HOW TO BUILD A MID CENTURY COFFEE TABLE

So as promised, here is the process in which I built my coffee table!

I love the lines of Mid Century modern furniture and I feel like it is so versatile and compliments so many different styles and furniture pieces. I wanted a coffee table that had clean lines, the Mid Century style and offered a little more storage than just a regular table. So I did a little research and found this style. It was so simple and a great blank canvas that I could design around. I knew the style that I wanted, but I definitely didn't want to spend upwards of $300 which is what most of the ones I found were going for. Plus, I always wanted to tweak them to fit my style and design anyways...So since I had already built a dining table and needed a new project to start anyways....I decided that I would just build it myself. 

Here are all of the supplies you need:

Two 18" x 36" pieces of wood

Two 8" x 18" pieces of wood 

Four 8" Tapered legs 

Four Angled Leg Plates

3/8" Dowels

Wood Glue

Wood Filler 

Wood Stain (if you want it stained)

Polyurethane 

Tools:

Orbital Sander (or a lot of patience and sand paper)
A Dowel Jig (I found mine at Home Depot)

Drill with a 3/8" Drill bit

Level

Screwdriver

Wood clamps

Now, I must say that I built this coffee table with the help of my Grandfather-in-law and I would strongly suggest getting someone to help you assemble this if you are just starting out. I definitely don't think I could have done it without him! 

I bought the wood for my table at Lowes and had them cut it down for me there since I do not have a saw at our condo to do this, but I would definitely recommend doing it at home if you have the resources to do so. The associates there are not always the most accurate when cutting the wood down and that is kind of a major deal when it comes to building furniture. I had to do a lot of sanding to do to get the wood to the same length and I think it would have been easier and less time consuming if I had just cut the wood myself. But I digress.. 

The first thing that I did was measure where the dowels would go and figure out how to use the dowel jig. This was the hardest part of the whole project! Definitely practice on two scrap pieces of wood before you start drilling into your good pieces of wood. This little dowel jig did the job but it definitely took a LOT of patience, practice and 2 sets of hands. I unfortunately didn't take pictures of this process.. but I will try and explain it the best I can. 

This is the basic concept of the how the dowel joint is going to work: 

Diagram from Hobbit House Inc.

I evenly measured out 4 places where I wanted the dowels to be on each piece of wood. Be sure to discretely mark the wood to remind yourself later how each piece of wood lines up. Follow the instructions for whichever dowel jig you have to make the holes on each piece of wood.We marked our drill bit with tape to make sure that we wouldn't be drilling down too far. I also recommend clamping everything down to ensure that the dowel jig does not move when you begin drilling... this was definitely the trickiest part! 

Once all the holes were drilled on all the pieces of wood, we dry fit the table together to make sure that everything fit perfectly before we glued it together. 

When everything looked like a good fit, we took the pieces apart again, applied glue to the edge of the board and down into the holes and reassembled. When you are doing this, make sure it is done quickly to ensure the glue does not set before the pieces are assembled. Once everything was assembled again, we clamped down the wood and let it sit overnight. 

Because my pieces of wood were not perfectly cut at Lowes, I had lots of sanding to do to make sure that the wood was flush. 

The picture below is once I finished sanding. Would you just look at that beautiful edge! Nice and flush! 

I also filled all of the seams with wood filler. This is optional but I just thought it make it look a little more finished.

Next I screwed the leg plates to the bottom of the table, and screwed in the legs! 

This is it assembled before it was sealed with polyurethane....Love at first sight! 

I applied 3 coats of satin finish, water-based polyurethane and sanded with a 220 grit sandpaper in between and this is the finished product! I cannot be more happy with the way it turned out! I hope you guys give this a go if you are in the market for a new coffee table and enjoy DIY projects! 

 Anyways, I hope you enjoyed this and let me know in the comments if you think you will try it out!
Happy Building!

DIY COFFEE TABLE

So I have finished another project and I definitely have to share!

So I this was the next piece of furniture in the living room that I wanted to replace. The old coffee table I had was a Mid Century style that was given to me by my mom. The stain didn't match the rest of the furniture and it didn't have the clean modern lines that I wanted so badly.

I thought of just getting a piece of wood and adding the mid century legs to it to make a standard table. It would have been a lot cheaper and way easier...BUT my husband is very practical and didn't want to go from a coffee table that had some storage (the shelf underneath) to something with less storage and I also agreed. With a small apartment, the key is to maximize all of the opportunities to add a little more storage.

So I had seen this style through my Pinterest searches and thought it looked like something I could accomplish on my own. I will be doing a separate post that will be a step-by-step guide to build this yourself! It definitely takes some patience but I think it turned out GREAT and is definitely worth it!

