Making Do For Free

Living in a very old house, the biggest frustration is lack of closet space.  The space we do have is pretty small, so storage is really a problem.

Until a couple of weeks ago, this is how the sheets and bedding were stored.

Piled up in a window, getting covered with dust and pollen, falling over on a pretty regular basis.  And that little table full of drawers it's sitting on?  Utterly useless because the drawers are really small.

When we moved into this house, the house I grew up in, the former tenant had left some things behind.  One of them was a bureau that we had used and must have left behind when we moved next door, into a new house that has plenty of closet space.

It was a 5 drawer bureau but try as I might, I never found one of the drawers, so it sat upstairs, unused. I was convinced that some day I'd find that drawer.

After the millionth time the pile of bedding fell over, I decided to get creative.  It occurred to me that we might be able to cut the top off the bureau and cut it down so it was a 4 drawer bureau and then glue the top back on.

I'm not picky about storage, just desperate.

But where to put it?  Another issue is space that makes sense.  There's a lot of space in this house, but things like windows, doors, fireplaces that don't work and radiators that do really put a cramp in any kind of decorating style.  Finding a place for a bureau was going to be a challenge.

There's a useless fireplace in the bedroom, complete with a mantel.    If we cut that bureau down to 4 drawers, it was going to fit perfectly on the bricks in front of the fireplace and it wouldn't be tripped over.

It took some convincing, but while I was out one day, k-ster cut it down for me.

You only see 3 drawers?  That's because he thought I wanted to put it IN the fireplace, and 3 drawers would fit in.

But, I had plans for the top of that baby, so out it came.  It now stores all of the bedding and on top, I've made use of the space to put other things that had random locations beforehand.

It's not ideal but really solves a problem!

The wood is scratched and I know plenty of people out there who would paint it but I don't like that look, so I'm leaving it as is.  Well, not with all of that dust.  I cleaned it, at least!

Linking here:
http://www.thesitsgirls.com
http://www.the-chicken-chick.com/2015/06/clever-chicks-blog-hop-143-featuring.html
http://www.flamingotoes.com/2015/06/show-and-tell-link-party-15/