DIY Fireside Cooler Table Tutorial

There’s not much I love more than enjoying a cold beverage while sitting beside a campfire. We’ve been needing a side table for our fire pit area for a while now, so instead of building a regular table, I made one that houses our little cooler! Now we can have ice cold bevs on hand while we’re enjoying the backyard!

Want to build your own cooler table? Just follow the tutorial below!

You’ll need:

A cooler
Drill
18 gauge brad nailer
Cedar 1x4s
1x2s
Cedar fence boards (lumber quantities will depend on the size of the cooler you’re building the table around)
2in exterior screws
1 1/4 in exterior screws
3/4 in screws
Flat metal plates
Small hinges

Step 1:

Make the corner uprights

Cut your cedar 1x4s into eight 22in lengths (or longer if you want your table higher). These will be the corners of your table. Drill pilot holes and then screw them together in an “L” at a right angle using 2 in exterior screws. I put 3 screws in each.

Step 2:

Make the basic structure

Attach 1x2s to the corner pieces to connect them all together. This will be what the platform for your cooler sits on, so you’ll want to measure the height of your cooler, and then add a half inch— that’s how far down from the top of the corner pieces you’ll attach these 1x2s. The length and depth of your table will depend on the size of your cooler. I’d measure the short side 1x2s to be about an inch larger than your cooler’s depth. If you want to have a table section that doesn’t open (like mine), measure the width of your cooler and add about 10-12inches. This will how long you want your long side 1x2’s to be. Drill pilot holes in the 1x2s before screwing them to the corner pieces and then attach wth 1 1/4 in exterior screws.

Step 3:

Create the platform for the cooler

Cut cedar fence board that span across and rest on top of the 1x2s. This will be the platform that your cooler sits on. Use an 18 guage brad nailer to attach the boards to the 1x2’s

(image is viewing from the top down)

Step 4:

Create an interior wall to secure the cooler

This step is probably unnecessary, but I wanted to create a little barrier so the cooler didn’t scoot over under where the table top doesn’t hinge open. This just keeps the cooler snug in it’s spot. I did this by framing a barrier using 1x2s (which is what I had on hand), but you could also just add another cedar 1x4 to the outside of the platform base 1x2s and then do a cedar fence board across the top from front to back.

Step 5:

Wrap the top of the table

Measure the short side of the table from corner to corner, then cut two cedar 1x4’s at that length. Attach to the top of the corner uprights using 1 1/4 in exterior screws or 18guage brad nails (if you don’t want to see the screws). Do this on both short sides. Now measure the long sides, including the pieces you just attached. Cut two lengths of 1x4 at that measurement and attach those to the long sides of the table.

Step 6:

Sheath the outside of the table

Using cedar fence boards (I used both 5.5in wide and 3in wide fence boards) repeat the process you just did for attaching the 1x4s to the top. Use an 18 gauge brad nailer to put two nails in each side of each board to attach them to the corner uprights. I put a small gap between each board (the width of a carpenter’s pencil).

Step 7:

Create the table top

The table top is made out of cedar 1x4s. I had my table top over hang about a half inch on either side, so my 1x4s were cut 1 inch longer than the depth of the table. For the side that isn’t hinged, you just attach the 1x4s to the base. You can do this with brad nails from the top, or if you don’t want any fasteners showing on the top (which I didn’t), you can use pocket screws to screw the table top boards on from below.

I used flat brackets and 3x4in screws to attach all the hinged table top boards together, which is a bit inelegant, but works great. You could also use pocket screws to screw the boards together side by side.

Once your hinged table section is created all you have to do is attach it to the base using a couple small hinges!

Botanical Kitchen Revival: A Rental Kitchen Makeover on a Budget

Transforming any space is fun, but transforming your lifelong BFF’s space is a special kind of fun. When Frogtape reached out to me to see if I’d be interested in being a designer for their annual Paintover Challenge, it came at the perfect time. My friend, Kristina, had been talking about wanting to update her kitchen in the rental home where she lives with her husband and son, and I instantly pitched her the idea of doing the paintover challenge in HER kitchen. We talked to her landlord, who gave us the greenlight for the proposed changes and we got to work!

This makeover was primarily achieved with paint, with some honorable mentions from a few other design elements. I traded out the old overhead track lighting for a pretty new light that not only looked gorgeous, but offered way more illumination (which is a godsend come those dim PNW winter months). In lieu of taking out the meager tile backsplash and doing new tile (which probably would’ve required some drywall repairs, and a significant budget bump) I opted to keep the existing strip of tile, and add beadboard on top to fill the blank space between there and the bottom of the wall cabinets. Then, we painted it the same color as the cabinets and the walls, for a delicious tone-on-tone vibe. This basil color is super pretty, it feels lush and sophisticated.

The big, unexpected showstopper ended up being her basic old fridge, transformed with a bit of removable stick-on wallpaper! Since we kept the existing cabinet hardware and painted it brass to match the light fixture, we did the same with the fridge handle to tie everything together. I used Rustoleum Vintage Gold spraypaint to paint both the cabinet door pulls and the fridge handle.

