We finally have summer here in the Pacific Northwest and some of the projects that we have had planned for our backyard are finally getting done.

I went out last week to add some features to the playhouse and found out that our drill had bitten the dust, so I had to wait for Ryan to decide which drill he wanted to replace it with and the kids and I worked on a “drill-less” water wall project instead.

Ryan came home with a drill the other night and due to the fact that I was working on another project (someone is getting a room redesign that I will blog about soon) I did not get to use the drill until this morning.

The sidewalk and driveway at our  house are an aggregate and do not get along well with sidewalk chalk, so I have had to come up with other ideas for using the chalk…one of which was our deck that was in desperate need of refinishing (that is now done) and our fence. While both were fine alternatives for the short term, I needed a long term solution to our dilemma.

I used more recalled crib parts to make an outdoor sandwich board style chalkboard!

Here is a crude tutorial on how I did it…really, the photos are very fuzzy, sorry!

First, I bought pre-cut pieces of plywood at Home Depot, primed them, and painted them with chalkboard paint. Of course, I don’t have any photos of that process, but it’s pretty simple.

Here are the crib parts that I used…they are the small ends of the crib (the large ends were given away as a headboard and footboard for a full size bed as they were still safe to be used that way).

Next, I lined the sides up next to each other and added hinges that I found in the door hardware aisle at Home Depot.

After that I added chain to the side to keep them from opening up all the way while the kids are drawing on the boards.

Then, I screwed the painted plywood to the crib panels.

See, you can see the texture of our driveway…not chalk friendly at all.

Also, do you notice my husband filling water balloons?! He was preparing for a water balloon battle with the boys next door that should happen later today.

So, pretty easy and I feel good about my reuse of the recalled crib parts!

I also added “s” hooks to the chain to hang some cute buckets I had sitting around to hold the chalk!

I have another chalkboard project that I will blog about in the next little while…stay tuned!

home is…mommies who can use power tools!

*linking up with Today’s Creative Blog…