I was refurbishing a vintage desk for my grandson, wondering how to incorporate his love for Avengers and still be able to use it when the Avengers phase was over, and all of a sudden I thought… drawer pulls….using the small action figures! He could change them out any time! In fact, I might need to be on the look out for Pokémon characters next.

He really wanted Thor but we couldn’t find him. The lady at our local game store said he was very popular and used in games a lot, so we found Captain America instead. Got a deal there on used ones for $2.50 each!

You can read all about the history of this desk and the lesson learned on it along with seeing the other grandkid desks on our blog post Vintage Desk Makeovers – A Labor of Love.

The desk, my late brother’s childhood desk, had those old vintage drawer handles with wings (that I think looks like the head of clown), so the first thing we did was

remove them. Whew! Scary! But then we had to fill in the holes. We used a piece of dowel rod that we hammered down into the holes then filled with wood putty. This filled up the space and gave a surface for the wood putty to bond to. We let that dry, then sanded the drawers smooth.

Next, we drilled new holes centered between the old ones and a little higher so that the action figures could be centered. We drilled a hole all the way through the center of each super hero with a drill bit the size of the 2 inch screw we’d be using. We also painted small washers black (so they wouldn’t show) and used two or three behind each one so they weren’t flat against the drawers.

That’s pretty much it. We put the screws through the figures, added the washers for spacers as needed and then through the drawers. We secured with the nuts on the back of the drawer.

I think my favorite part of this whole project was when my granddaughter joked to her brother, “Liam….Mimi killed the super heroes!” But seeing them there on the drawers ready to spring into action, I am sure they will rise again to save the world! 😂

A few more pics of the finished desk: