DIY Drawer Organizer - No tools required!

The feedback on my PB Knock-Off Letter Bin was absolutely astonishing. I want to thank you all for taking the time to send nice words my way, either via Pinterest, the tutorial on ana-white.com, the feature on knock-off decor , or even personal messages, sent to my inbox.

A trend that I've noticed is the WANT to recreate letter bin... but a discomfort in the plans... maybe I'll even go so far as to call it a fear. Mostly of a saw.

I was amazed by how many people responded with things like, "I'll get my husband to do it." or "I'd love to, but I'm not handy with a saw."

Not because I don't think they could do it... But because I was RIGHT THERE WITH YOU! Every single response along those lines took me back to January of 2010 (hmm... not so long ago, huh?!) when my husband bought a jig saw. When he first used the jig saw, I KNEW he was going to kill himself, and I stood nearby with a phone, waiting to call an ambulance.

You have no idea how much I wish I could say that was an exaggeration. 

No idea.

He survived, but I still wouldn't even touch the thing. And I don't want to try to coerce you into doing something you're not comfortable with. You'll get there. I have faith in you :-) And until then, I figured I'd try to do something that didn't require anything scary to create.

MORE POTTERY BARN! YAY!

(who else loves looking at all the accessories than the products being sold?!)

Source: Pottery Barn

This is supposed to be a detailed shot of the Rustic Wall Organizer  - but honestly, WHO is looking at the organizer, when there is that AWESOME container made from yard sticks?!

Umm... Those teeth marks in my nightstand are "distressing," ok? It's the next big thing.. You'll want to send a teething toddler to all the furniture in your house soon. You'll see.

I created one for my nightstand months ago, but after showing you all my amazingly tidy junk drawer, I knew I needed to rethink this.

There are plans for drawer dividers out there, but they require tools. And we're keepin' it simple today. So go grab some yard sticks, glue and a box cutter, and let's get organizing!

We're gonna go from this 

To This!

To the untrained eye, this may still look like a hot-mess... but there is definitely organization goin' on in here!

FIRST THINGS FIRST!

Measure your drawer! I knew that I wanted a spot for all of my manuals (top left), my wash cloths (bottom left), scissors/tape/glue (bottom middle), Pens/tools (umm... bottom right middle?), fire (bottom right), and "misc" (top right). So get an idea of what sizes you might need and get to work.

An amazing benefit of working with yard sticks is that... you don't have to measure! 

To cut, score a line at the right measurement (ON BOTH SIDES). Go over it a few times to make sure you'll get a clean break.

It's a good idea to use a protected surface when scoring your stick. I, however, am not very fond of this train table....

NEXT! Line your scored line up with a corner. You're going to bend the yard stick at the weak point you just created 

Snap it quickly. In the ruler at the top of the picture... I didn't score both sides. SO MAKE SURE YOU DO!

You end up with a not-so-smooth edge (but I wouldn't call it ROUGH, really...). Just take your utility knife, make sure your fingers are out of the way, and scrape off some of the ugly.

Score, break and glue all of your pieces. The measurements are absolutely customized to what you need.

I keep a gun nearby... you know... in case the zombies come! Or until the kid comes and finds somewhere else to play with it.

You have the choice of just inserting the dividers into the drawer, or gluing them. I chose not to glue mine because they were a good, tight fit. 

So tight, in fact, that I had to bust out the rubber mallet to gently nudge it into place.

Now put everything back!!! In it's intended spot! :-)

So tell me, is this something you can do? :-) If you think you can, it'll cost under $2.

Wish me luck?

Screen Shot of my computer at 12:25PM on Friday

What I'm going out back to attempt to recreate...





















Seriously... I have no idea what I'm thinking...

Homework Solution (or boredom buster)

This past Saturday, I WAS BORED!

Seriously, I felt like an annoying kid asking, "Are we there yet?" (except it was "Is it time for dinner yet?").

So, to find something to do with my time, I checked The Design Confidential and Ana White's Facebook pages for project requests. I've come to be kinda handy at drawing up plans, so I figured I'd give it a "go."

One of the more popular requests was the Daily System from PB.

Source: Pottery Barn













I've kept coming back to this, because it looks SO EASY, but I couldn't quite figure out exactly HOW it done.

The flat surfaces (cork board/white board) have all been covered in blogs, so I wasn't too concerned with them... It was THIS GUY that I wanted to tackle.

Source: Pottery Barn
















And you know what? In all the times I'd looked at it, I've never looked at the above image..

DUH! It goes in a FRAME!

