Everything Old is New Again...

   I have a stack of little wooden boxes that held clementine oranges sitting on my craft table. The stack keeps growing because, well, I keep buying the oranges. I've been wondering what to do with them because I can't bear to throw them out and I know they could be useful in some manner. After playing around with them for a while, turning them around and stacking them up, I realized that they would be great for organizing craft materials. 

   I lightly sanded any lose bits of wood off the edges of the box and then painted it with sage green paint. I painted one end of it with blackboard paint. If you've never used blackboard paint, try it...I guarantee that you will become addicted to it. I used this particular box to hold some of my rubber stamps. I plan to make more like this one for other craft supplies. The added advantage is that you can stack them on top of each other, thus saving a lot of space. The other one I just sanded and put a primitive label on that says "Buttery 1879" and placed some of my antique canning jars in it. These are just a couple of examples of what you could do with these cute little crates. You could decorate them to use as Easter baskets by painting them and tying a ribbon around the outside of the box. You could decorate it, fill it with goodies and give it to someone  as a gift; leave it on your counter to hold coffee, tea, sugar, honey, and teaspoons; it's the perfect size for holding quite a few Cd's or dvd's; the possibilities are endless!
   I found this photo where someone used a clementine box to make a bed for a child's doll...very cool! And if you turned it upside down it could be a table.

   The blackboard paint that I mentioned can be used for many things. Besides using it on the clementine boxes, you could paint a section of your wall, put a picture frame (the older and more ornate the better in my opinion) and use it as a message board, paint a section of wall in your kids bedroom and tell them they really can write on the walls (as long as they do it on the blackboard area) and then stand back and watch their creativity flow, and you can paint the inside of one of your kitchen cabinet doors and use it as a shopping list. It's very handy, just look through your cupboards, see what your running low on, and write it on the chalkboard!

   This particular brand of chalkboard paint that I used is made by Rust-oleum. It's a 30 ounce can and I swear it must be bottomless because we have all used it on numerous projects and it's still half full!

   Wooden crates aren't the only thing you can re-purpose; how many times have you been driving down the road and spied an old bed sitting there for the trash man? Well, this is what we made out of two old beds that we had out in the barn:

   ...and here is how we did it:

   This is what it started out as, just your basic twin headboard and foot board. After washing and sanding it, we cut the footboard directly down the middle to make the arms. Using bolts and washers we attached the 'arms' to either side of the headboard. We had another part of an old bed out in the barn so we took a piece from that and used it for the front apron. After attaching that piece, we screwed sections of 1 x 3's to either side and the back.We then cut some pine boards to use as the seat and screwed them into place.

I sanded it all one more time and then painted it...voila! A very cool bench for just pennies! 

  Here's a photo of another one we made from a different bed on it's way to it's new home:

  These were both made from twin beds, but you could just as easily use a full size (or larger) and make a wider one. The twin size is easily comfortable for two people to sit on, and it's very sturdy. So the next time you're driving down the road or at your local landfill and see an old bed, you might want to take it home with you.....and now I think it's time for a tune. Feel free to sing along and dancing is strongly encouraged!