Book Barn: Part 1

I found an amazing project idea from a post on Pre-K Pages, a page on Facebook. They had a link to a website:

http://tunstalltimes.blogspot.​com/

She has an awesome book area in the shape of a barn, which I intend to copy. I am putting my pictures and instructions up in this blog in hopes to help everyone who would like to build one for themselves! Bear with me as I post; I am still in the middle of construction! Hopefully I will finish my barn this week. We'll see! The 100+ degree weather is cutting into my initiative and productivity levels... :)

Here is a picture of the project. Mine will look similar, but with a few modifications and a lot of safety backups. A few things I have done may seem like overkill, but I only want to build it once, and I have 22 more years of teaching left! I sure want it to hold up, not to mention be safe for my students!

Welcome!

Lately I have been trying to decide what new way I should use to share ideas with my fellow teachers. I follow several blogs, so I figured, why not? Hopefully we can gain some insights into each others classrooms and have fun at the same time! I have been teaching Kindergarten for 8 years now, and am still loving it!

In my free time I love to tinker in my workshop and work on carpentry projects. Each summer I try to complete one project (sometimes more) for my classroom. I had yet to decide what to do, when low and behold, the perfect project appeared on Facebook! I belong to a number of teaching pages, one of which being PreK pages. Someone posted a picture of a book barn, and I knew that it was exactly what I wanted. Unfortunately, the owner of the barn could not provide any blueprint information or dimensions, so I had to design my own and "wing it". So my saga begins and the "Book Barn" project was born! I will be posting all the instructions, steps, and tips I have used while constructing. I warn you; this project is not for the faint of heart or amateur builder! Either ask someone to help you that has at least some rudimentary knowledge of carpentry work, or be prepared for a long haul! I hope you enjoy my journey through this process, and if you plan to build your own and have any questions, just let me know! :)

Trish Loven,
Kindergarten teacher