Are you wondering what a ‘shawl shelf’ could possibly be? You’re not alone. Jay was wondering the same thing when I first mentioned it. It’s exactly what it sounds like… a shelf for shawls.

You see, I’m tired of not having anywhere to store my shawls except on top of my dresser.

I don’t want to hang them because I’m afraid they will stretch out. I had some room between my lingerie chest and the wall so I asked Jay to build me a shelf.

Ask and you shall receive…

I told him that it didn’t have to be an exquisite work of art. I just need something utilitarian. We even used some paint that I had sitting around, too.

The inspector came around and gave it her stamp of approval.

As soon as the meow of approval had been given I went ahead and filled it to the brim with every shawl that I own.

Yes, all three of them. Jay saw that and said, “That’s all you wanted it for? Three shawls?!” I told him no, that I have plans for at LEAST three more so the room will definitely be needed! He just shook his head and went back to his work bench.

That isn’t the only project that has been finished lately, either.

Remember this:

And I had started to paint it like this:

Are you still wondering what in the world that could be? Are you ready? Think about it for a few more seconds… Okay… here it is in use:

It’s a charging cord organizer!

I thought the clothes pins would hold the plugs in place so that you could wrap it around the dowel below. I was so tired of having a mess of cords on the desk near where we have the USB outlet in the library.

Now I just have the “normal” mess on the desk!

(It really are the little things that make me happy!)

Hold on… I have somebody here who wants to say hello…

Penny is still wearing her Ewok costume, but she was having a good time riding around in the basket of the scooter with her kitten. She especially enjoyed it when Jay would see just how fast the scooter can take corners. The kitten was not as happy.

Anyway, back to the woodworking projects.

The last mystery project that we were working on was this:

Obviously it’s a shelf of some sort. It’s too small to be a shawl shelf. It’s too big to be a spice rack. What could it be? It’s another utilitarian project that I had asked Jay to make.

This was the problem I was trying to solve:

This is the cupboard above the fridge where we keep our paper plates and bowls. We are tall enough to reach it, but if you wanted a large plate it was kind of a pain to lift everything up with one hand and try to remove a plate with the other.

Here is the Paper Plate Holder in use:

Isn’t that great?!

And the shelf slides out, too:

Here’s a tip that I picked up from somewhere… I rubbed a candle against the edges of the shelves to help them move more smoothly in and out of the slot. It waxes the shelf without any kind of grease or residue. The candle that I happened to have on hand was a cinnamon scented one, so it will also smell good! The candle trick also works really well with metal zippers. If your metal zipper isn’t opening and closing as smoothly as it should just rub a candle over the teeth and that will help tremendously!