ICYMI, in the summer of 2014, we purchased a $10 hollow core door from our local ReStore.  We used the whole door and remodeled a filing cabinet to create a “built-in” kitchen desk.  This was part one of our “Kitchen Command Center” project.

You may be thinking, what’s left to be done besides screwing in those pretty snazzy Pottery Barn knock-off drawer pulls?  I’m glad you asked, friend.  While perusing Pinterest back in the fall of 2013, I landed on this awesome desk hutch tutorial by Pretty Handy Girl.  It fangirl-ed about it for over a year until Christmas 2014 when my Dad bought us a Scroll Saw [note: same Christmas we received the Kreg-Jig].  From there, tt was game on. 

If you look close enough, you can see the pencil cut line.

Fact: if you buy your tools from Harbor Freight, buy yourself some new blades.  Someone was thiiiiiiiiis close to losing a digit when the blade snapped in half!

As I said in Part I: very Taylor heavy project, this desk/hutch combo.  I popped down into the workshop [re: poorly lit unfinished basement] to snap a pic every now and if I was feeling generous, maybe I even brought him down a brewski. 

Once assembled, Taylor tagged me in and it was time for pocket holes to be filled, seams to be caulked [okay, Taylor took care of that too], sanding, priming and ultimately a paint job.

These little buddies received a nice dose of wood filler.

I painted the hutch with the leftover Behr paint that was color matched to Rust-o-leum’s “French Cream”.

Once it was ready to hang, Tay brought out the stud finder [insert standard stud joke here] to insure it would not fall out of the wall and bring everything crashing down on me while I am busy being a boss.

Tell me about it, stud 😉 [Name That Movie!]

Once it was attached with confidence, I began to fill those cute little cubbies with the 10 New Orleans cuisine cook books we have, a few spray painted magazine holders from Target, and the most perfectly sized baskets from Home Goods. 

That bare spot in the center of the shelf is still waiting for an awesome desk light fixture, but electricity is apparently where Taylor draws the DIY line.

A $10 door, a $25 filing cabinet and $14-ish worth of wood and we have ourselves a command center.

I’ll leave you with this inspiring thought: when life hands you a door, think outside the door frame!

Also, if anyone wants to come over and wire in a desk light for me, just let me know!

*Xx