Step 1. (Not pictured) Go to the local big box construction store with 3 kids in masks plus a dog because WHY NOT make it a circus. Choose laminated lumber slabs that are 24" x 48" x .75". Lose one child who keeps running off to find a lumber cart, tell the children to put their masks on 15,000 times, and, for the love, please give other people some space because social distancing. Break up about 14 arguments about who gets to push the cart.
Step 2. (not pictured) Let the kids pick a quart of trim paint in whatever garish shade they want. Do not comment. Ask the youngest 20 times to stop treating the lumber cart like a sled and ooching it all over the paint department. Make your daughter put back her fan of color swatches. Let about 10 people ooo and aaahh over the dog who is in the store and who brings their dogs into stores!!!!????
Step 3. (also not pictured but hubs DID try. I was too focused) Don eye and ear protection and cut those boards to size with the skill saw that you are terrified of because John Hardy lost 3 fingers to one when you were a kid. Insist that hubs supervise just in case you need someone to ice your severed fingers on the way to the hospital. Feel super empowered. Also feel like vomiting a little.
Step 4. (pictured here) Have your surly kids, who think it's too hot and this is too hard, sand the edges off of the desks because of sharp edges and their being prone to needing stitches. Attach the 4 blocks you cut off each board with wood glue and a center screw as a clamp to create corners for the legs to attach.
This is what the top of the desk will look like after sanding and attaching blocks.
This is what the bottom of the desk will look like after sanding and attaching blocks.
Step 5. Have your kids complain loudly about hard it is to be perfect with power tools that they have maybe used twice in their lifetimes. This will make the process so much more enjoyable. Drink coffee to sustain yourself and maybe sneak off to stress eat a few cookies. Whatever works best for you.
Step 7. Prime the desks alone on the front porch while listening to an audio book because the only primer you have now is Kilz (original) and can only be cleaned up with mineral spirits. Get light headed cleaning the brush outside with mineral spirits and google frantically because you don't remember how to dispose of it. Leave it out to evaporate, but where the dog and kids can't get it.
Step 8. Spread out that giant tarp that you are definitely not going to roll dead bodies in and head for the lake if the bickering doesn't stop around here, and let the kids paint their desktops. Clothes will be ruined. They will mysteriously get paint on their faces. Are we eating paint now?!
The dog will get in the mix.
He will totally get painted. The kids will be filled with self confidence. You will feel like you are killing it at this parenting thing.
Step 9. While the kids are watching The Dragon Prince on Netflix, sneak outside and paint a 2nd coat to make the desktops look like they weren't painted by 7 and 9 year olds. The 11 year old's looks amazing. She's doing a great job so just touch it up a tiny bit on the edge were you can still see primer, but for the love, don't tell her or you will wound her tweenage soul. The desktops will look amazing. Almost as if you had some clue as to what you were doing and TOTALLY not winging the whole thing from beginning to end.
Step 10. Order 5 different sets of hair pin table legs from Amazon at the appropriate height for your kid and have only one set show up and the others be mysteriously "undeliverable". You will need to order more. Actually this would have been step 1, but then the shipping debacle will happen so here we are. Desktops build and still no legs.
Step 11. When they finally arrive (2 days AFTER school begins - because pandemic), attach the hairpin legs to the blocks under the desktop and hope and pray that these small children won't actually test the 500 lb weight rating these table legs have. In fact, don't mention it at all, in case they get ideas. Be sure to use screws that are just a hair too long and then do some patching and painting to the top to make it smooth where the wood splintered. Or don't. You can just leave it. At this point, who cares. We are almost to the finish line. It will bother your soul though. Because these kids didn't come by their perfectionistic tendencies by change.
Step 12. Set up the desk in the room that is about to have to have the ceiling ripped out where the 100 year old plumbing pipes failed because could life BE any more insane right now. Step back and marvel at
Happy Building!
