BG

Friday, February 7, 2014

Upstairs construction

The title of this post is a little misleading. However, I did use a miter box, saw, drill, screws, wall anchors, a level, liquid nails, a hammer, and finishing nails - I consider that a construction project!

Upstairs we have a lot of built ins. There are two that caddy corner in the far corner of the room. The problem was that there was a hole (down to the floor) where the built ins met. Paul (one of our cats) loves to climb and regulary jumps onto the shelves, and has started to investigate the hole! I can't imagine the chaos that would ensue if he got stuck down there.

So, construction project!


I started by cutting some scrap wood into 6 inch pieces to use as cleats to hold up a piece of wood to cover the hole.

I couldn't find any studs, so to attach them, I drilled pilot holes and used wall anchors to give a bit more grip to the screws.


Because I'm paranoid and a crazy cat lady (in case Paul decides to sit on the newly constructed piece), I also used liquid nails to help REALLY secure the cleats to the wall.


After the pieces were secured to the wall, I had to find more scrap wood to cover the hole. I really didn't want to try to cut a piece of wood to fit without a jigsaw on hand, so I tried to find something that would magically fit.

I didn't have anything in my scrap wood pile, but looking around the room, I realized I had 12 (yes 12) extra shelves that I wasn't going to use in the book shelves, so I decided to just use a couple of them to cover the hole. You can't see the top of the shelves (unless you are 7 ft tall) so I didn't really care if it looked that great.

I used two and nailed them into the top of the built ins, and voila!


The hole is gone!! There is a small hole still visible, but it is less than an inch wide, so Paul can now climb up there safely without me worrying about him. :)

On a more fun note, I also decorated some of the shelves with stuff we had around the house.

 
The dog picture from my old office cube and Jon's beloved Peanuts print

 
Sports memorabilia and movies/games filled our other shelves.

There are still some either items I want to get, like more storage boxes to help fill some shelves, but it's definitely an improvement!

-T

1 comment:

  1. I miss that puppy painting! :)

    And I'm impressed. I have no clue what cleats are...well, apart from the ones soccer players (like Juan Pablo!) wear. :)

    ReplyDelete