A Few Little Projects...

Remember when I mentioned that during my blog silence we ticked off a few of the many projects on our (rather lengthy & somewhat wishful) To Do List...Well, here are a few pics of the "afters!" Unfortunately, for some sad reason (probably I was so excited to see the projects get started) I didn't take any "before" photos, so you will have to take my word that both pieces were old & brown & really not very attractive...

First up is a very old, six-drawer dresser that I remember being part of my grandmother's bedroom suit when I was a little girl. It has been sitting in our garage for at least 2 years now & has had various intended purposes. We ultimately decided to put it in our home office as a place for me to organize some of my crafting supplies stash.

Now I cannot really take any credit for the actual refinishing of this piece of furniture, I owe the beauty of its finish all to my dear husband. He worked for several days painting & applying the rustic finish & I think he did an excellent job. I love the results! In addition to moral support & encouragement, my contribution was discovering & researching the kind of paint he used for the project, Annie Sloan's Chalk Paint. I had read about this paint on a couple of blogs & was instantly intrigued because it claims that you do not need to sand or prime your pieces...and we found that to be true! The paint is fairly expensive (about $40 per quart), BUT Jeff painted this entire piece with one coat of cream paint AND he only used about 1 inch of paint from the can! Pretty amazing stuff. The great patina comes from adding in a layer or two of the special wax, which Jeff found to be pretty easy to work with.

Ah, it felt so nice to have a project completed & useful in just a few days (not counting the 2 years sitting time in the garage!) My other contribution on this project was the total overhaul of our office...moving furniture around, sorting, throwing away, clearing out piles of stuff in the corners, organizing. It has been a few weeks now & the office still feels much neater & looks much prettier with the addition of this piece. I still smile every time I see it! And here is one more pic of it as it stands now with the addition of a pretty lamp my mom bought me for my birthday last week (thanks, Mom!)

The great results we had with this project quickly spurred on another one...

A new bedside table for Jeff. For the last 2 years he had been using a small pedestal table that was prone to tipping over if one of the kids leaned on it. Or when Drew & Lucy were learning to walk, it would tip if they tried to pull-up on it...not good. It also looked quite cluttered with a stack of magazines, a lamp, an alarm clock, a photo & the phone pretty much covering the entire surface.  This table was what my family used for a TV table way back in the day, but it had gotten some water damage that caused the top to split & buckle. Jeff's dad (amazingly gifted woodworker that he is!) had worked some time ago to repair the top & sand it smooth, but after that it languished in our garage for months. Jeff chose a blue shade of the Annie Sloan paint & again used the dark wax to give it a rich patina. He also lightly sanded the edges for a bit of a distressed look. He stained the top of the table a rich walnut, and once again, I love the results! Not only is the table wonderfully functional (no tipping over & it has a handy drawer to keep the TV remotes,) but it also looks beautiful in our room. Whoo-hoo for another completed project & that much more free space in the garage!
Speaking of which, ever since we moved into this house almost 2.5 years ago, our garage has been--Oh, how can I best describe it...I know, a hot mess! So probably the most significant project to date has been getting it under control. We accomplished this in bits & pieces over the summer, but we finally got rid of stuff that had been needing to go, we organized most of the rest into labeled bins, and now we have removed two large pieces of furniture...that's what I call progress! I dare say, with a few more little improvements (an ad-hoc gift wrapping station & some way to corral the herd of ride-on toys) we may be able to park our van in the garage this winter. Can I get an amen?!!