Shanty Ballard Inspired Shelves

Hey Guys!!!

I hope you all had a great weekend!  Both Ashley and I spent ours in Dallas at NCA Nationals.  Ash is a competitive cheer coach and just happens to be the coach to two of my girls :-)  We had a blast.  It was long though and I am surprised Ashley is still walking.  Our gym took home 5 National titles with over 750 teams there... Woohoo! Way to go Ash!

I started this project last week and finished it today so I thought I would share.  I originally saw Miss Traci's Ballard inspired cafe shelves long ago and fell in love.  I just didn't know where I could put one.  However... My new curtains brought me a bit of inspiration :-)

Here is how mine turned out...

Now I will kind of show you how I did it!

For this shelf I used a 4 ft 1x10" piece of pine from Lowe's.  I used my miter saw to cut it a few inches short of the space I was filling.  I think mine was 36".

There are many brackets at Lowe's and Home Depot.  These were the ones I chose to go with.  I loved the size of them.  They are big and a bit longer than most of the others.  They were about $6 a piece and I decided to use 3 on my shelf.  Since I was just building one I thought it would give it a bit more presence on the wall... Know what I mean?

I used a little Gorilla Wood Glue on the 1x10...

And attached my brackets using my brad nailer.  Can I just say that this might be my very favorite tool?? It would definitely be a toss up with the saw and hot glue gun but it's for sure in the running.  Mine was only $44 at Northern Tool and it makes me so happy :-)

There it is attached... Like 46 seconds later.... Whoop!

At this point I had my shelf built and needed to add the trim.  I used my miter saw for this part but I do realize that many of you don't have one.  Traci gives an awesome tutorial on using a cheap hand saw and  even cheaper miter box to make your own HERE. Super easy I promise!! Check it out!

My final step after trim was painting it.  I also shantied it up a bit using a 3M sanding block with 120 grit.  Once my edges were sanded I used a little stain to make them stand out a bit more.  You just use a foam brush to apply your stain to your sanded edges and use an old t-shirt or cloth to wipe of the extra.

I hung my shelf up and added a locker basket with a couple of towels.  I was so excited to find those at a decent price!!  I love the old antique ones but not for $30 a pop.  I got mine on Amazon here...

See the shantied edge??

I then added another recent revamp to finish it off for now.  I know I want something else up there but that is in the works :-)  For now... Here it is.

Hope you like it! Make sure to check out Traci's great tutorial as well!!

Happy Wednesday!

~Whitney