a window? Or change up the fabric? Velcro seemed safer.

Sure, it’s not the fastest way, but I think it was worth the time. And my $20 craigslist sewing machine handled it like a champ.

We’ve already done some good lazin’ around in the new fort. Or nook. Or tent. Whatever, Ethan seems to think it is pretty cool.

It’s also pretty popular with our furry friends.

using the gaby kitchen island plan from ana white I built this over 2 weekends, taking my time! We needed a new, larger side wall island for our laptops, phones, junk, etc and we couldnt love it more. The martha stewart drawer pulls add a nice touch and it all came together quite nicely for our purposes. Thanks so much for taking your time to post such great plans!

I have a 2 1/2 yo daughter and a 2 yo niece, so I make most of Ana's awesome plans in duplicate! These are two versions of her Dress Up console, one was for my niece's 2nd Bday, the other I just had to make for my own little Princess!

Coffee Table built from these plans: http://www.ana-white.com/2012/07/plans/rustic-x-coffee-table

Media console built from these plans: http://www.ana-white.com/2015/08/free_plans/grandy-sliding-door-console

I used a combination of Ana White's book, The Handbuilt Home, and her website plans to build TWO twin sized headboards. I did not build the rails and/or footboard, because the room is too small. I simply attached the metal bed frame to the posts of the headboard. My boys love their new beds!

I made this version of Ana's Reclaimed Soda Crate as Christmas gifts for my kids' teachers. Less than $6 per gift! Full instructions can be found on my blog at www.dropdeadthrifty.com

Followed the plans on the site but made it 3" wider to better fit our electronics.

This is for a full.

There are three plans combined here in this picture. All three completed in the past year. The toy boxes are from the one plan, the cubby shelves from another and finally the dress up stand is the third. It is never this tidy in our playroom! Ah ah, what you cannot see is the other half :D But the girls do enjoy it quite a bit and it does keep most toys off the floor and easily accessible. Thanks Ana for a great variety of plans!

Made a few changes to the cuts on the supports as I made a mistake on the mitres.  However, it worked out and added a different look than the plan's design.  (notice pointed mitres on supports)

Modifed the Rustic X console to fit the width of den area's windows. Wife wanted storage, I needed a project.

We really wanted to give our 2 year old a play kitchen for Christmas. We also didn't want to spend the money on the likes of the Pottery Barn set, and weweren't sold on the lesser-expensive options. Fortunately, a quick internet search led me to Ana White's website and plans for this play kitchen. As someone who has never built anything before, the plans seemed very doable. All of the brag posts were also inspirational and sold me on starting this project. I worked on this an hour or so after work for a couple of weeks, and then a few longer nights running up to Christmas Eve (always a bit of a procrastinator!). As neither my wife or I know how to sew, we decided to turn the space underneath the sink into a cabinet. The paint color was left over from painting our kitchen and family room, and we decided to stain the stove and counter tops. Overall, we are very pleased and proud with how this turned out, and our 2 year old loves playing with the set!

Table was really fun and difficult to complete.  It took me about 30 hours to complete.  However, it is a real hit in the neighborhood.  I used pine and some of the material was really soft and difficult to sand/finish.  Decided to paint the pedestals chalk white (wife's inspiration), which was a really good choice.  Fitting the center sections of table top to frame was most difficult aspect of project.  Thanks Ana for the inspiration!

Johnny Wilson

Shelbyville, TN

I was looking for a "super easy console table" and once I was ready to build it, I mustered the confidence to try a more complex table top design. Using pocket hole joinery, 2"x2" legs and supports, scrap 1"x2" "blocks" for the herringbone pattern, scrap 1/2" 8"x4' plywood, 3/4"x1/2" pieces to frame the top, and much wood glue, I built this 8.5" narrow console table for under $30. The plan shared on this site was one of the inspiration pieces that helped me believe I could do this too!

My master bath was in desparate need of storage, and as usual, it was Ana's site to the rescue.  I built this Ladder Shelf exactly from Ana's 'Painter's Ladder Shelf' plans.  I built and had it painted in about 2 days.  Now I finally have a place to store towels.  Thanks again, Ana!

We altered the plans to match our kitchen island to our 10-seat farm table my husband made.  The top design is a replica of our table.  We then added some wrought iron hooks and iron bottle opener for detail as well as corner plates to match our dining table.   We decided to leave out the drawers and add a little open cubby for storage instead.  Will look great with our rustic, country theme in our house!