When we remodeled our house I wanted a space for built-in shelves. When figuring out the layout of everything, I found the perfect place next to our fireplace to have them. Before Marty and I moved into our house my mom and I took measurements of where the shelves were going so we could get them ordered. It only took about a year … but finally a month ago we started looking on Etsy for different shelf options. I knew I wanted old, distressed, stained floating wood shelves. I soon realized they cost anywhere from $150-250 each – this was going to cost a whole lot more than I expected!!
My mom decided we could make the shelves ourselves so we started watching DIY YouTube videos on distressing wood. We thought it looked easy enough and had a lot of confidence in ourselves. We bought planks of Douglas Fir wood; borrowed a miter saw from a friend and my brother cut the wood to the exact lengths we needed; my mom started beating up the wood with a chain, hammer, saw, grinder, nails, and anything else we could find in the garage; she stained, sanded, stained, sanded, and then sanded them some more; and finished with two coats of Polyurethane. Let me tell you the wood looked SO good – it was perfect and cost only $100, time, and labor!!
Now it was up to my dad to figure out how to hang the shelves. He went to a cabinet shop and talked through different options and came back with a plan. If you know my dad, you know he’s a bit OCD and a bit of a perfectionist. So last Friday he came over and spent hours getting the shelves spaced and aligned just right. And let me tell you, they couldn’t be more perfect!! I love our shelves! I need to go shopping to find new decorations for them! I went around our house collecting random things to put on them in the meantime.
THANK YOU mom and dad for helping (well actually doing all of the work) with the shelves!! If it wasn’t for you that would forever be an awkward empty space in our house.
