Updated Exposed Wood Shelf

This is a little project that is pretty quick and easy, yet makes such a big difference.

My laundry "room" is nothing more than the laundry stuff behind two sets of bi-fold doors. It's in the mudroom hallway, directly opposite of these hooks. When we first moved in, my dad helped me hang up this melamine shelf that I had hanging around to put my laundry essentials. I didn't get a wider shot, but directly to the right of the shelf is a window so there's no place to hang a cabinet. That's why I had to make do with just a shelf. Not to mention, that it would be hard to get to anything that would be on an upper shelf.

Anyway, even though I'm the only one who uses this room and the doors stay closed when I'm not actively putting clothes in/out of the washer or dryer, I still wanted to do something about the exposed edges of the shelf. I know they make some kind of tape you can iron on, but I wanted to do something prettier.

I first cleared everything off the shelf and purged and organized. I filled up a mason jar with oxyclean so I wouldn't have that big box to pull down every time I needed it. Got rid of stuff I didn't use anymore, and put all the free samples into a little container.

Then I went off to Home Depot and got some nice, but not too thick, moulding. I'm still getting over my fear of power tools, so I got out my handy miter box and cut two pieces to size. Each piece had a straight edge that would sit flush with the wall, and a 45 degree angle edge where they would meet at the corner.

Just squeeze a strip of liquid nails across the whole piece and put it up.

I held them both in place for a few minutes and then used painter's tape to hold it in place until it was dry.

Here's a view from underneath, but I think only my kids are at a height where they could see it.

There was still a tiny gap between the shelf and moulding and the corners did not meet up perfectly, so I used a little caulk to close the seam.

Much better!

You will notice that the big tide on the left has one of the cups that you pour into. I've been keeping it in a bowl since for some reason the sides of it always get sticky, but a styrofoam bowl did not fit with my new plan.