So now I am correcting that oversight

If you read Post 1, you will see that I decided to go with 1/2″ thick batten because I didn’t like that the 3/4″ boards created more of an obvious cut-back where it meets the existing baseboard molding.

In Post 3, I show how I decided to slice off some of the batten so it met the baseboard–but I didn’t go the more popular route that other bloggers have gone, with a 45 degree cut.  I showed that 45 degree cut on the 3/4″ batten in post 1, but the 1/2″ board is not cut back at all in that post.  I only took off enough of the board, so that the cut sat on top of the baseboard already on the wall.

Here’s how it looks in close-ups on the wall and complete:

And also how it looks at standing height:

I remember being a little worried that the 1/2″ option would be thick enough, since many bloggers were using the 3/4″ option.  I have no regrets going with the 1/2″, and I prefer that the batten doesn’t stick out any farther than it does in this room.  I also like that everything is slightly smaller than the door moulding and the built-in cabinet face frame boards.

So there you go–thanks for asking for this info Kelly!

You may not look too closely at anything other than the batten in these pictures.  I need to freshen up the ding marks on the doorway with new paint.  And maybe eliminate a dust bunny…or two…or seven.  Truly, after showing some other messy areas in our house over the years, you’d think I’d be over any embarrassment, but it turns out that I’m not, lol!

Posts in this series:

Board & Batten {Post 1}

Board & Batten {Post 2}

Board & Batten {Post 3}

Board & Batten {Post 4}

Board & Batten {Post 5} The Reveal

Board & Batten {Post 6} Angle Cut at the Baseboard

It is the end of March.  Where is spring?

Much anticipating your answer,                                                                                                                                                                                                             Pink Toes                                                                                                                                                                                                                                             (although you wouldn’t know it, since my toes are still wearing slippers instead of sandals)

***

I’m sure that most of you are aware that garage floors in unheated spaces are cold.  Very cold.  So I’ve kind of been on a DIY hiatus because my 40ish year old body cannot handle the cold out where the tools are located.  So I was much anticipating our school’s Spring Break so I could get started on a rather large project that is next on my list.  But instead of breaking out the nail gun, I was in the grocery store getting ready for the 6 inches of snow that they are calling for in our area.  I’m hoping that it melts quickly, but since we were out of pretty much everything, I couldn’t chance it!

So I guess I will finalize the plans for the big project over the next few days, so that I’m ready when the warm weather finally hits.  I’ll post the drawings soon.

Hope you are warm wherever you find yourself reading this!  I’m thinking happy thoughts of blooming daffodils and chirping birds.

Kristen

P.S.–I had to begin to moderate the comments again today–sorry if that is a pain for anyone.  A bunch of spam was getting through the last few days.  It stinks when the few ruin it for the many…

Full disclosure:  This is not hard, but it takes a LONG time to make!!  I think I spent over 3 hours on it, and Pip was helping too!  Here’s how we started out:

An empty tissue box, cereal box, and some tape.

Then I just started making some strips of looped yarn.  I used Lion Brand Wool-Ease Thick & Quick and I got it at Walmart for about $6.  I only used part of a skein.

Sticky side is up for the tape.  My loops were more even than this picture looks, but you don’t have to be too careful.  You can always give the puppy a trim in any spot where it needs it once you are finished.  In fact, in a lot of spots next to her face I did just that–left it really long and trimmed until it looked right.

Push the yarn down onto the tape really well, and then do the same once you get it onto the tissue box.  I was afraid the yarn might come loose, but it has held really well through the construction and through a day in a 4th grade classroom.

After you attach, clip each loop.  This was Pip’s job.  She would clip while I constructed the next layer of loops–we made a great team!

Attach the next layer so that you are hiding the strip of tape below.

The loops in the face area were very small, but the loops under the ears and around the face I made really long.  I did trim them so that they framed her face.  As I said on the picture, I used some packing tape to cover the sides of the head in order to have something to tape to.

For the top of the head and the tail, I used a strip of hot glue in the middle of really long pieces of string.  I think I also trimmed the ears cardboard so that it was smaller, like I did on the tail.  Then I gathered the long yarn from the top of the head into two pig tails over the ears.  Attach a bow to each ear to hold it.  Fill in with some long yarn under the ears if blank spots show up.

I attached the eyes, nose, and mouth with hot glue.  I had to make the nose with black yarn, since we didn’t have black pom poms.  The tongue is velvet Christmas ribbon (didn’t have any red/pink felt).  Luckily I had wiggly eyes on hand already.

