Homemade Chalk Paint Bandwagon...& Painting Tips.

Lately I have been a furniture makeover machine.  I just couldn't help myself.  I became determined to weed through the furniture hoard stash I have accumulated in our basement.  Thank you, thank you, thank you, Craig. ;)

I started out with a dingy, old mid-century modern bedroom set that I turned into nightstands for me and hubby. {Btw, I still have another dresser and nightstand left over from this set just begging for attention/sale in our basement.}  Those pieces got the paint-dipped treatment from me, as well as some gorgeous hardware.

And since working on one project just isn't enough for my project-ADD self, I started tackling this dresser-turned-console.  {Like the set above, I'm not using the nightstand...so it's being hoarded stored in our basement for now.}

I l-o-v-e-d the detail on these drawers and the beautiful lines.  My first thought was to just add some new hardware and call it a day.  I put the piece behind our couch, and just didn't get the warm and fuzzy feeling I was hoping for.  Between the dark charcoal couch, the orangey-toned dresser and our chocolatey-toned floors....it just didn't feel right.

I thought about possibly staining the piece another color, but unfortunately the detailing on all of the drawers was plastic. Grrrrrrrr...

So much to the chagrin of many of you, I gave this baby the paint treatment.  And I'm loving how it looks!!

Since I had already dealt with sanding and priming the other laminate pieces I was working on, I did not feel like carrying this bad boy outside to sand and prime it...plus the detailed drawer fronts would be annoying to sand.  What is a lazyyyy girl to do?!?!  Duh...give homemade chalk paint a whirl!  I had seen SO many recipes and reviews for it online.  In fact, I'm pretty sure I'm the last in the blog-o-sphere to give it a try.  I searched the interwebz for recipes, and a million and one came up.  Ultimately, I selected this recipe based on what I already had in my basement...latex paint and Plaster of Paris.

I started by pouring approximately two cups of paint into a plastic container.  Then I mixed the Plaster of Paris and water in a separate plastic container until everything was smooth and there were no lumps left.  Once the consistency was creamy, I mixed that into the paint container.  {FYI...don't pour the paint into the Plaster of Paris/water container because it will be harder to mix evenly throughout since that is what is on the bottom of the container.}

After that...it's painting time!

Here are a few tips that I always use when I paint furniture:

1) Before you paint the piece, and when you are removing the drawers, take note which drawers went where.  I always pay attention to how the drawers go in and out.  If they don't seem to fit right...move them around. Maybe they are supposed to go in a different slot, or perhaps the wood has warped over time causing the drawer and frame to rub against each other.  This is a fixable issue.  Just take out your electric sander {or if you are into self-tourture, you can sand by hand ;)} and go over the "sticking" areas a few times.  It'll pay off in the end...especially since you are adding some thickness with the layer{s} of paint. I have also gotten into the habit of labeling the bottom of my drawers for future reference.  It really comes in handy!!

2) Eliminate the need to buy paint tray liners or cleaning out paint trays by lining your tray with aluminum foil.  Easy peasy!!

3) Lightly sand your pieces with a fine grit sanding block in between coats, then wipe off allll dust and let fully dry before applying your next coat.

Now, onto the job at hand...

I double-coated the dresser in one night.  I know latex paint says to wait a couple hours in between coats, but I was impatient and this stuff dried pretty quickly....possibly because of the addition of the Plaster of Paris?!? Not sure.  Either way, I broke the rules and double-coated things. ;)

I used a low nap roller made for cabinets and smooth surfaces for all of the flat parts of the dresser.  Then I used a quality brush for the drawers since there was so much detail.  I was a little skeptical of this homemade chalk paint after the first coat...mostly on the drawer fronts.  {Note, I was not neat AT ALL with my brush strokes on the drawers.  Since I was experimenting with new paint, I wanted to see how the brush strokes would go with this type of medium.  Typically, I do loooooong, smooth and even brush strokes to minimize lines and, well, ugliness.}

But after a second coat went on...I started to feel much better.

I called it a night after two coats, but I wasn't all done with the batch of chalk paint I whipped up.

To store it over night, I simply wet a paper towel, squeezed out the extra water, laid it over my paint container...

...and then put that in a zip-lock bag.  {Make sure to squeeze out as much air as you can before it's zipped up tight!}

My paint was good as new the next day!  I just gave it a good stir, and I was ready to put the final coat {or what I thought would be the final coat} on my dresser-turned-console.

