Saturday, September 23, 2017

DIY Desks in Girls Room- Made from Nightstands


There has always been this little spot in the corner of the girls shared bedroom that I just never knew what to do with. This little spot has housed dressers, nightstands, and a dollhouse, but something just seemed off about each change I kept making to it.
One day while talking to my husband about it, he suggested putting desks there for the girls. Before the addition of their desks, they would play with their dolls or color and draw on the floor (and there is nothing wrong with that!), but I knew that if we could somehow make desks for them they would finally have their own space to play, color and draw, while keeping toys, crayons, and markers off the floor.



One night while thinking about desk ideas, I remembered we had these $5 nightstands I bought at a thrift store years ago. One was being used in our bedroom and the other was just sitting in my son's closet not serving any purpose. I knew I could swap out my nightstand for one that was in our room already and convert these 2 matching nightstands we already owned into desks.
My husband said the project would be doable and figured we should give it a try!

We went to Home Depot and looked at all of our wood options and bought simple 1X3's which cost us about $16 total.

So if this worked out, it would only cost us about $21 for BOTH desks!! Holla! That would be a good deal. Plus, the paint I wanted to use for these was given to me by a friend from church who had a bunch of samples left over from a project she did a while ago. Hooray!!!



I also took this $5 chair (another thrift store find a couple years back) and added pink chevron fabric that I saved from a project I did last year. Sometimes it pays to save things. ;)









Putting the desks together was fairly an easy process. My husband cut all the wood to the size we wanted and attached them with screws.



I added some caulk along the edges of where the boards met the side of the desk so there wouldn't be a gap.





Because of the size and dimensions of our desks, the legs were a bit wobbly, so I made a quick trip to Wal-Mart and bought a packet of L-brackets in order to keep the wobbling at a minimum. It's been working well so far!







All I had to do was paint the desks and sand them...and then they were ready to be used! And boy have our girls been using them everyday!

Here are some pictures of their room with the finished desks.
















 

To read about the painted doors, go here.

Also, if you are interested in making doll bunk beds, Ana White has some great plans on how to do that. She is definitely a very talented woman!











We've had the desks in here for about a week, and they are seeing good use. 
It's so sweet to see my girls play together. There's plenty of arguing in between those moments for sure, but it makes us happy when they show grace and love to each other. 

Saving money tip: If you are looking to save and not splurge on children's desk, check out your local thrift store(s) for inexpensive nightstands. They usually carry tons! We bought ours for $5 a piece. Just make sure to look for ones that have an opening at the bottom so you can slide chairs or ottomans easily underneath. 
The nightstands we purchased years ago had legs that were easily removable and all we did was add longer wooden legs to them. 


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