Another thing we did was add a whole wall of open shelving to give her a ton more storage. We painted those shelves the same green as the rest of the kitchen, but kept that wall white to give some contrast. Now she has a bunch of space to store all her pretty jars of dry goods, cute mugs and, of course, more plants.

And one more fun little detail: we put a chalkboard area in for her toddler to use! That panel is access for the water heater, so it was just an unfinished wood panel before, so we framed it out to match the shaker style of the cabinets and did the center panel in chalkboard paint so he could draw and have fun!

Projects like this have all the elements of what makes me most excited about design and remodels. Making a huge impact for not a huge amount of money, coming up with creative solutions, and doing really fun and out of the box elements (I’ll never get over that fridge).

I’m so thrilled that Frogtape brought me in on their Paintover Challenge this year so I could do this amazing project!

\\ Sources //

Paint
Spraypaint
Light fixture
Removable wallpaper
Rug

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New T-Shirts! Rep the DIY life!

In an effort to not turn my entire wardrobe into paint splattered, sawdust encrusted DIYing clothes, I decided to make some cute (and, okay, a little kitschy) DIYing shirts for me and you! If you need a little somethin to throw on for your weekly— or if you’re like me, daily— Home Depot run, this is it right here.

Scroll down to check out all the new designs!

Elevating interiors using the senses

Thank you WoodWick Candles for sponsoring this post.

Finding inspiration for the design of a space is all about creating a mood.

Taking your design to the next level means creating a space that makes you feel a certain way when you enter that space, not just putting together pretty things. It's that design je ne sais quoi, you know?

Including WoodWick Candles in my home has elevated the spaces I've worked hard to build and style, it's like the cherry on top of all the other design elements. I love the scents, but also the soothing crackle of the wooden wick. It's such a lovely added ambiance that helps my house feel like a home.

Something that I like to think about when I'm designing is focusing on the senses. How does the space look, yes, but also: how does is sound? How does it smell? What do the materials feel like when I touch them? What quality of light is there?

When you design from that perspective it informs how you choose your materials, your finishes, your styling. You don't put fluorescent lighting in a cozy bedroom. You don't buy a firm couch for a room where you're going to curl up and read a book for a couple hours.

One of the things that helps me create a solid vision for a space’s design, whether I’m doing a remodel or simply the decor, is creating a mood board. You can do this digitally, or IRL by gathering swatches and elements of your design. This way you can see how all the different elements interact with one another before you commit to them. How does that tile look against the cabinet finish? How do the paint colors compliment the textiles? Does anything clash? Is there too much of one texture that it’s feeling unbalanced? Mood boards are a great way to give you the confidence to fully realize a design.

Great interior design incorporates all the senses, and scent is a particularly strong element for us psychologically so I try to incorporate some element of fragrance into each room I create. These WoodWick Candles not only have amazing scents, but they have a wooden wick, which crackles softly as it burns, creating an added element of ambiance, which I love.

I chose the Seaside Neroli candle for our bathroom, which elevates the space so beautifully and gives it a subtle spa-like vibe which is exactly the feeling a bathroom should have, and the Melon Blossom candle has such a bright, fruity scent that has been perfect for the kitchen in these spring months.

For this WoodWick Shoreline Trilogy Candle, I wanted to create a mood board based on the candle, taking inspiration from each of the three scents. This mood board is definitely very organic and natural, with a bright and fresh feel. It’s got the pink and peachy colors inspired by the Melon Blossom scent. Then, there are some more beachy vibes, like the wood tones, shaker cabinet door, and textiles, inspired by the Coastal Sunset scent. Then I brought in some bohemian elements inspired by the Palo Santo scent, with the rose quartz and macrame elements.

Having a mood board like this lets me have an anchor when I’m choosing things like tile, throw pillows, rugs, linens, etc. It’s kind of like a design litmus test: does this element fit in with my mood board? If yes? Go for it!

DIY Painted Faux Tile Backsplash

My ultimate plan for our kitchen backsplash involves a gorgeous black zellige tile, but I knew that it would be a while until we got that tile project underway. In the meantime, I decided to have fun with a hand-painted backsplash that gave the effect of a faux tile look. I absolutely love how much depth the dark backsplash adds to the space!

Hand painting isn’t for everyone and there are other affordable but less tedious and time-consuming ways to upgrade your backsplash, like stick-on tiles, removable wallpaper, and paint stencils. You can even get a stencil that mimics this hexagon design!

For my process, I used chalk to trace the hexagon shape onto the wall, then used a straightedge to draw the lines inside the hexagons with chalk. Once that template was on the wall, I used a small craft paintbrush to paint interior latex paint along those lines. Definitely tedious! But I did this in the midst of the post-election madness and a tedious project that needed a lot of focus what a pleasant distraction, haha.