Thanks to Ana at Knock-off Wood

Just in case you are like the only person on earth who has not seen this website, Knock-Off Wood, you should leave here immediately and head over there.  Ana is seriously the most talented and prolific semi-professional, stay at home mom, living in Alaska (yes Alaska) carpenter you could ever cross paths with-even on the internet. 

From the first time I saw this website, I just knew I was going to become a master carpenter (mostly in my mind-the same way I can do pretty much all the gymnastics and ice skating I see on the Olympics) and complete all the projects on her site in record time.  While other people have pretty much done just that (check out her "bragging board" section for proof), I decided to start small.  My objective:  Gabe's room, which started out looking something like this:

Not much to look at, to be honest.   With this project in mind, I was happy to find that I had in my possession a few stray pices of wood, left over from a wall storage thing we bought when Cecilia was born (score one for reusing 13 year old wood).  I also got some new clothespins and painted them with the blue glazing paint I recently got at Ikea on clearance (score again).  Here is a photo of the tedious but worth it painting process:

I also stained the scrap wood with antique finish stain from Ikea that I got for 99 cents!!  I actually love the shade that the antique stain brings out in even cheap pine, so I got several cans just for good measure, yet another testament to my ongoing obsession with oops paint and the like. 

Next, I assembled the necessary tools:

Which included my new favorite: the staple/nail gun I purchased because apparently I lost the old one.  This one is superior anyway because it shoots small nails in addition to staples, which made attaching the clothespins really simple.  With Ana's design, she used glue to hold the clothespins on the boards.  Because I know my son, I went with the small nails to hold them on.

Here's a look at just the boards, all nice and level.   Well, except for the fact that the concept of "level" is relative when your whole house isn't level and your plaster walls aren't straight.  But, this is as good as it gets around here.  I had to stop short of both the wall and the frame of the window if I wanted the boards to look level, but that's the "charm" of a house that is nearly 100.

So, I used the staple gun/nailer to attach all the clothespins to the boards, and only nearly stapled my finger once, which I thought was really talented and amazing. 

After struggling for quite a while trying to hang two frames perfectly next to each other on the wall that isn't straight in a room that's not level, in my old house, I resorted to some old-school tactics to get the frames up.  I won't show you how I did it, but let's just say, it isn't pretty.  The end result, however is:

All, in all, I am pretty pleased with my first small project from Ana's amazing blog.  I can't wait to really build something big!