Red and Shiney

I love Craigslist, it's where I find 95% of all my furniture, including this one.

 

So the high gloss needs to go (I'm thinking something a little warmer) as well as all those paint runs.  There are several places on the skirt that are broken so I will be gluing and clamping today.  The top is in rough condition so it definitely can't be stained.  There are places that look like something really hot was left on it because it's bubbled and has lifted.  I will be sanding a lot inside the drawers and on the side's of the drawers because there is red spray paint all over the place. 

I'm working on about four dressers right now but you can see the red paint on the back of the small drawer.  The other drawer that looks red belongs to another dresser and I will have to use an oil base primer on that one, bummer.

So I finally got all the red paint concealed and the hole's  patched.  I painted her in Sherwin Williams graycon green, which is one of my favorite colors.  I used a Val spar glaze on it and then finished with Min Wax rub on poly.    The color is darker then the picture so I tried some indoor and out door pictures. 

 I have lined drawers with fabric and scrapbook paper before and liked them both.  I was at the dollar store the other day and found this contact paper that guaranteed it was removable, which is a big concern of mine, but yet stayed in place.I had to try it because it really is much easier then the other two options.  I have to say it worked really good and was so fast and easy.  I pulled it up and
resituated it more then once and it still stuck when I was done with it.  The down side was that the dollar store had two pattern's in stock so if you see any and like it, grab it.

The last photo is truest to it's real color (I need a new camera), it's a color that would go with about anything.

Thanks for stopping by, I love your comments and follower's as well.

Sandi

I Got Nothing

My daughter found this dresser for me at a yard sale.  Isn't it nice to have family and friends who help you out when they see furniture at yard sales or thrift store's?  I consider this a retro style and since I haven't refiinished this style before I'm kind of at a loss for what to do with it.  As you can see it's pretty banged up so I got out the nail gun, wood glue, wood filler and went to work, (that make's a lot of hard work sound so simple doesn't it?). 

On one side the bottom was peeling pretty bad.  I took a razor knife and straight edge and scored all the way across the dresser so I would have a nice clean edge when I lifted the laminate.

Now I had a single edge to wood fill instead of all those jagged one's.

I applied a good amount of wood filler and then glued the bottom boards together.   

I decided to paint it a creamy yellow color and spray paint the original handles silver.  The cream color looked too plain by it's self so I added some paris gray to it.

I love the handles on this piece, so very retro!

The picture doesn't do it justice, or maybe it does.  I can't qute get used to the boxiness of this style.  So this is my second paint job, tomorrow I will be trying a different one to see if I like it better.  Any idea's for me, they are more then welcome.

Okay, I just didn't like it!!!  I had to redo it again, I know, I know, what can I say?

I painted it all the same color and the top is ASCP graphite.  I then used Rustoleum oil rubbed bronze to redo the handle's.  I really didn't like them spray painted silver even though that was their original color.  I also put a little bit bigger handle's on the top drawer.  I like it better, infact it's kinda a cute....finally.

 

Thanks so much for stopping by.

I Love My POC

Have you ever bought a dresser and then thought to yourself, "what was I thinking", oh, I always do. And so because of this my husband thinks I have a soft heart for the unloved furniture that most people would either throw in the dumpster or burn, thus, the unloved furniture syndrome. As soon as I loaded this piece in my SUV, it started to fall apart, really that fast.  But I loved the hardware on it and. I'm a sucker for great hardware. I really do have a soft spot for the unloved furniture. You know, it's kind of a challenge.

The main thing that's holding this dresser together is the wood filler.  One drawer completely fell apart, and the rest of them had to be reglued and nailed, and one simply had to be made new from scratch.  I sanded until my fingers were sore, but the more I worked on it the more excited I was to see how it would turn out.

So my husband made a whole new drawer and we only used the old front of it because the rest was so warped, broken, and just falling apart.  Now, let me tell you how we referred to this piece of furniture.  POC, Piece of Crap.  I didn't give it that name, but Doug did as soon as he saw it, and so the name stuck until we were done.

I knew I wanted to paint it a color similar to ASCP Duck Egg Blue, so I went over to Altard's blog and Mandi has compared Behr and Sherwin Williams paints to Annie's paint colors. She has saved us all so much work, thanks Mandi.  This is S.W. Halcyon Green and is beautiful.  I lightly distressed and glazed with Valspar glaze.

The old mirror was missing so, hubby replicated the skirt on the bottm of the dresser for a accent trim to take the mirror's place. It took away the emptiness on the top and made it look more complete

This one is one of my favorite redo's of all time, I don't know why, but I sure like how it turned out.  The dresser is completely functional now and will brighten any one's home.

Thanks for stopping by, I love your comments and

new follower's as well.

Beautiful Highboy

So my kids were split on this one, half of them liked the back splash and half thought it looked out of place.  So I refinished it and decided to give the new owner the choice if they wanted it on or not.  This dresser is one of the heaviest pieces of furniture that I've worked on.  It looks really sound and like there's not much work to do here, but I discovered that all the drawer guides were broken. 

As you can see one knob is missing and the latch to one of the handles is gone.  I took them to an antique restoration guy and he not only had close matches but he also fixed the handle for me on the spot.  He has the greatest workshop, I hope some time to feature his place.