Pip was really excited about the results, and so was I!  What do you think of our creation?

***As an aside, we finally decided to purchase a new laptop after my last one was destroyed when I downloaded the Swagbucks toolbar.  I’ve got a complaint ticket submitted to Swagbucks notifying them of the problem I had.  It will be interesting to see their response.  I just got the new one this week and I’m trying to learn how to get around Windows 8 now, and get all my backed-up files transferred.  I like the new laptop I got (Dell), except for one issue–the spacebar doesn’t always work when I push it–it only works if I push the key in just the right spot.  I can actually repeatedly replicate the problem by pushing the space bar toward the bottom.  I feel like a huge complainer right now (Swagbucks ruined my computer,wah!  My spacebar doesn’t work, wah!)  but do you know how often you push the space bar????  It is driving me nuts that I am continually having to backspace to get to the spot where it didn’t space!!!  My other computer was a Dell and I never had a problem with it.

And that concludes the whining portion of this post.

I hope you are having a great weekend!!

Dowloading the toolbar also wiped out my computer.  At least from what I can tell.  I can’t get on it, it keeps running things to try to fix an error the computer recognizes, but can’t seem to recover from.  It tells me to uninstall whatever I last installed, but I have no idea how to go about that when I can’t even get into the computer.  Luckily we just renewed our McAfee subscription and I backed up my computer in December.  Unluckily I’m going to have to tell my husband about this because it is outside of my DIY realm.  I’m not the only one who has had this problem I have found now that it is too late.

I am thankful that it was not on the computer that we use for any financial accounts since others began to have suspicious things happen when they logged in to their bank’s site.  Always be wary when you are suddenly asked for information you’ve never had to provide in the past.

Hopefully the recovery will go ok, fingers crossed.  So glad I backed it all up not too long ago!  Two things to learn from me:

1) Go back up your computer, right now.

2) Don’t download anything from Swagbucks.

Now I’m off to break the news to the Hubs.  Anyone familiar with how Rachel apologizes to Ross when he discovers she and Joey are dating?  I’ll be using that technique…(I love Friends.  Perhaps too much.)

Man, I still love that before and after.  I know I’ve hit gold when I’m able to keep it looking like this for an entire year, because I’ve made no secret of the fact that neat does not come naturally to me, myself, and I.

Anywhoo, I thought I would mention that if you have an inexpensive organization tip, trick, project for any part of your house, go to Remodelaholic right now and link up!  There are not that many projects on there, and they are going to feature a few that catch their eye later this month.  Getting talked about by Remodelaholic is an awesome opportunity to drive traffic to your own site

Can I also admit that I linked up Pip’s closet organizer?  It is inexpensive in the grand scheme of closet organizers, but maybe not what Cassity was thinking when she said it is an inexpensive organization link-up party.  Do you see what I stress about??  Sheesh, it’s a wonder I don’t have high blood pressure.  I attribute dodging that bullet to a steady supply of wine.

Hope you are keeping warm–it is insanely cold here in Ohio right now!

I made a couple of pillows like this for our couch awhile back, and when I found the clearance sheets for Pip’s room that I talked about in the Scrap Wood Upholstered Footstool I recently posted about, I knew I eventually wanted to make some pillow covers for her room using the same process.

Let’s dive in, shall we?

First we need to make a pattern.  This looks complicated.  It’s not.  I used a 14″ square pillow form.  A square pillow form would work best for this, so whatever your dimension is (X) the 14.5 would be (X).5″ and the 7.5″ would be half of your (X) plus .5″.

Now use your pattern to cut out 4 triangles per pillow form.  Make sure your pattern pieces are on the same line of your stripe for each one.

The triangles are not stitched together in this next picture.  Just showing you why the cutting out part is important.

Pins would be a really good idea at this point.  If you have problems with your fabric “crawling” on you (one side moves faster or slower than the other and the end of your stitching doesn’t match up when you are done stitching the seam together) then I would definitely pin.  Right sides together, and matching up the stripes from each triangle are important at each pinned spot.  Stitch two smaller triangles, then the other two, then stitch the two halves together.  Quarter inch seam allowances.

I  have an aversion to pinning, so I didn’t…but I was careful to match stripes down the entire seam.

