DIY Racing Stripe Desk

Oscar is still on a huge maze-drawing kick. He sits for hours every day drawing complicated mazes of every subject imaginable-- valentines, Super Mario Bros., the auditory system, words ("OSCAR" is his favorite to draw a maze through), the Mousetrap game, scenes from Totoro. As much as I love watching a budding skill, however, we had a problem. Despite my constant reminding him to put his finished papers in a designated box, his mazes had completely taken over the dining room table. It was clear to me that Oscar needed his very own space for creating. 

With permission, I dug a long-forgotten student desk out of my parents' shed. It was pretty beat-up, and years of neglect had left the seat very rough-- it would need to be refinished, or Oscar would be getting a bottomful of splinters every time he sat down on the thing. So I decided to have some fun with it and paint racing stripes on it.

It's my first furniture painting project, so it has its share of flaws, but I am so pleased with how it turned out. I left two stripes bare to let let the pretty wood grain shine through. Best of all, Oscar loves it, and I have my dining room table back! Win win!

Downright Domesticity DIY: magnetic spice rack!

Since we ended up renewing our lease for another year, we have decided to really make our little apartment liveable. In Oklahoma, we fell into the trap of looking at our apartment as just a temporary place to stay... and three years later, we were still living in a bland, crowded, dorm-like space. As Adam and I packed up the house and prepared to move, we agreed that we would decorate and home-ify EVERY space we lived in thereafter, whether we were there for six years or six months.

This past year, we did a great job with the living room/dining room/kitchen area, but the den was a wreck and we never got around to getting little necessities around the house (like a toothbrush holder). So when we renewed our lease, I made a little home decorating wish-list, and I've been trying to tackle at least one thing a week.

First up... a magnetic spice rack!

 They stick right to the fridge!

Labels on the side...

Incredibly strong neodymium magnets glued to the top.

A word about the magnets. Every tutorial I found was vague on these magnets, so I was kind of shooting blind when I ordered them. I got the 1/2" x 1/8" magnets from here. If I could do it over again, I'd get magnets that are at least 1/4" thick, because the jar tops dip inward more than 1/8". I had a problem getting some of the heavier jars to stay put on the fridge until I stacked some of the magnets on top of each other so they could actually touch the fridge. If I had realized this earlier, I probably could have gotten away with using fewer magnets. But it is definitely a testament to the neodymium magnet's crazy strength that some of those jars are held in place without having a magnet physically touching the refrigerator!

4-oz Ball jelly jars (12-pack) -- $8

50 neodymium magnets-- $17

Gorilla glue-- $2

Reclaiming my cupboards from all those spices-- TOTALLY WORTH IT!!!

Linked to Works for We Wednesday at We Are THAT Family!