Little Free Library: The materials
Somewhere along the lines I decided to build a Little Free Library. It's not that everyone's doing it, though spacefem put me onto the existence of the things. And I was planning it before my friend A* actually did her own, but it was kind of a nebulous idea, waiting for spring and garage sale season.
I really didn't have much of an idea to start. The general idea in my head was that I would do something with a dragon on top reading a book. My mom does carving so maybe I thought she could do one for the top. Or something.
I knew I wanted 2 shelves, so I measured the books we have on ours. One shelf for taller hardcover types, and one short one for paperbacks. I was a little worried that it'd be huge, but went on anyway.
So it was garage sale season, finally, and AM and I got in the car one day with a list of garage sales and wandered around. I think we stopped at 5 on the list, and a couple more that we just drove by.
First I got these:
Because how cool would those be on the side? I had no idea how I'll attach them, or anything but dude, cool colors.
Second I found these:
What the heck are they, even? I don't know! But I bet they'd make a cool part of a roof. If I could find something else to do the other part of the roof.
Didn't really find anything else for the LFL that day, but that was good enough. Much of the rest would be either found later or scrap we had lying around anyway. For example, we have these wood shelves in our living room. There were a number of screwups when we bought them, so we wound up with something like 8 or so extra shelves (wrong color, and/or warped slightly). I took the wrong color not warped ones, to use for the actual shelves.
Then I needed the box to go around that. Fortunately I had once-upon-a-time built a HUGE bookshelf out of particle board, basically because I needed a big bookshelf and cheap is good. But it kind of looked crappy so when we got real jobs and a real house and stuff we bought real shelving. But we kept the particle board. It's wider than a regular shelf, so I cut that to size to use for the two sides. I cut two more to use for the back, I figure I can stick them side by side and seal it good. I didn't know how to do that yet, though. One thought was to groove one and cut a tab in the other with our shopsmith (that we just got, it belonged to C's grandfather). I don't know if we can do that.
I also got yesterday some GLUE OF DOOM which will probably help.
I realized after I'd cut all the other pieces and went to see how big it would be that I probably needed at top piece as well. So I cut another longer piece (so it has an overhang) for that.
Then I thought "Hm, it sounds like it's best to double box the thing. I need some plywood." Now, there is ALWAYS plywood listed on the free market, but.... this time there wasn't! ANY! Gah. But I had to go to Home Depot anyway and it turns out they sell smaller pieces of plywood for pretty cheap. Just about the right size. So I got one (I may need to get more for the roof but maybe some other idea will happen to me).
I also got hinges and a few other little things at Home Depot, like the plexiglass which no one ever seems to have lying around for free. The paint guy was remarkably obnoxious (this is rare; we shop at HD often and the people are usually pretty awesome about "I need a thing to do this thing and it has to have these properties") but aside from that I think I got all the things. And of course this is where I got the GLUE OF DOOM. Which as you might guess I'm fairly excited to use.
BECAUSE GLUE OF DOOM!
Oh and on vacation I got this at the Tibet Store:
I think it'll go on the side. I'm not sure what I want to put on the other side although this store on etsy has some interesting stuff.
I still need to figure out: door latch, roof.
This entry posted at Dreamwidth. There are
comments there. Reply there or here.
I really didn't have much of an idea to start. The general idea in my head was that I would do something with a dragon on top reading a book. My mom does carving so maybe I thought she could do one for the top. Or something.
I knew I wanted 2 shelves, so I measured the books we have on ours. One shelf for taller hardcover types, and one short one for paperbacks. I was a little worried that it'd be huge, but went on anyway.
So it was garage sale season, finally, and AM and I got in the car one day with a list of garage sales and wandered around. I think we stopped at 5 on the list, and a couple more that we just drove by.
First I got these:
Because how cool would those be on the side? I had no idea how I'll attach them, or anything but dude, cool colors.
Second I found these:
What the heck are they, even? I don't know! But I bet they'd make a cool part of a roof. If I could find something else to do the other part of the roof.
Didn't really find anything else for the LFL that day, but that was good enough. Much of the rest would be either found later or scrap we had lying around anyway. For example, we have these wood shelves in our living room. There were a number of screwups when we bought them, so we wound up with something like 8 or so extra shelves (wrong color, and/or warped slightly). I took the wrong color not warped ones, to use for the actual shelves.
Then I needed the box to go around that. Fortunately I had once-upon-a-time built a HUGE bookshelf out of particle board, basically because I needed a big bookshelf and cheap is good. But it kind of looked crappy so when we got real jobs and a real house and stuff we bought real shelving. But we kept the particle board. It's wider than a regular shelf, so I cut that to size to use for the two sides. I cut two more to use for the back, I figure I can stick them side by side and seal it good. I didn't know how to do that yet, though. One thought was to groove one and cut a tab in the other with our shopsmith (that we just got, it belonged to C's grandfather). I don't know if we can do that.
I also got yesterday some GLUE OF DOOM which will probably help.
I realized after I'd cut all the other pieces and went to see how big it would be that I probably needed at top piece as well. So I cut another longer piece (so it has an overhang) for that.
Then I thought "Hm, it sounds like it's best to double box the thing. I need some plywood." Now, there is ALWAYS plywood listed on the free market, but.... this time there wasn't! ANY! Gah. But I had to go to Home Depot anyway and it turns out they sell smaller pieces of plywood for pretty cheap. Just about the right size. So I got one (I may need to get more for the roof but maybe some other idea will happen to me).
I also got hinges and a few other little things at Home Depot, like the plexiglass which no one ever seems to have lying around for free. The paint guy was remarkably obnoxious (this is rare; we shop at HD often and the people are usually pretty awesome about "I need a thing to do this thing and it has to have these properties") but aside from that I think I got all the things. And of course this is where I got the GLUE OF DOOM. Which as you might guess I'm fairly excited to use.
BECAUSE GLUE OF DOOM!
Oh and on vacation I got this at the Tibet Store:
I think it'll go on the side. I'm not sure what I want to put on the other side although this store on etsy has some interesting stuff.
I still need to figure out: door latch, roof.
This entry posted at Dreamwidth. There are
comments there. Reply there or here.