My journey as a mother/ homemaker: DIY nightstands!

Me and the Helpful Husband

Wow! Never thought I would actually get around to starting my own blog, but here it is. Where does this journey start? It begins somewhere between when my son was born and when my husband came back from Afghanistan. After his return, we moved to Colorado and I was completely alone with no family support. Being home with my son, inspired me to find creative ways to use my time (nap time is never long enough) and being an army wife, inspired me to find creative ways to stretch my dollar. This blog is going to encapsulate my life and everything along my journey of being a stay at home wife and mother. My life-long dream has always been to be a mother and wife. I am blessed to be able to live this dream. I titled my blog," And You Thought It Was Easy to Be a Stay At Home Mom," mostly because I USED to think this until I became a mother. I used to always ask my mom what she did all day when we were at class, with friends, etc. Now I no longer need to ask. My days are filled with those impossible busy mom/wife moments that are so hard to explain how they could possibly take up so much time, but these moments take up all my time. Hopefully my successes and failures (there will probably be more of these than successes) in cooking, crafting, DIYing (is this a word), child-raising, fitness, everything in between that are recorded here will inspire you to chase your dreams, give you an idea, or at least a good laugh. 

The first thing I want to share is how I spent my weekend. It was full of house decorating, unpacking (those last few miscellaneous boxes that everyone hates), and DIYing. My husband (from here on he will be called helpful husband) and I decided to make our own headboard and nightstands. It was my idea to begin these DIY jobs to save money and helpful husband just happened to get sucked in since he wields the power tools. Below you will find the instructions along with pictures (I always need visuals) for how to recreate these awesome nightstands at your house! These are a fraction of the cost of store bought nightstands.

It all started with a leisurely stroll (very dangerous) through Target (one of my favorite stores). I was looking for storage ideas and happened across this 2-piece cubical (mine is in espresso) and these great storage bins on sale and an idea started to form. After seeing the cubical and cloth drawer, an idea I had seen on pinterest for floating nightstands (found here) came to my mind. I decided these would be perfect for beginner DIYers like myself and helpful husband to create! The nightstands I had seen on pinterest cost about $50 to make. Mine cost a total of $45 and have a drawer to hide things in (you can leave out the drawer and cut the cost by $10). 

Floating Nightstand with Drawer

Both nighstands

Cord hole that helpful husband cut into cubical

Lamp added to nightstand to cover cord hole.

 So how did we make these nifty, cheap nightstands? I am happy to say very, very easily and with little effort (my kind of project). It took an hour tops (with breaks to play with baby boy). We bought the 2-piece cubes from Target and assembled them as instructed. Then we decided how close we wanted them to our bed and made sure they were centered and going to screwed into at least one stud. If you plan on using a lamp, cell phone charger, baby monitor, or anything that needs a cord, be sure to put them next to the plug. You can't see the electrical sockets, but they are to the right of the nightstand. Next, depending on what side your sockets are on, drill the cord hole on the appropriate side. My holes go through the top and bottom of the nightstand. Next, measure and level the nightstands on your wall and then just screw them into the stud. Easy as pie you have two nightstands with a drawer for $45. I have so many cords due to the multiple electronics that I used zip-ties to organize them and keep them detangled. To hide the cords, I plan to stand my books up in front of them. All of the other things I don't want people to see, I hide in my handy little cloth drawer. Good luck DIYers! Go create your own cheap, but cute nightstands! And let me know how it goes.