Get creative with your FREE stuff

Problem: No kitchen island and no money
Solution: Re-purpose an inexpensive cabinet into focal point.

Since I already had the base cabinet, I only needed to add a "counter" to the cabinet. I wanted something a little eclectic, something that would have the "wow" factor. The idea was to use old newspapers and create a collage. I posted an ad on http://www.freecycle.org/ to see if anyone had any old newspapers. Someone gave me a stack of old newspapers, including some very historic articles. Some newspapers were old, some were not, I found articles, pictures, and even entire pages.

Materials:

1. Old cabinet painted black (this one is from the 1950's, all metal- $30 at some thrift store in Alabama)
2. 2 pieces 30"x42" 3/4" pieces of MDF board (Home Depot/ Lowe's will cut boards for you)

3. Construction adhesive to glue MDF together, and then to glue the boards to the cabinet

4. Old newspapers (again www.freecycle.org)

5. Mixture of 1:1 white glue and water, mix together and cover newspaper onto MDF board

6. Apply 4-5 coats of polyurethane to protect newspapers

7. Add some funky stools, these came from http://www.ikea.com/ ($17 a piece)