A New Life For An Old Bookcase

My sophomore year of college was kind of a big deal: I had a room to myself with space for some real furniture. By “real”, I mean a solid bookcase instead of milk crates. The cheap piece from Home Depot was white and made of MDF, and held my school books and photo albums for three years of college before being banished to my parents’ basement. It sat there for the past several years, holding boxes of my old college junk. You can see the bookcase in its heyday here.

All nurseries need a bookcase, and I realized that my old one would be the perfect size for Junior’s room. My plan was to keep it white, but after years of moving from dorm room to dorm room and being neglected in the basement, it needed some TLC.

This cute paper from Paper Source was the inspiration:

Paper Source, $7.95 for a roll

Now, I know that goldfish have nothing to do with the loose travel theme that’s planned for the room, but they’re cute, and keep things from being too thematic. It’s not totally out of place, though – it kinda sorta goes with the Fisher Price “Ocean Wonders” entertainment thingy (for lack of a better description) that will be on his crib.

I embarked on this project knowing that MDF is a bitch to paint, and that this would not end up as some heirloom piece. The next bookcase will be up to Junior’s handy grandpa (my dad) to build some day. After the Mr. roughed up the very smooth surface with some super-gritty sandpaper, I lined the inside of the back with newspaper to keep it paint-free.

We then applied three coats of Behr’s paint+primer combo in “Neptune Blue”. I’d hoped that two coats would be enough, but like I said, MDF is a major P.I.T.A. and paint doesn’t adhere well to it. I’m guessing that an oil-based paint would have been a better choice.

Next, I cut the goldfish wrapping paper to fit the inside of the bookcase, and poured Mod Podge into a plastic bowl. Using a large foam brush, I quickly spread a thin-ish layer of the glue all over the inside of the case. After loudly uttering several curse words, I managed to lay the curling paper down on the glue, and used a ruler to smooth out the bubbles.

Here’s the end result:

He doesn’t have a lot of books yet, so there’s plenty of room to grow. The little suitcase, also from Paper Source, was used as the card box for our wedding, and it will hold Junior’s CDs (like this U2 lullaby CD I just ordered). In case you’re wondering how the suitcase’s lid is propped up, just chalk that up to my dad’s creative solution – a screw and metal bracket cut to fit the width of the lid.

I’m so happy to cross this project off my list. Did you finish up any projects this weekend?