DRUGSTORE BEAUTY ESSENTIALS

There are few products that I feel that I must simply have in my makeup bag. These are the tried and true, five star, work like a dream beauty products that I need to have in my makeup bag at ALL TIMES! 

1. Blistex Lip Balm 

So let me start by saying that I am currently wearing Blistex Lip Balm on my lips... right now... as I type. This stuff is amazing. I will warn you though, it does have that medicated salve-y scent to it; so if that isn't your thing, then this might not be for you. I love this lip balm though, and I actually like the scent. It moisturizes, it repairs, and if it's winter than you better believe I am putting this on every night before bed. 

2. Physicians Formula Conceal Rx 

I feel like the job of a concealer is to completely mask whatever it is that you are trying to conceal...hence the name. Nothing aggravates me more than buying a conceal that does literally less than my foundation does when it comes to coverage. If I have a blemish, I need something that is going to completely cover it, and continue covering it for the duration of the day. I don't want it melting away with the Florida heat. This concealer fits the bill! It is FULL coverage, but not too thick, and can be blended for a lighter more natural finish. It's not a one trick pony either where you can only use it under your eyes, or on your face. This is an AND product. I use it for my under eye circles as well as any blemishes/redness that I may have that day. It's one flaw is that it can settle in creases from time to time so make sure you set it with a powder and you should be good to go! A little goes a long way and you definitely get your money's worth out of this product. 

Moving right along! 

3. Rimmel London Stay Matte Setting Powder

Do yourself a favor and just go buy this product right now. It is SOOO inexpensive and does a beautiful job at setting foundation. As you can see, I have hit pan on mine and will soon be making my way back to the drugstore to pick up another because I can't go a day without it! Why spend tons of money on a powder when this one does an amazing job for a fraction of the price. Try it out, you wont regret it!

4. Revlon Colorstay 24 hr Foundation for Combination/Oily Skin

Medium/Full coverage with a beautiful finish...Isn't that what most people want in a foundation? Well this is it. Although I had taken a little break from this product over the summer opting for a lighter BB cream, I find myself reaching for it during these cooler days or want to go for the porcelain skin finish. For a girl with combination skin who lives in Florida, it is extremely VITAL to find a foundation that wont run off your face throughout a hot, humid summer day. I can always count on this foundation and actually wore it on my wedding day. 

5. Wet n' Wild Eye Shadow palette in Walking on Eggshells

This is by far the best product you will find for the price you will pay. All of Wet n' Wild's eye shadow palettes have incredible color payoff, they are velvety to touch, wear beautifully, and are SUPER affordable (not to mention they also put coupons in the paper to make it even more affordable). I use this product for my everyday makeup and have for the past year. I have hit pan but it has lasted me an incredibly long time! I will most definitely be making a trip to the store for another in the very near future! 

Well those are my Drugstore Beauty Essentials! Let me know if there is anything that will never leave your makeup bag, or if you have tried any of these products and what you thought of them! 

Until next time :)

MODERN TAKE ON OLD SCHOOL DESK

I’m back with another project that I have completed!

Behold my new end table! I know what you are thinking…”Is that a school desk?” Why yes, yes it is. I wish I could say that I thought of this on my own but I actually got the idea from a tour I saw on Apartment Therapy. 

I get TONS of inspiration from the house/apartment tours on Apartment Therapy.com, one of my favorite blogs of all time! Most of the time when I’m browsing through different tours, I’m making mental notes of things that I want to recreate in my own home one day. I came across a tour that I absolutely loved which ironically enough was called "Jesse's Modern Bachelor Pad." The last thing I am trying to create here is a bachelor pad... I'm just trying to convey more of a mature, put together home. But this house tour is one of my favorites. It's modern, but cozy... a hint of Scandinavian design....it is just simply GORGEOUS! 

 Photo from Apartment Therapy 

As you can see, I was inspired by this old school desk that was re-purposed into a nightstand. So when I came across an old school desk at a thrift store for $2.99... I just could not leave it behind. 

I loved that I could adjust the height of the desk to fit the low profile sofa that we have, and how I could incorporate more natural wood into the space. 

I basically just cleaned up the old desk, painted the base, removed the top and replaced it with a piece of birch plywood that I bought at Lowes. Then I just put a satin clear coat on top to protect the wood. The table top matches the Ikea Poang chair's frame perfectly and also the legs of the sofa (It's the Karlstad from Ikea).

I decided to add the geometric cut out on the top to make it easier to use the storage area underneath since the only way the end table fits in our small apartment is up against the sofa. 

It was definitely a fun project and let's face it... who can beat an end table for $15! My husband was definitely a fan of the price! 

Stay tuned for my next project! I'm going to be building a Mid Century inspired coffee table! 

MID CENTURY MAKEOVER

Remember in my last post when I said I was refinishing some old mid century modern chairs?? Well they are finally done! It took way too long due to having the flu, a cold, and a little bronchitis (insert "Ain't nobody got time for dat") but alas, they are finished!

