A chalkboard Parson Desk

I have been lusting over a desk for a while now. I didn't actually have a purpose for one until I got a sewing machine for christmas. This inspired me to get cracking. That and this awesome Parson desk that YHL gave a tutorial on :) I love the look of Parson desk and I was dying for an easy way to hack it. Over at Young House Love, they used a closet door as the top, and I thought that was genius! I went over to my favorite store, the Habitat for Humanity Restore, and was on the look out for a closet door. I found one that was nearly perfect and had the new sticker still on it. Score! I asked a woman that worked there how much the door was and she said it was $1.00. Score! I scooped it up and took it to the register, gave the lady my shiny 1 dollar bill and walked out the door before they realized they just gave me a BRAND NEW DOOR for only one dollar! I took it home and measured the space I knew I wanted to put it in. I cut the door down using a circular saw. Then I was on the search for legs. I knew I wanted 3x3's, but the only ones I could find were poplar and $13 a piece. I decided to splurge because they were perfectly sanded and had beautiful square edges, AND because I got a gift card for Lowes for christmas that covered the whole cost.

Lastly I used some scrap 1x3's for the apron.

Constructing this desk was very simple. I used a kreg jig to make all the pocket holes to screw the aprons to the legs and the legs into the base. I secured the legs with wood glue and painted it all with two thin and even coats of Chalkboard paint.

Start to finish, this project only took about an hour. I am very pleased how it turned out and can't wait to set up my sewing machine and get to work!

Here's the deets!

1. Measure your space. I cut my 24 inch wide door down to 45 1/2 inches long to make a decent side desk.

2. Measure and cut all your wood. I decided how long to make the legs by sitting on my chair of choice and measuring how tall I thought the desk should be, which was 28 inches. I determined the length of the aprons by taking the width of the desk (45 1/2 inches) minus the width of the legs +1 (5 inches for 2 +1 is 6 inches) to leave a half inch on each side. So two of my apron pieces were 39 1/2 inches and the other two were 18 inches (24 - 6).

3. Drill your pocket holes. I LOVE my kreg jig so I used that to pre drill all of my pocket holes.

4. Then we assembled the leg pieces together into a frame.

5. We flipped it over and wood glued the legs down. Then we screwed the legs into the top.

6. After we let the glue dry, we flipped it over and started painting. We had chalkboard paint because of a failed project, but I seized the opportunity to use it again.

7. Let the paint dry and then shimmy it into place! Tada!

I still need to put some things on it, and make it look pretty :) I think it needs some shelves above it, but I think it looks pretty great. I am very happy with it and I can't wait to set up my sewing machine and get crafting!