I was really bad about taking pictures during the prep work.  I recruited my hubby and he made new drawer guides for four of the five drawers.  I had tried to use the plastic drawer guides that you staple on the back of the drawer, but none fit quite right, and besides,that would be too easy, 

 right?

I used S.W. antique white and made my homemade chalk paint with it for the base.  For the drawers I used S.W. intellectual Grey.  I love Sherwin Williams sample's.  They were having a sale last week and so for $4.50 I got a quart of paint in satin.  You can't beat that with a stick!!  So I stocked up on a bunch of great colors that I've been wanting to try.

I lightly sanded it then finished it off with Min Wax rub on poly.  I always use a poly finish when I paint furniture with latex.  It seals it so much better and also prevents the drawers from sticking to the base if you let it cure properly.

The back splash didn't look like it came with the piece originally but when looking more closely I think it really did. It will be fun to see which way the customer goes on it.

I love how it turned out, I could easily put this in my home and have it fit right in.

Thanks so much for stopping by, I love your comments

and new followers as well.

Beautiful Rosette's

I found this fun piece in the garage of a lady who was getting rid of some of their antique's.  I fell for this one because I have a thing for small pieces.  I have to admit though, the decorations on the front,or the large rosettes are kind of funky.  I can't decide if I like them because I've never seen one's this big, or because they are cool looking, I can't decide which.  Either way I really like this piece.

It's really well made so I'll just add some homemade chalk paint and restain the top.

I used Swiss Coffee for the body and plaster of paris for the homemade chalk paint recipe. 

The mixture for the chalk paint is 3 parts paint to 1 part plaster of paris.  Mix the plaster of paris with a little water first so that you get all of the lumps out of it.  Add it to your paint and then add just a little more water to that mixture until you get the right consistancy.  This recipe has always worked for me and I love how easy it is.

I stained it with Min Wax dark walnut and then used rub on Min Wax poly to seal the whole thing.

I distressed it before using the rub on poly, and also used Rustoleum bronze spray for the hardware.  I love how it turned out.

                                                       Thanks so much for stopping by,
                                            I love your comments and new follower's as well.

Yellow Desk

While out yardsaling, I came upon this pretty desk. I love going to yard sales but I think most of us were jumping the gun on this day because it was bitter cold.  The wind went right through me, so I quickly grabbed this desk, stuffed it in my suv and headed home.  Later a client saw the desk in my shop and she loved it, thinking that it would be perfect for a scrap booking desk.  At first she wanted it a bright red and then she decided that a happy yellow would be just as good.

                                    

I really enjoy doing pieces that the client gets to make all the decisions.  She chose cornbread yellow, with dark walnut stain for the top, very little distressing, and wanted the hardware painted.  Sounded good to me!

                                   

                          Doesn't the vinyl table cloth add a bit of class to all my make overs?

Here's the finished look, and it did turn out to be a perfect scrapbooking table.

She wanted it lightly distressed, and I used wipe on poly for the finish.

Min Wax dark walnut stain on the top and Min Wax rub on poly for the finish.

She was such a fun client and I'm looking forward to working with her again.

Thanks for stopping by, I love your comments and new follower's as well.

Sandi

Pretty from the start

I found this beauty on Craigslist and was thrilled! To begin with I love serpentine furniture, and then to get it for such a good price too, score!  I know it's beautiful the way it is but if you could see it better you would see that there is lacquer dribbles all over it.  So guess what kind of paint I''m going to use.  Yip, chalk paint !

Picking the color for this piece was easy because I saw a beautiful buffet on Pinterest (of course) and I loved the color of it.  You can look at the buffet over at Paint In My Hair.  She does wonderful work.  The colors she used were ASCP graphite with a little french linen added to that.  I didn't have any french linen so I looked at another one of my favorite blogs, Altards, and Mandie has a conversion chart from chalk paint to latex.  Thanks so much Mandie for going to all that work.

ASCP graphite is really close in color to SW Tricorn.  French Linen is really close in color to SW Intellectual Gray.  I haven't used Sherwin Williams paint before but l really like it.  I love the sample quart size for six dollars!  Also I love that it has a screw on lid.  I mixed these colors 3 to 1 and then added my plaster of paris chalk paint recipe.  I loved how the color turned out.  I then used AS dark wax, the picture above shows the before and after using the wax.

 Usually I don't use wax because it's so much extra work compared to using poly.  I like to use wipe on poly acrylic or even spray on.  But I wanted the darkened look the wax gives it, and the sheen that you get with wax.  I took the hardware off and sprayed it Oil Bronzed, and that gave it the boost it needed.  

Here she is all done, it was so much fun doing this dresser, I guess because I knew the color was going to be beautiful from the start.  I didn't want to have to wait for an order of french linen to come, so this was the next best thing.  Hope you like it

                                               

The basket was given to me by my hubby so that when I needed to carry paint etc. from one place to another I would have something to pack it in.  I use the basket all the time for my supplies, I love it.

The drawers can be pushed in all the way like the bottom picture or even with the dresser like the above picture.  I like them even with the dresser the most and all my kids like it best like the bottom picture.  Which way do you like it?

.                                             

                Thank you so much for stopping by, I love your comments and new followers as well.
                                                                         Sandi