A little after the Christmas holidays, I began crocheting skull caps for various charities affiliated with my employer as well as local hospitals. I also crochet baby clothes and blankets. Lately, my yarn stash has become ridiculous, therefore I’m at a point that I had to catalog my yarn in an iOS app to know exactly what I currently own. This ensures that when I am in a yarn shop, I am not unnecessarily buying yarn that I already own. Once I reached 103 skeins and hanks I felt that its best to buy a shelf. The problem is, I was against investing in a Sauder shelf because they are compressed wood and I found Raymour & Flanagan too pricey if it’s just a yarn shelf.
Then I thought, “Wait a minute! I can do this!
Using a little ingenuity and an Xmas gift card from my daughter, I decided to make my own shelf to store my yarn and the flat screen in my sewing room. I take pride in this because I did this without anyone’s support.
Here’s what I did:
First I picked up 8 wooden crates. Initially I wanted the heavy-duty $28 crates but yarn isn’t heavy so I opted for the $10 crates instead. In reality the $28 crates would have defeated the purpose in saving money. (If you use this idea for a desk or table that will hold lamps, books, a laptop, please invest in the $24-28 crates)
Even though I knew that my yarn would not weight much, I was unsure if the crates would provide stability, so I decided to go to Home Depot and buy wood to support the back and base (I used birch – no specific reason other than color was close to the crates). .
Then next day, I felt that it would look really cool if I painted the crates white and stained the top and made the base. To support my little flatscreen, I had the base cut 3″ deeper to ensure that it does not tip over. Here’s where the fun began:
After work, and any time that I wasn’t watching Netflix, I began sanding. This was necessary to ensure that the wood does not snag the yarn.
I read that stain applies better if you apply wood conditioner so after sanding, I applied a coat of wood conditioner and allowed 30-45 minutes for it to absorb. As I began toying around with the assembly of the crates, I got the idea to add feet. Ugh! Here I go back to Lowes on Memorial Day weekend. When I arrived, I honestly did not know how I was going to affix them or Lowe’s selection. I was overwhelmed and stared at various legs and bums for 30-45 minutes. I selected on a 4″ to raise the shelf off of the ground. Because my shelf is going to be roughly 70″ wide, I felt support in the middle would be best, so I invested in 8.
Just look at the rich color! I was so pleased in this stain choice.i knew this would definitely pop once I painted the crates white.
The first really looked good. So I gave it a few days to completely dry, did a light sanding and added a second coat. I then waited a few days to ensure that there were no sticky areas before assembling.
This is the outcome.
On Father’s Day 2018, I had the privilege of finally getting around to emptying some of the bags and boxes of yarn. I wiped down the shelf, brought it upstairs to my sewing room, stocked it, and stood back to stare at my work and smiled.
I would have made my late mother proud!
The Selfless Seamstress 