When I was trying to figure out the gallery wall in my living room, I had gotten a bunch of different sized frames. I still had four 11x14 frames left over, so I decided to tackle this system.

To make sure proportions and dimensions were correct, I first came up with a few construction paper templates, and assembled them in the frames.

When I got the sizes to be what I wanted, I drew up a master template and took it outside to start cutting. I ended up with this. If you plan to do this, make sure you measure the inside of your frame. That's the width of the "fronts". They're 5 & 6 inches high.

But you've already seen this much.


























With paper, you don't have to take into account the width of the wood when assembling, so I had to figure out where/how much I had to notch out to make the top front (the 6 inch one) fit (it still had to touch the glass on the frame, so papers didn't fall straight through).

From here, I attached the sides of the bin to the inside of the picture frame using wood glue. Then I put the fronts on with more wood glue, and a little weight...

New use of rice 'n beans, hmm?













When it dried, I caulked the seams (something I would ALWAYS suggest for a more professional appearance) and wiped away the excess with a damp sponge.

Got her all spray painted up, and now I LOVE her!

To make your own, you need an 11x14 frame and some scrap 1/4" ply.

I submitted this plan  to ana-white.com (here's the link), so you can download the template and get the cut list from there.

Oh great, mom's making something again...

When I haven't done anything hands-on in a few days, I start feeling kinda useless. I feel like after having the second kid, my brain needs constant "work" or I'm going to turn into an idiot (trust me, right after she was born, I couldn't remember common words!). So all day I've tried organizing or playing logic games, or just being involved... but this itch to do SOMETHING wouldn't go away.. So I found something to do!

And of course my smart-alec 5-year-old has to put her two cents in...

"Oh great, mom's making something again."

Why yes! Yes I am!

Sunbursts, Starbursts and Redvines

I feel like I am the only one choosing to stay off of the sunburst bandwagon. I just don't like them. As much as I'm thrilled that retro styles are back, this is one that I feel should've stayed in the past.

People are just ADORING them, and coming up with many different ways of making them.

We've got..

Utensils..

source - flamingotoes.com



















Shims

source - hisugarplum




















Grass (seriously?!)

(i can't find the source for this - pinterest keeps leading me to other people's pins)











Even clothespins!

(Can I still hate them, but LOVE something that was inspired by them...? The art piece below makes me think of dandelions :-))

source - throughcat-eyes.blogspot.com










When I refer to these mirrors-that-i-do-not-like, I OFTEN call them "starburst" mirrors.

candy... yumm...

So I often have to correct myself. "I hate sunburst mirrors. I love starburst." But... I only have redvines.

If you follow me on Facebook, you probably knew this was coming....

This is where this gets REALLY entertaining... I hung the licorice-burst mirror up, only to have it look like Lauren hill.

PLEASE tell me you see it! 

Anyhow... after I got done cracking up, I still had ALLLLL this licorice to eat.

Oh, woe is me!













How do you feel about sunburst mirrors? How about LICORICE-burst mirrors?

I think I need to go lie down - sugar rush...

It's hard to wear you, hardware!

I'm currently working on getting a "House Tour" page set up on the blog, so try to keep an eye out for it! In the meantime, there've been a few little projects that i want to share.

The most exciting of which has to do with... where else, but the kitchen? (I've been focusing on that room for what feels like TOO long! But don't worry, we'll get a break!)

I got all of the hinges changed out, so I've been able to move onto the pulls!

Or... at least the first drawer...

What you SHOULD do when installing drawer hardware is to empty the drawer.

Especially if it looks like this..

But, if you know me, you know I'm not a do-things-right kinda girl..

At all..

I just pushed everything out of my way and dove right in! Removed the drawer face.

Played around with pull placement before being shoved aside by the expert.

Placed them a couple different ways before figuring that there should be more to my placement strategy than just eyeing it...

Like this? It looks cross-eyed...

My formula was to divide the width of the face in quarters, and put the center of the pulls a quarter of the way in from each side. Since I had 3" pulls (3" is the amount space between screw holes), I measured 1 1/2" fron the center in both directions and that was where I screwed my holes.

These pulls needed to be countersinked, so I used my countersink bit to dig in there...
See the "mess"? That's where I was SO THANKFUL that these pulls hide that!

Then I had to take a break, because these cheeks don't stay chubby on their own!

(like the mullet? it's always amplified after a nap!)

A few more "goes," and they're done!

Here's a tip for people changing their drawer hardware... If you have a removable face, you need longer screws than what's provided. You just do... Accept it.

One down, 5 drawers and 25 cabinets to go!!!!

Have you changed hardware lately? Did you know about the extra screw needs? What was for lunch? :-p