Fence Picket Floating Shelves

I had to rearrange my room to make space for a home office, and in so doing, I some of my shelf space.  Suddenly, I had to put supplies for an office in the spaces I had used to display my kids' artwork.  After I got all the furniture placed, I realized I had a completely blank area in which I could hang small shelves.  A quick search of Pinterest, located floating shelves, but when I saw the labor intensity and the hardware I would need to buy to pull them off, I was disheartened.

Then I came across this post, and had a flash of inspiration.

I had to replace some pickets on my fence because I have a black lab who thinks she's in training as an escape artist, and I bought the 8' pickets from Home Depot, and cut off 12" so I could have a slightly higher fence in that area of the yard.

I grabbed my circular saw and cut 1" strip off the length of each 12" section.  Then sanded each piece with my sanding sponge.

I hate nails, so tried to use screws to attach the sections in an "L" shape, and split the wood.. :( That didn't work!  Pulled out some small nails and my hammer and, using wood glue, made quick work of the little ledges.

Then I covered with 3 coats of a nice red paint that I've been enjoying.

(That blue/red piece at the top is another, much larger project, that I'll be posting next.)

When dry, I used the same nails, made sure they were level and nailed to my wall.

SO easy, and I think they turned out GREAT!

Total Cost = materials already on hand
Total Time = 1 day (waiting for paint to dry)
Outcome = SUCCESS!