I wasn't really in blogging mode when I made these aka I didn't take a lot of pictures but I do have a before and after and it is pretty impressive if I do say so myself! 

So, can I first start by saying that CHAIRS ARE SO FREAKING EXPENSIVE! For being the bargainista that I am, I was completely naive going into the chair buying process. The least expensive chairs I could find were at Ikea. They weren't the best quality (not saying their stuff isn't great quality, but for the price I was looking for...they just weren't). A fifty dollar chair is "apparently" very inexpensive....but then you have to buy 4 of them and suddenly you are shelling out 200 bucks for some chairs. The chairs I wanted though were not 50 dollars....they were more like $150....and that's when it gets a little hard to open your wallet! 

Luckily, I was fortunate that my mom and her fiance had some old chairs in storage that where the perfect style that I was looking for. There were four chairs and they were all the mid century modern style...but they were different styles and in pretty roouuughhhh shape. Lets just say my mom told me they had been in storage 15 years...

Now I'm hip, *cough I'm really not...cough* I read blogs and I stumbled across this beauty!

Photo from A Beautiful Mess 

A Beautiful Mess did a post on the process of painting and reupholstering some different chairs and now look at them! They are PERFECT! I decided to apply this same concept to my new, well, old chairs and I loved the way they turned out! 

 Pay no attention to the carpet in the dining room...its a rental.

Here are some close-ups if you really want to get in there and see! 

Have you started any new projects so far in 2014? If so, leave a comment and let me know! I'm always looking for new projects around the home! 

DIY DINING ROOM TABLE

This Stylizimo table with a twist was built for under $100 and is as easy as can be!

I also found more detailed instructions on Little Lucy Lu's blog post here. 

What You Need: 

Two Lerberg legs from IKEA- $10 each

Five 1" x 8" boards cut to 4' (I bought three 8' boards and had them cut in half)- $16 a board

Three 2" x 4" cut to a little shorter than the width of the table $6

Sandpaper

Wood Screws (I asked a Lowes Associate what length I needed)

Minwax Wood Stain in Espresso-$8

Minwax Gloss Polyurethane- $10

Minwax Prestain Wood Conditioner (optional)-$11

Let's Get Started! 

1. First decide how you want to arrange the boards

2. Measure and arrange 2 x 4's on the underneath

  3. Screw 2 x 4's to wood - Two screws to each 1 x 8

4. Flip over and sand everything until smooth (this takes some time and patience!)

Make sure you wipe all of the wood dust off THOROUGHLY with barely damp rag

5. Add a coat of Pre-Stain (this is optional)

6. Paint on stain (I used two coats)

7. Wait for stain to completely dry

8. Assemble Lerberg Legs

9. When stain is completely dry, lightly sand with 220 grit sandpaper, wipe away dust thoroughly and paint on clear coat 

10. When clear coat is completely dry, lightly sand with 220 sandpaper, wipe down and apply another coat of clear coat. (I did this 3 times)

11. When top is COMPLETELY dry, flip table and repeat process on the bottom side

This doesn't need to be perfect because no one will really see it. 

I only did one coat of the clear gloss for the bottom.

This is the finished product!

I absolutely love this table and I also enjoyed making it! Give it a try and let me know how it works out for you! 

My next project will be some refinishing some mid-century modern chairs! 

BUILDING A DINING TABLE?!?

I enjoy creating things. Whether it is painting, ceramics, drawing, building, makeup, crafting or decorating; nothing gives me quite the thrill of completing a project and knowing that I made THAT! (whatever “that” might be)

As I have mentioned before, my husband and I are newlyweds! (We are going on 7 months now!!) This means for us that we have quite a bit of hand-me-down furniture which we are very thankful for …..but that "we" (mostly me…my husband doesn't care about decorating) want to slowly replace with things that are more our style.

So what am I working on now?! I built a Dining room table!! You might be asking yourself why I decided to tackle this project.

I'll start by saying that my husband is an EXTREME saver. I LOVE this about him… but that typically means that I have to bargain shop to find the things I "want" and don't "need." This isn't a big deal because I LOVE
bargain shopping, but dining room tables are EXPENSIVE, especially if you want quality. So naturally I decided to build one!

 I got the idea from a blog. (No big surprise there!) Which blog? Stylizimo…and you can find the post right here.

I loved the look of this table and how easy it would be to make. I mean, I have never built a piece of furniture before… so convincing my husband that I could make this was a little easier with this simple design.

I did alter it a little though because I wanted the stain on the table top to be a dark espresso color.

I will be doing a separate blog post to go more step by step on how I built the table but here is a sneak peak of the finished product!

I would definitely give this a try if you are looking for a table or desk and want more of a beginner's project!

Let me know what you think!