I made this simple shoe rack for our laundry room to keep the shoes off the floor. You can find out how to make your own at not martha.

I’ve made my first attempt at building an outdoor birdhouse. There were a few issues to deal with that I didn’t have to contend with when I built my other birdhouses.

First, it needs to be able to keep out the rain. So I made sure the roof was at a 45º angle so that I would be able to simply overlap the two roof pieces and then seal up the tiny cracks with silicone seal.

Second, if any birds do choose to make this their home, I need to be able to clean it out during the slow season (winter). So I put a little door in the back for easy access.

And finally, it had to be mounted somewhere. So I put up an eight-foot pole for it. But the birdhouse had such a wide base that I wanted extra support, so I cut four little support arms out of wooden garden stakes and drilled them to the pole.

Click the picture above to see a few more photos.

Click the picture to see my second birdhouse. This one is a bit smaller than the last. Crown molding adorns the façade, while a tin roof adds a folksy charm.

Actually the roof didn’t come out quite right. I had hoped to use 1” thick wood on the roof, but I ended up having to use 3/8”. The sides of the roof are at a 60 degree angle, which would require the ends of both roof pieces to be cut at 30 degrees where they meet in the middle so they would fit together. If I had made the angle of the roof 45 degrees, I could have simply placed one side of the roof overlapping the other, and they would have fit flush, creating a 90 degree angle at the top of the roof.

Long story short, I can’t make a 30 degree cut across eight inches of wood because I don’t have the tools to do it. And even if I had the tools, I can’t promise you I’d know how to make a cut like that. So the solution was to overlap two thinner pieces of wood and then cover the joint with a bit of aluminum left over from my old shed.

After finishing the shed project, I still had the urge to make something, so I built this birdhouse. To spruce it up, I went with a door motif. I used a glass door knob, some old keys and a draw pull that looks like a door knocker to decorate the front. I used an old tin ceiling tile for the roof, which was much easier than trying to make a roof out of wood. With tin you just cut, bend, and nail into place.

I’m pretty happy with how it turned out. I may make some more.

I’ve added a few elements to the shed since my last post on the subject. I put down a small, simple flagstone patio in the front. This makes taking out the lawn mower easier and gives me a dry spot to do it. And I found a firewood stand to sit on the deck where I left a little extra room next to the shed.