Make@Zomboid.com: Ultra-easy Makeover: Cardboard Magazine Holder

Monday, November 23, 2009

Ultra-easy Makeover: Cardboard Magazine Holder

Little known fact: I always have tons of papers and mail in a stack next to my computer. I'm just one of those people who can't throw anything away, but I also need to keep letters, bills, and important papers nearby so that I don't forget about them. But I despise having that messy-looking stack of papers next to my computer. It drives me nuts, and every time I see it (roughly 1281267623 times a day) I'm tempted to hide it somewhere out of sight.

I've tried a few different solutions for organizing my papers... office-style trays, folders & binders, and most recently I had them all clamped in a giant clothespin (no, I'm not kidding). None of these worked out, though, and all of them ended up stuck somewhere else and repurposed. They were just too large, too unattractive, or too...something.

I have very limited space, so I wanted something that would store the paper vertically and be very low-profile so I could slide it in between my monitor and printer. I've looked at magazine holders at different stores and always felt they were way overpriced for essentially being a glorified cardboard box. For a while I kind of forgot about the whole thing and just lived with my horrible stack of papers....until I got lucky and happened to spot a magazine box at a local thrift store. It was only 0.25$ and in brand-new condition, so of course it came home with me! As you can see, it's a bit on the plain side. Red is one of my favourite colours, but since I'll be looking at it whenever I use my computer, I decided it needed something to make it prettier. After some fiddling around, I came up with a plan: cover it with hot pink bows punched from vintage flocked florist's ribbon! Here's a picture I took right after I started:

Note the wee Chihuahua foot in the upper right hand corner. She always has to get in on whatever I'm doing and nose around. Such an attention seeker! At least she behaved herself, though...my Boston Terriers spent their time sneaking around to try to eat my punched out bows! D:

Anyway, let me get back to my overly-long explanation of this simple project! :D

Punching out the bows was fairly easy and went a bit quicker once I figured out the best way to line up the punches. The ribbon was only about 1.5" wide so I had to be creative about placement. Unfortunately, I had used up about a foot or two of ribbon before I realized I could fit more than one punch across the width. So much waste! Woe is me. :[

The entire project took quite a bit longer than I expected it to. In fact, I was kinda over it by the time I was halfway through gluing bows to one side of the box. I don't remember the exact number of bows I punched out, but it was around 200 or so. I do really like the result, so I think it was worth the time. What do you think?

If you'd like to try something

like this, here's a tutorial for making your own magazine box from instructables.com. I may give it a go myself, because I could really use a few more of these (but maybe without the 200 bow punch-outs next time!).

Labels: diy, magazine box, makeover, simple, storage