I’ve been collecting pallets for a while. They give them away free (if you can get there in time to get the good ones) at the local gas station. I’ve perused Pinterest for ideas on what to make and I’ve finally made my first project! I made an end table for my living room. I got the idea from HERE – the fourth picture down. I drew out my ideas on a piece of paper, bought some screws and got to work.
First I took a sawzall and cut the wood into pieces. Everywhere that I read says not to pull the nails out, but rather get the sawzall blade inbetween the pieces of wood and just cut the nails. It worked great, and in no time I had a stack of wood.

Next, I laid out the pieces and measured their length. They were exactly 40″ so I cut them exactly in half. When I laid 5 pieces out, it measured 20″ – so my table would be 20″ x 20″

I got the thick pieces from the pallet and cut them directly in half also – Those were 4′ so my end table would be 2′ high. Here are the 4 legs that I’m going to use. The table is upside down and doesn’t have the legs attached.

I used one of the legs of the table to mark an L cut so that the bottom shelf of the table would fit. I made 4 of those pieces. I screwed 1 screw down into the notch that was already on the pallet. I then had 2 legs, and 2 legs. Next, I turned 2 pieces of my 20″ on their side and screwed them into the sides of the legs so that I could complete the bottom shelf.

I turned the table over and screwed the other 2 pieces with the notch out of them to the legs where the pallet already had a notch.

I took the pieces of wood from the bottom of the pallet. They are wider. I wanted the top shelf to be completely enclosed on the sides. This piece was the exact width I needed. I screwed them to the insides of the table legs. The length was also 40″ so I cut it in half and had one piece for each side.

Then I took another piece from the bottom, cut to 20″ (in half) and finished the bottom shelf.

I turned it over and put the last 5 pieces that I had onto the top. I made sure they were straight on the left side, marked what I needed to trim on the right and cut that straight.

I took some “hard as nails” and put some into 2 corners that had gaps. It’s now ready to paint!

I picked out semi-gloss paint from Walmart. Brown for the majority of it and orange for an accent.

The second picture is of how it looks on the side. It’ll have a lamp on the table and a USB plug-in for phones / tablets.

So, what do you think? All it cost me was screws and paint. (The screws and the paint will also be used for another end table and a coffee table)
It didn’t take long to make – but it took me all day. For every 10 / 15 minutes of work, I had to lay down for 30 or 45 minutes so I would be able to keep going. One of my left fingers popped out of socket and I have a beautiful purple bruise and after an hour or 2 of my left knee coming out of joint so many times, I finally put my knee brace on. I’m tired, but excited that I was able to make a piece of furniture for (literally) nothing. Yesterday I sanded a portion of our living room wall (where I mudded) so our living room makeover is well under way!