I've known since this summer that for Brody's first birthday, I wanted to make him something. Thanks to Pinterest, there are an abundance of DIY ideas out there... so I just had to pick one. Since a lot of the projects I came across weren't quite age appropriate, I decided on a DIY busy box for boys.
I loved this project start to finish. I found most of the components at several West Michigan Restores. It was like a treasure hunt digging through all the bins finding just the right things that clicked, spun, opened, dinged, boinged and latched... I loved it.
A huge thank you to Papa Z for all his help getting the board prepped. We opted to go with pressboard to cut down on splinters and used a handheld router to round all the edges for safety purposes.
Three slits were cut down each end so that velcro scraps can be used to secure the board to a piece of furniture or other sturdy object. This beast weighed quite a bit when it was all said and done, so I would highly recommend taking some sort of action to stabilize it rather than just lean it against a wall.
Painting was a ton of fun. I opted for traditional caution tape colors and stripes.
A lot of the pre-used gadgets had some wear and tear, so most of them were spray painted to give 'em a fresh look. I used gold, silver, black and white spray paint to keep everything looking cohesive.
We used extra pressboard to create two 6"x6" doors... one opening to the side and the other opening at the top. I created little picture sleeves out of black binding covers and a transparency.
Mama Z came up with the great idea to include a functioning doorbell. :)
I found this stove knob and arrow that somehow had to be included. So thankfully I came up with the clock BEFORE I started painting. I left a large enough circle to encompass the entire arrow and painted on the numbers using a toothpick.
