Friday, October 7, 2011

Chalk Holder

Super simple craft review today. A little background first:


My husband and I bought our first home, a fixer upper back in 2008 a few months after we were married. At first it was a whirlwind of activity fixing it up. It has slowed down and picked back up a couple times in the last almost three years. One of the first things we did was rip all the paneling out of the family room and adjoining kitchen, and paint the kitchen cabinets. Once that was done, our gross little pantry door stuck out like a sore thumb. Take a look:
(apparently it was February when I took this pic. and please ignore the wall color, it was the 3rd one I tried - I am currently on #4 and not sure I love this one either)

I was skeeved out by the years of grease and dirt near the handle. Here's a lovely close up of that:


To make it all go away, I decided to pick up some chalkboard paint I have seen in blogs and on tv, and create a little chalkboard/message board for us. I painted a large rectangle in the middle, bordered it with some white paint we used for the trim, and my husband framed it out with some moulding. Unfortunately, I have no during pics. But you can see the finished product in this random photo - btw we don't eat like this every night, my husband recreated the meal we had at our wedding reception for our anniversary. Isn't he sweet?:

(this is kitchen color #4, still not sold on it)

Since then, we have been storing our chalk in a little cup inside the pantry. It worked, but we didn't use the board as much as I think we would if the chalk was out and visible. Once I joined Pinterest, I kept seeing this lovely little idea:
(photo from here)

The pin actually came from a etsy ad for the whole chalkboard. Obviously I already had the board, but what a simple and genius idea! So on one of our weekend Home Depot trips (they usually happen weekly), I browsed the cabinet hardware section and picked out a Martha Stewart cabinet pull. I liked the dark color (it matches the rest of our cabinet hardware) and I loved the square shape. At only $4.97, it was a cheap investment.

After I got it home I had to figure out the placement. The chalkboard part is pretty narrow, so I didn't want to put it by the door handle, cutting the board in half. I decided on putting it near the top so it wouldn't interfere with any potential large scale pieces of "art". Once I drilled my holes, I ran into a problem...the screws were too short to go all the way through the door into the holder:

(please ignore my fat swollen pregnancy hands and messy pantry)


Having a Plan B is nothing new to this family, many of our projects have been redirected halfway through. My temporary solution? Use command adhesive strips on the back of the holder. Not very conventional or scientific, but I cut up two strips, stuck them on the back of the holder, and stuck it onto the door. I was concerned that the holder would be too heavy and fall down, but it has been a couple weeks and so far, so good. Eventually I will get some proper screws and make it more permanent, but for now it works. Anyway, here it is:



I like that the holder itself blends into the chalkboard and I can even write on it (I love a label).


So there you go, a ton of words and pics for a simple 5 minute project. Stay tuned for some etsy product reviews and hopefully some more recipe reviews before the baby arrives (18 days until the due date!).
-Grace


No comments:

Post a Comment

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...