DIY Bench from Headboard

So I got a Facebook message from a family who had this headboard and wanted it made into a nice bench for her foyer. It is a queen size about 60" wide. I also had the bed rails that were made from wood that matched the stain so I wanted to incorporate them into the design somehow. Let the brainstorming begin!!

The first problem was that the headboard needed to be raised about 6". So I took some of the bedrail and made a 6" extension. I trim it out in the finished product.

Next, I had to build the frame for the bench. The headboard had that "inset", and I wanted the bench to go the full width of the headboard all the way to the outside edge, so I had to account for that. As you can see, I put one 2x4 the same width as the inset and used pocket screws to secure it to the headboard. Then I built a rectangle frame that wrapped around the sides of the headboard and used pocket screws to secure the frame to the other 2x4. You'll notice that the rectangular frame doesn't quite go all the way to the outside edge. That is because, I have 1" trim pieces that I made from the old bed rails that I will fasten to the frame toward the end that will make the bench flush with the outside edge. 

Next was pretty easy. Just filled in the bench with 2x4's and pocket screwed them into the frame, and built the legs with 2x4's to match the height of the back legs. I then added some braces as you can see to just tighten it up a little more. What you cant see is that I also added a 2x4 underneath the bottom of the bench in the middle to give the bench more support. 

Add, here you have it. I painted the new wood pieces all black and trimmed the outside edges with the old bed rails. I put a nice wax shine on all the wood to make it look like a brand new bench.

Materials

1 old headboard and old bed rails

10 - 8 ft 2x4's

1 - Can of black glossy spray paint

Nails and screws

Couple pieces of scrap trim for the leg extensions on the back. 

Making Picture Frames From Cabinet Doors

So, lately I've been into making homemade picture frames for some of my photos. I am in the middle of remodeling my bathroom and when I took the cabinet doors off of my 1979 bathroom vanity I had an AH HAH moment! Why not make picture frames out of these doors. Once I'm done I will have 4 perfectly matched frames.

That is where this blog begins! Here is a shot of the original door, complete with the fake brass decorative knob...

Next, I scraped the old loose paint off the door, this was pretty easy for my doors because we didn't paint them correctly last time, so the new paint scraped right off. 

Then, I drew boxes in where I wanted the cutouts for the pictures to be. In this case, the door was a perfect size for three 5x7 pictures. The cutouts were 4 3/4 x 6 3/4 so that the photo could rest on a 1/8" lip inside the cutout. In other words, whatever photo size you want revealed, make the cutout 1/4" smaller. 

Then I drilled holes on the inside of the four corners so I could use a jigsaw to cut out the openings. 

Here is the door once I cut out the openings. 

And here is the door once I took a power vibratory sander and gave the door a little distressed look by revealing some of the underlying wood. 

 Here are all four doors once I completed the job. Tomorrow, I will rub stain on the doors to give the wood that has been revealed a really cool distressed look.