That finishes the top.  Now the back needs cut out.  Mine turned out too big since I had a lapse in the thinking process and included 1/2″ seam allowances in my sketch.  It might still be big with the new dimensions, not sure.

Iron a 1/2″ over, twice to finish the 15″ sides of both pieces.

Overlap the two back pieces, right side up.

Place the pillow cover front over the back pieces.  Although it would make more sense to put the pillow cover top down, right side up, and lay the backs overlapping over the top piece.  Go figure that I would do something the hard way…so not like me…Not!

I had to trim some excess from the back pieces, as I mentioned earlier.

I did pin this time because I had to.  The two back pieces would have slipped around

I think I made my seam allowances a little more than 1/4″ for all four sides, so that the cover fit snugly over the pillow form.  Just a little bit though.

Turn the pillow cover right side out and slip in the pillow form!  Here’s how the back turned out.

Voila!  Not too difficult, but pretty neat.

Do you see the flowers on her nightstand?  Pip picked those out at Kohls in their Christmas clearance section and she paid for them with her own money.  I love them–she’s got good taste!

Interested in making another pillow cover?  Check out the How to sew a Ruffled Flower Pillow tutorial.

See what I mean?  This was a very easy project.  I had put together the bench part before I started on the living room built-in, but I finished the rest of this in the midst of my general-Christmas-madness-combined-with-starting-a-major-project brilliance.  I will once again beg all of you to remind me that I should not start major projects during the holiday season next year!

I left the edges of the plywood unfinished–I just filled some spots where there were little voids in the ply with wood putty and sanded really well.  Two coats of primer and 1 coat of my white.  I did do two thin coats of polycrylic since I had it out already for the living room built in.  I really like the smooth finish I end up with when I use it.

Here are the steps I used to upholster the top.

Leftover 1/2″ foam from my DIY camera bag, muslin, thin quilt batting, scrap wood the size you want the top, and a staple gun with some staples.  I didn’t include the fabric for the top in the photo.

I put two layers of the 1/2″ foam on the top of the board.  Obviously you could use 1″ instead, or even one layer of 1/2.  The sky is the limit to your choices

The fabric I have used for a few of the projects in Pip’s room came from two clearance sets of sheets I got years ago when I knew she was moving to a regular sized bed.  I paid $10 total for both and I’ve made her duvet cover, 2 pillows (you’ll see those soon),  a chair cover, and the cover for this footstool.  That $10 went pretty far!

Here I layered the batting, muslin, and the sheet fabric on top of the foam and board and then cut around that.  As you can see, it isn’t a precision project.  I left about 2″ on all sides.

Staple one side, leaving some room on the ends to make nice corners.  Pull the other side so it is taut, but not so that it is stretching and making the foam do funky stuff.  Staple the second side.

I think this is the tricky part for upholstering–the corners.  I have no idea if this is the “correct” way, but it is how I did it and it turned out for my purposes.  Neatly lay it out like you are wrapping a present…at least if you wrap presents this way…if not, follow the picture!  I put one staple in each edge to hold it in place before I went on to the next step.

I also trimmed the batting from the corners to remove some of the bulk from wrapping it this way.  Trim both corners at this end.

Then I brought that side up and stapled it in place–pull it taut, but not so tight  that it pulls the foam in weird ways.

Repeat on the other side.  And you’re done with the top!

To attach the top, I drilled four holes through the to of the bench part of the footstool using a bit around the same size as the wood screws I used to attach the upholstered part.  I had to use a screwdriver and my muscles to attach this, since my drill wouldn’t fit in there.  I turned it upside down and used my knee to keep the two parts tightly together as I attached it.

**Updated picture to clarify attaching the two parts together.  I think I actually sat on the part with the pocket holes and then screwed the screws into the top part by hand. You need to have drilled the holes through the top before you turn it over so that it is easier to do this by hand.  The top is already upholstered when you do this step–this would be your final step in the construction of the footstool!

I made the dimensions so that it could be stashed next to her desk or be used as a table next to the chair as well, but Pip is enjoying using it to kick back and read.  She is able to use her chair much more comfortably for that purpose since she got this simple, scrap wood, upholstered footstool added to her room!

I think that all I have left in there is a few more pictures on the wall to the left of her chair!  An entire room complete.  I can hardly wrap my head around it…

***

I love PureBond plywood and since that is what I use to build with, that is the scraps I have left over to build free projects with!  Hence, this footstool was made with PureBond.

