Ideas for Old Pallets

I’m at it again, scavenging for things people throw away! I’m always looking for ideas for old pallets and throughout the year I’ve been collecting them with the idea that I would be able to use them for something.

Pallet Garden Extension

Back in July we needed more room in our garden so Rich pulled out one of the pallets and turned it into a garden extension! He stapled the sides with plastic, filled the pallet with garden soil and planted squash and watermelon between the slats. I was so excited to have more garden room and watch the vegetables grown with hardly any weeds! By the end of the summer the watermelon vines had overtaken a big portion of our back yard and we even had a few watermelons. This is the blog I wrote back in July about our Fresh Garden Vegetables. There is nothing better than fresh vegetables all summer long and even into the fall and winter from what I freeze. Also if you notice the pink and white bench in the far corner by Lia’s garden, that was also saved from the landfill. As we pulled in a man was getting ready to toss it in the recycling bin and I stopped him! He even helped Rich load it in our truck. It was the basic black iron with wood slats and in need a a paint job. This is a photo blog of the bench before and after from 2020!

I always had an idea to make something out of pallets and since we still had pallets stacked in the side yard I could finally tell Rich my plan!

I wanted to display the Nativity Scene along with the rest of our outdoor Christmas display. I found a nice sized Mary, Joseph and Baby Jesus and purchased that in the hopes I could find a stable.

A Stable from Pallets

It didn’t take long to realize we could build a stable from pallets! Mid November Rich dragged a few out and we started our project. The back is one pallet, the sides are a pallet cut in half. When it was time to take it to the front yard, that was a challenge. Pallets are heavy! Rich had used “L” brackets to hold the pallets together so we brought the three sections out and assembled them out front. We didn’t have enough left over wood to make a roof so I came up with the idea to use an indoor/outdoor heavy drapery fabric! We used some branches from our tree trimming to add in between the wooden slats and it was ready to add the figures!

We had some hay left over from our Halloween display and we borrowed the star from Lia’s tree in her Princess room. I was so pleased with the results!

The next addition was adding a string of white lights around the stable. We also had Santa’s sleigh on display, the old wheel barrow saved from the landfill a few years back. On Christmas Eve we lined our yard with Luminaries. Looks like all we needed was a blanket of snow!

As it was almost time to put the stable away we made a few additions for next year. I found a little Angel at Walmart on their half price sale for $5.00! She is made by the same company and even lights up like the other figures.

Okay the day to figure out how to get the stable in the back yard has come. It’s all together and SO heavy! Rich got it on the dolly and we carefully wheeled behind our fence. But then another idea popped in my head. Let’s get wheels for the bottom so we can save our backs and just wheel it out next year. Now we didn’t need them right away but Rich ran to Lowes and the stable now has wheels! We are also planning on making a wooden roof before next Christmas and my search throughout this year will be looking for the 3 Wise Men and the animals. We had so many neighbors stopping by to look at our Nativity scene and we got many compliments from our pallet stable! I’ve very pleased at how it turned out.