I had seen a desk that fits over part of the kitchen table on an RV forum and thought it was a great idea. It was made by an Amish company in Indiana. The cost was $800 plus shipping. Kevin and I started brainstorming whether we could make our own.
The Amish one had a wood file cabinet on one side and a cabinet with shelves on the other. We searched office furniture stores in person and online. All the file cabinets we found weren't tall enough. So we went to Menards and started walking the aisles for inspiration. We found the cabinets you see below. They are actually upper kitchen cabinets. They were almost the right height and they were unfinished oak. Our wood is maple, but we thought the oak would work. Then we bought an oak board to make the top. Kevin cut it on my dad's table saw and then I stained and finished all the pieces. I found a stain color that matches really well. We had to put an extra piece of board between the top and each cabinet for a little extra height. Otherwise, it was sitting directly on the table, and we were concerned it would scratch the table too much.
We also put a piece of wood on the floor between the two cabinets. I was planning on putting the printer and scanner down there. As you can see, our printer is quite big. It's the one from our desktop we had in the house. We'll keep it for now as it works fine. Someday, we may get a smaller one. Both the scanner and this printer wouldn't fit below so the scanner is in a different cabinet. We still need to do something with all the cords :)
There are 3 shelves in each cabinet for keeping our office supply items and for some added storage. We're using the 4th chair next to our island as a type of bar stool.
If we need dinner seating for more than 2, we can pull out our table extension and still put all 4 chairs at the table. We haven't traveled with this set-up yet. We think we'll be able to put the 2 extra chairs upside down on top of the other 2. If not, we'll find a place to put them while we travel.
I'm really pleased with the way it turned out. And, the best part is it only cost us about $200.
Do you like my flowers? They are from my last day at work and still look good. I especially like the green plastic cup as a vase. I didn't want to keep the glass one figuring it would break. It's at the house as part of the estate sale stuff for tomorrow :)
It sure has been cold lately. Highs in the 40s and tonight we have a freeze warning with temps expected to be in the low 30s. We are staying toasty in our new RV home. We're using 2 electric heaters and haven't had to use the furnace.