Stay tuned for a major blunder on this project...but how I saved the day with some awesome-sauce hardware!! ;)

Friggin' File Cabinet...

Yup, I said it…friggin’ file cabinet.  There are so many attractive, don’t-even-look-like-I-belong-

in-an-office options out there…but all of those come with a price tag I hate to even think about.  Heck, even some of the not-so-attractive options can cost a fortune!  But expensive or not, I knew we needed one for our home.  The cheapo cabinet I made due with since I was a single gal was not only broken, but also wouldn’t provide the filing space we will need as our family {God willing} continues to grow in the future.

So what was I to do?  Simple...it’s something I had done a million times before.  I became a Craigslist stalker {in a totally non-creepy, furniture-needing kind of way}.  I scoured the ads daily to find a lateral file cabinet made of wood or wood laminate.  These two qualities would help mask the “hi, I’m a file cabinet” appearance.  This was important to me since we do not have a designated office space in our home.  {We could make one of the guest rooms double as an office, but the truth is, we wouldn’t use it.  We are more casual and tend to sit on the couch or at the dining table to get any necessary work done.  Maybe when we finish our basement a million years from now, we can assign part of that space to be an office….but then again, maybe not. ;)} 

Anywho, after months of searching, I finally stumbled upon a cabinet that fit all of my criteria, was within my budget and was only a couple miles from my house!  Hallelujah!  {Speaking of which, thank gosh it was so close to my house because it BARELY fit in the car, and if I had to get on some sort of highway versus the back roads I was taking, I’m pretty sure it would have fallen out of the trunk and smashed onto the pavement.}

Here is the boring and functional piece of furniture I purchased.  I don’t have any photos of it together because the drawers were out when we got there {to make lifting and transporting easier}.

Once I got it home, it was time to sand, prime and paint.  The sanding I did on the piece was very minimal.  It was laminate, so I just wanted to rough up the surface a bit.  Then a few days later I got around to priming the piece.  Instead of using regular primer, I used my favorite Kilz spray paint primer.  That dried quickly, but it still took me a couple more days to get around to painting the piece.  Whoooops!  

I decided it’d be fun {and economical} to use the leftover yellow paint I had from when I made over the Craigslist’ed nightstands in our guest bedroom.  The happy yellow totally transformed the cabinet!  Originally I thought I would switch out the hardware on the piece, but after it was painted, the original stuff looked perfect!

Anyone else have tackle a furniture makeover lately?  I feel it’s becoming second nature for me to make over Craigslist finds! :)

Painting...Round 2

A while ago, I gave you guys a sneak peak at our master.  Then I gave you a mini-update of it on Friday.  As you saw, it was...and still is, very far from masterful.

Since these pictures were taken, a couple things have changed {but unfortunately, no where near enough to call our room complete haaaaa}.

Since then, we:
- sold our old bedroom set on Craigslist and replaced it with a mid-century modern set we Craiglisted and painted
- bought a rug for the living room, but didn't like it there, so it now lives in the bedroom {happy accident}
- re-arranged our furniture layout to suit our new-to-us furniture better
- re-painted the whole room because the accent wall was now the wrong wall {thanks to our re-arranging} and I was SUPER antsy to get rid of the pretty-but-not-the-look-I-was-going-for tan-ish walls

I started the painting on a Friday night after finishing up our barn door, and began by covering our former accent wall in Glidden's Pebble Grey.  I finished that wall before I was forced to call it quits so my hubby could rest up for work the next day.  {Boooo busy season and working Saturdays!}

When I opened my eyes in the morning, I was pleased to see that I loveddddd the new color.  It was perfect.  Darker, a little more moody...and definitely made our white trim and dark floors pop.

I couldn't wait to get started on the rest of the room.  The hubs told me there was no way I could finish the whole room in one day.  HA!  That's what he thought.

With the assistance of my iPod blasting and some March Madness commentary, I had our bedroom one-coated by the time the afternoon rolled around.  {And thank the Good Lord, the room only needed one coat!}

I started by cutting all the grey walls in... 

...then I rolled them all.  Then I cut the green wall in, and rolled that.  {I was so focused at this point that I forgot to take progress pictures.}  So here are two finished pictures.  And when I say finished...I obviously mean the painting...not the disaster that we call our bedroom. ;)

I'm so pleased with the new color!  I know it isn't a dramatic change, but I'm in love!  {And don't mind the splotchy color.  The walls were still semi-wet when I took these pictures, but it dried nice and even!}

Also, I'm sure you caught a glimpse of our newly painted furniture in this post.  At that point everything was severely lacking some hardware.  Hopefully I'll get a post up to show you their finished-ness sometime soon! :)

Plan B

Noooooooo...this post has nothing to do with emergency contraceptives!!  It's about a rug, actually.

