We have a very simple chess set ($2.99 from Rite Aid) and though we don't play very often, it's just one of those things it seems like every house should have. Ond day it was sitting out and I practically cringed when I noticed how badly it clashed with our orange living room decor (the squares were black and bright red).
I got the idea right then to cover the red squares with scrapbook paper. I happened to have a sheet of cute orange paper in the house already, so I used a glue stick to cover the red squares with the paper. There was also a bright red outline around the board, so I used a black magic marker to color that in. Then I modge podged the whole thing so that the surface would be even.
We love how it ended up, and now it's sitting out more often than not!
Next, Scott decided to make a headboard for the full size bed in our guest room. He bought ten fence posts from the store and built a short fence. He used roofing nails because they are big and shiny, I thought that was brilliant of him.
These were fun little projects, and they were both CHEAP! Even better!