The Making of a Desk Part 1

Since posting our School Desk

Before

and

 After

I have had a lot of questions about how we did it.

I have to say this will be a hard post to write because there are lots of steps. I am going to try and keep it as simple as posible

I am dividing the process into two parts.

I hope you can take this info and apply it to a project of your own.

So here we go.

-To start with we bought an entire kitchen of solid wood cabinets off of Craig's List for $100

-They were stained a very orangey color so I sanded and painted them

-We used part of them in the basement for our school desk for over a year

-I hate the basement

-Idea was formed in my head to change the formal living room into a school room

-Sweet talk Hubby and sell him on idea

-He thinks it is a good idea, YAY,let's get started

-Remove upper cabinets from basement and bring upstairs

(my dad came to help Hubby with this part)

-Mark wall for studs

-Determine height of cabinets

-Level and screw in a board to rest cabinets on while attaching them to the wall

-Screw cabinets into studs on wall

-Remove board the cabinets were resting on

-Sand, prime and paint insides of the cabinets

-Fill in nail holes and cracks on the outside of the cabinets then prime and paint

-while primer was curing we worked on the desk top

-We made a rectangle out of 2x4's, slightly smaller than we wanted the top of the desk

-Reinforce for strength and to have a place to nail the top into later

-Attach the rectangle to the wall with screws that go into the studs

-Attach legs, purchased from Lowe's

-We used 3 - 7inch (cut to size) pieces of 1inch lumber to make the top

(we took a few days off because of life and I had to start moving our school books upstairs, so ignore that part please)

-once we had them cut and in place we nailed them in with  finish nailer

-Fille in all the nail holes and gaps with wood filler

-Let dry over night

-Then sand

-After sanding I finished the top with stain and polyurethane and painted the sides and legs.

Now move onto Part 2 for the big finish