Making Tabletops from Lemons

Have I mentioned how much I love reclaimed wood? A lot. And I happened to find some in my house! The previous owners had jimmy-rigged a “storage system” over the toilet in the master bathroom – yes, open storage over the toilet – that left these purty little shapes on my wall when I immediately ripped them down:

I see it; the off-center toilet bugs me too.

I mean, it was like the first thing I did in the house, right after closing.  Sups hid. (“super hideous” if you don’t happen to speak Princess) Face it, this idea of storage was a dud and part of me really wishes they hadn’t painted over the yellow walls; so sunny!

I was able to salvage the shelves by removing the supports and sanding everything down. You may remember this post where I stripped down the longest one (that was over the closet door) and we last left everything looking like this:

Well I finally got my hands on a jig saw and quartered the six footer into submission. When laid together, it was all starting to look like a 3x3.08’ tabletop. Yay!

I even found use for part of the old supports by using them as the connecting pieces.  I laid everything out the way I wanted it and started gluing.

Since each support had two holes predrilled from where it attached to the wall, I used some washers to secure the screws. After those were in, I just screwed directly into the wood in a bunch of other spots. The wood is super soft so I didn't need a drill bit, but I did have to make sure I didn’t get to close to the ends for fear of it splitting.

 

Here it is with everything screwed in:

And here it is all done!

I am storing it indoors and laid flat so that there isn't any warp-age between now and when I actually get the table base and banquette seating together during Phase 2. I will probably need to seal the wood since it will be used for dining, but it feels so good to cross something off of the list!  The stripe-y natural wood is going to be a warm, welcome contrast to all of the stainless steel in the room and the cool blue walls.

Did anyone else get to cross something off their list this weekend? Or rip something apart and put it back together? Do tell!

~Easty