DIY Wood Scrap Shelf Sitter

DIY Wood Scrap Shelf Sitter

The following project is purely just for fun.  So if you like all your projects to have a purpose, this DIY wood scrap shelf sitter is not for you.

I started this project wanting to make a little man shelf sitter out of my many pieces of scrap metal sitting around. I quickly had to scrap (see what I did there) that idea when I didn’t have anything I wanted to use as a body or a head.  I had plenty of arms and legs, but no main body parts.

That’s when I spied this old table leg, the perfect body and head. I also had a few dowels sitting around which would make perfect arms and legs.  I had a new direction, a wood shelf sitter.

In the upper part of your body drill a hole all the way thru your body the same size as your dowel.  Make this hole about where your shoulders would be on your wooden body.

On the lower part of the body, use the same size drill bit, and drill 2 holes where the legs would be placed making them sit straight out from the body.

Cut off any extra table leg and sand the cut edges making sure your body can sit without falling over.

For the shoulders, push one dowel all the way thru the body leaving an extra half inch on both ends.

For the legs, cut 2 equal length dowels and insert in your lower drilled holes. These upper leg parts, the thighs, were about 3″ long.

Sand the ends of the dowels and use wood glue to secure in place.

An odd shaped washer will be my neck.

I’ve also left an extra lump on my head piece to be the brim of a hat.

Glue the neck and head to the body with your E6000 glue or something similar.

The lower legs and arms are formed with  dowels and sanded blocks of wood.  Drill holes in each shoe and hand to insert your leg and arm dowels.

You can make your arms and legs any length you desire.  My upper and lower arms were  each  about  1 1/4″.  The lower legs , the shins, were a little under 3″.

Sand any part of the dowel that won’t be glued into a hand or a shoe.  Glue  and let dry.

These are my ears.  One thin slice of dowel cut in half and sanded.

Attach with a strong adhesive, such as E6000.

Create the nose in the same way but using a larger dowel.

Drill a small hole in each leg and arm joint.  Insert a wire and twist to tighten.

Cut off any excess wire ends and bend the ends inward to hide the excess.

I chose a half of a wooden ball to be my hat topper. My guy is kind of casual and this looks sort of like a baseball cap.

You’ve done most of the wood assembly, it’s time to start painting.

I also considered these hat toppers which would totally change the vibe of my little guy.

A top hat would need a suit to go with it and the pointy one looks more like an elf on the shelf.

Don’t forget to turn him over when you’re painting to get all the nooks and crannies.

Paint as desired.

I used a black fine line drawing pen to add details that would be hard to paint on with a brush.

Don’t forget his shoes.

Still needs a few more details, but when you’re ready, spray with a satin polyurethane to seal all the fine lines and give your guy a little shine.

I want my guy to sit on a bookshelf so he might as well be holding a book.

Make your own mini book with a piece of leather about 2 1/4 x 1 1/2″.  If you don’t have any scrap leather sitting around, an old belt works perfectly.

Cut a few pages for your book slightly smaller than the leather.

Assemble your book.  While everything is in place and held tightly, drill some small holes thru all the layers.  Stitch up your book with some fine twine and a needle.

Glue your book onto your little shelf sitting man with some hot glue.

Last thing to do was to give my guy some hair.  I have no idea where I got this piece of fur from but it was sitting in my scrap fabric pile.  Cut a piece to fit and hot glue in place.

If you have no fur, painted hair would work great as well.

**When cutting fur, try to cut the backing only.

All ready for shelf sitting.

 

If you’d like more ideas of what you can do with your rusty junk, you may be interested in my rusty junk owls  or junk angels.  Just put junk angel in the search bar, I think I’ve done about 10 of them so far and it might be time to do another.  So much junk, so little time.  🙂

Until next time, stay inspired.