Here’s a picture of one of the doors I put into the built-in for the living room.  I actually didn’t mean to construct them this way…I meant to do it the same way I constructed the drawer fronts on Pip’s closet organizer.  But I remembered that after I had already routered the edges on all the 1x3s I used for the rails and stiles.  Oops.  Constructing them this way  makes it more difficult to assemble the door perfectly square and end up with cuts that meet exactly right on the corners.

One door was perfect and it was the one I did second.  For that door I assembled 3 corners, and then used the clamps in the picture to square up the door before screwing in the pocket  holes for the last corner.  To make sure the door is square, you measure the diagonal corners–each measurement should be the same.  If not, adjust the clamps until they are.  The one that I did first, and didn’t square it up with the clamps before attaching the last corner, did not turn out exactly square…I had to shave off the top edge.  Next time I construct a door or drawer front that is going to be inset, I’ll plan on making it a little oversized so I can shave it down to perfect (thanks for that hint Dennis!)

Now onto the pocket hole plug jig.  First step is to take a piece of scrap and drill the pocket holes into both ends.  I used my miter saw to shave off some of the ends of the boards after I drilled the holes, so that the screws could move freely without catching on the wood.  Don’t take off too much though, then the screw falls right through the hole (I did that the first try…).  Put screws into each pocket hole.

Next up is to cut some of your dowel into smaller sections.  I think mine were 1.5″.  Use a 3/8″ rod for the Kreg Jig system.  Pound them into place with a hammer–it will be a tight fit.

The guy in the video purchased a hand saw to cut these flush.  It was inexpensive–you can watch the video for his recommendation.  I already had a Dremel MultiMax**, so I didn’t want to purchase another tool.  I used the wood and metal blade that comes in the Dremel MultiMax 14 piece accessory kit.  I think there is a blade included with the Dremel that works, but we did another project with that one and I needed to use a fresh blade (you’ll see that project sometime soon).  It worked well for my purposes without having to shell out more money for the 3/4″ flush cut blade that is recommended in their video.

Then pop out the plugs by tapping the screws with a hammer.

You can see in this photo that the plugs were burnt.  I had to play around with the speed of the Dremel to get it like the first photo of the plugs cut flush.  When I had it at the higher speed, I couldn’t move the blade through the wood fast enough and it created the burned edge.  Slowing down the speed worked just right.

After you remove the plugs from the jig, you can put them into your project.  You’ll have to tap them in with something.  I used a hammer, but that creates dents in pine.  A rubber mallet may have been a better option–or using a block of wood between the project and the hammer, which is what I switched to after the first few dents

It isn’t perfectly flush, at least in my initial attempts with this jig.  I used wood putty over the entire area.

And finally, I sanded it all smooth with my finish sander and 220 grit sandpaper.

I was pleased with the finished product.  This was painted too, so the back of the door ended up with a nicer finish than if I had just left them with the exposed pocket holes.

You could also just stick a 3/8″ dowel into your project and flush cut it there, but I didn’t want to chance marring the door.  I don’t like to add any more steps than necessary to a project, but I will continue to use the pocket hole plug jig to make the plugs!

Other posts in this series:

Living Room Built-Ins {post 1: The Befores}

Living Room Built-Ins {post 2: The Plans}

Living Room Built-Ins {post 3: The Reveal}

Living Room Built-Ins {post 4: Coping Base Moulding}

Living Room Built-Ins {post 5: How to Install Crown Moulding}

**Dremel sent me the Dremel MultiMax and the 14 pc accessory kit to try out and tell my readers how it performed for me.  All opinions about the product are mine alone.

Here’s the tutorial from CraftyNest.com.

Has anyone else done this already?  Have you turned any other clothing into something useful?  I have a slight obsession with tote bags.  I think I need to cull some of my other not-so-cute totes and donate them…

Painter’s tape to the rescue!

Keep the moulding right where you want it while using a nail gun.

This would have been impossible to try to drill into the cabinet without extra help.

Just two quick examples of how I have used it beyond its obvious purpose.  I’ve also seen some examples on the web how others have used the tape for clamping.  Here is a video from DittleDattle.blogspot.com where Carrie uses it to construct some 4×4 posts out of mdf.  This bit of genius may be coming in handy for a future project I have in mind for one of my boys.  And Sandra over at Sawdustandpaperscraps.com recently used it to finish her library.

What about you??  Have you discovered the wonders of painter’s tape?  What have you used it for (because I can always use a hint or two as well!!)