TannieSpace

geekery, drawing and then some

Posts about diy

Magnetic paintbox

I like to switch around my paints (a lot) and found it very annoying to do so when I blue-tacked the paint to the paintbox. I like to squeeze in more paints than the official number so I removed the pan-holder from my tiny paintbox to do so.

paintbox paintbox

I decided to try something else: magnets!

I had ordered a set of magnets a few years ago, and some of them I hadn't used yet. After digging them up from the drawer, and finding some empty pans, I started my project.

Requirements

requirements

For this to work you need:

Steps

Step 1

Put magnet inside the empty pan.

I used a small tin to help me keep the pan in place. I put the pan on it and placed the magnet inside, roughly in the middle.

Step 2

fill with paint

Filled up the empty pan with paint, about 3/4 full.

Step 3

Stir wth toothpick

Stirred the paint with a toothpick to get the air-bubbles out and the paint in the corners. I then left it to dry.

Using a filled pan

paintbox

I have plenty of pre-filled pans as well, and my bad habit of creating wells in the middle actually came in really handy. After popping the paint out of the pan – it came out easily with some wiggling of a sharp knife (don't hurt yourself) – I place the magnet in the well and added some water. Then I turned the pan over and pushed it down on the paint. With some colours I had to scrap the edges a bit, due to the shape of the pan (more narrow at the bottom).

Letting it all dry

drying

After adding all the pans, I let them dry in the window overnight. Some dried up a bit wonky, I noticed airbubbles on the side and one of my red-browns looks a bit crumbly. These will all receive some extra treatment to smooth them out, but the basics work :)

It works!

And a little movie to show that it works:


Doing some DIY in the kitchen.

img img For a long time some (most) of my kitchencabinets have annoyed me. I cannot imagine why today, kitchen-makers still default to shelves for the bottom cabinets. Shelves below the waist, so if you want to get something out, you have to kneel down, and dive in. With my knees, often plagued by pains and swelling because of the RA, this quickly became such a painful event that I rather left everything on the counters than store it in the cabinet. Not precisely the most handy thing to do.

But no more! Today we fixed my two main cabinets with drawers. I could have replaced the front bit as well, having 'real' drawer-fronts, but I chose to use the old door instead, saving a bit of money along the way. The installation went smoothly and using the doors worked as expected. So now I have fancy drawers, instead of messy shelves. I still have to put all the stuff back, and probably move around a few things for easy access, however, I already feel thrilled about it. The access has become much easier, I don't have to lean over or around the door anymore and I don't have to sit on my knees either.

This will make it so much easier for me to access things. I still have to do the bit by the kitchen-sink (those yellow things), the cabinets there need replacing and I will replace them with similar ones as these. I already found a kitchen-sink-cabinet with a drawer and have eliminated enough stuff from under the kitchen-sink (only frequently used cleaning-supplies, the infrequent used supplies have their place in the hallway-closet) to have a pretty good idea that a drawer will also work. I think they come with one, at the bottom, but possibly also with another (half) one halfway. Either will work great!

Have already started saving for it, it'll take more time and money to get that bit done, but after that, I'll have redone the entire kitchen :)