Still in the Spare Bedroom

Spare bedroom from the door after second 15 minute session

Today's requisite 15 minute session is again in the spare bedroom. Since this room is usually closed off from the rest of the house I don't dust or vacuum in here often. But my daughter says she might come spend the night this weekend with her girls, so I thought I'd better knock down the dust today.

spare room after second 15 minute session

So what I did in 15 minutes, rearranged a few more things to take up less space. Stripped the bed and put the sheets to wash. Dusted the ceiling, walls, molding and window blinds with my feather duster, washed the window and the window sill, ran the vacuum. Now the only thing I actually took out of here today was a small storage table, more about that in a minute.

spare room after second 15 minute session

When I realized that this little storage table was empty I realized it would be perfect in the living room as it is smaller and will take up less space than the old coffee table. The other great thing is that I can use it to corral all of the grand kids crayons and pencils, coloring books and papers in it.

Pine wood storage table with painted decoration

I made this little table about 20 years ago (which is probably a whole Squidoo article I should write!) You see I used to belong to a historical recreation group and was camping out every weekend.

 The top of this box is not hinged, it just sits down over the body and the lip of the table top keeps it in place. The table top is wood grain formica over press board, with a real oak band. It is recycled from a local fast food restaurant. (A friend was shift manager during a remodel and acquired several of these.) It is about 24 inches square.

There is a lift out tray in the top of the box

 The box was built of scrap lumber I had handy, 1x12 pine boards make the body. The bottom of the box is a little smaller, a frame of 1x4's with a piece of plywood on top. The plywood is probably luann or some other imported wood. I scavenged it off a pallet that was used to ship computers on. small pieces of 2x4 layed on their sides gave me a good place to attach 4 casters so the little table can be rolled around. The lift out tray in the top is made of 1x3s with a piece of 3/8 inch plywood for the bottom.

painted table showing inside cleats that tray rests on

 There are two small bits of wood in the inside that act as cleats for the lift out tray to rest on. The outside of the box has two handles for carrying.

 While I designed the box using the materials to hand, I kept in mind the purpose for which I was making it. I wanted a small table in camp to put by my chair to hold my lunch and drinks and maybe a bowl of fruit. I also needed someplace to store all the plates, cups, silverware and what not.



In the bottom of the box I stored my fruit bowl, my plates, cups and bowls, a few snack items like tinned meat and crackers, along with my napkins. In the lift out tray I used a plastic cutlery tray in the large section to keep my silver ware in. In the narrow section I kept my knives and bottle openers. It was very nice to have something nice to look at that could serve so many functions at once. Another nice thing about it was that when I went home and unpacked it could just sit and be a handy table in the living room.

 I've taken so much time to show off the box to encourage you to look around at your 'stuff' with fresh eyes, see how you can make, fix or refurbish something to better suit your purpose.


Oh yes, the decoration? The designs were taken from Medieval Folk in Painting. Quite a fun book with easy to follow photographs and instructions for a number of different projects.





Now I was so excited to have gotten some space in the spare bedroom I went and did an additional 15 minutes working in my front room.

Here it is afterwards. Mostly today I used my feather duster to get the majority of dust and cobwebs off my loom and other weaving equipment and shifted those items to the spare bedroom. I knocked down spiderwebs and dust off the walls and swept up the floor, though looking at it I think I need to run the vacuum and mop too. Well, I'll save that for another day!