A couple of weeks ago, I purchased a rug from One King's Lane.  And I'm not talking about this one.  Its a different one that I spied for our living room area.  It was a great price, 100% wool and I was head-over-heels for the pattern on it.

Fast forward to when it was delivered.  Unfortunately, it sat idle in our garage for quite a few days because I couldn't figure out how I'd drag an 8' x 10' rug up the basement steps by myself.  {The hubby works very late every day, and Saturdays, January through April...gotta love busy season.}

After way too many days of walking by it after I got home from work, I decided I was going to get this thing up the steps, no matter what.  HAAAAAA...you all would have loved to see me tackle that feat...but don't worry.  The score ended up Gabbi - 1, Rug - 0.  Somehow I managed to drag/push/kick that sucker into the living room.  Then I patiently waited for my hubby to get home and help me get it out of the package.  {I'm sure it was exactly what he wanted to do at 9:30pm, after working a 12 hour day.  He's the BEST!} 

Normally, I would have attacked carefully unwrapped the protective packaging with a pair of scissors, but there was a ginormous sticker on the exterior that told me to open the large bag-type thing carefully from the end, because if we return the rug, it needs to go back in the same plastic.

So with the hubby's assistance we essentially dumped the rug out the one side of it's packaging.  Here she is all rolled out.

Clearly, Perny was a fan of it. 

{Ummmm, he was way over due for a haircut in this picture.  I'll have you know, I have since given him a haircut and he looks more like this now.}

But anyway....I digress...back to the rug.  The hubby and I were not fans of how the rug looked in the living room.  Granted, we never took the time to move the couch and put the rug under it, but it just didn't feel right.  So it was on to Plan B...{carefully} dragging it down the hall to the master.

Did I mean to buy the rug for our bedroom?  Definitely not.  But did it work?  We think so!  {Pleaseeeee ignore the lack of sheets and duvet on the bed.  It was all in the wash.  And our room is MAJORLY in progress, obviously...but as usual, I want to keep it totally real with you guys.}

We love the rug in our room.  And come on...who doesn't love feeling a thick and comfy rug under foot while you're hopping into and out of bed?!?!

Also, as you can clearly see...our bedroom is re-arranged from the sneak peak you saw here, and you are getting a little preview of our Craigslist bedroom furniture re-do!  More on that and our freshly re-painted bedroom coming soon! :)

Happy Weekend!!!

Using What You've Got

In my sunburst mirror post, you caught a glimpse of the new console that now lives behind our sofa.  Its actually a dresser from a mid-century modern bedroom set that I purchased on Craigslist for $200.  Yup, that's right.  I was able to find a beautiful, dovetailed set {dresser, armoire and two nightstands} for that price.  Yayyyy!

Anywho...since the hubby and I have these awesome closets that fit most of our belongings, we knew we wouldn't need both the dresser and armoire in our bedroom.  The armoire worked much better for our layout, so the dresser needed to find a new place to hang out.  Lucky for me, I knew just the spot for it! 

I wanted to put a console table behind our sofa, and since we didn't have the budget for one, this dresser was the perfect substitute to serve as a perfect placeholder.  Its a bit deeper than I wanted it to be, but hey, beggers can't be choosers!

Unfortunately, I deleted the before picture of this piece, but I do have a before picture of the armoire from the same set.  Hopefully this will give you an idea of what the dresser looked like before...

I love the lines of the piece, but the color and hardware just weren't the look I was going for.  So after the usual sanding, priming and painting methods we used on all of our other Craigslisted furniture {here, here and here}, our new console table looks like this...

No, it's not painted white.  It's {wait for it}....a very pale aqua!  Anyone surprised?  Nope...I didn't think so haha.  And noooo, it is not the same color as the buffet.  The buffet is actually a much brighter aqua.  This is more pale and subdued.  They coordinate, but are not the same.

I wish I could take better pictures and show you the real color of the piece...but just trust me.  It's very pretty!

Here is a picture at night...so the lighting is even worse.  It's hard to get a straight-on shot of this piece because it's so long and I can't back away from it very much.

Of course Perny needed to try and get in a picture...

 Let's try that again, without the cat in the way!  {You can see it's a bit more blue in this picture...}

Here is a close-up of the hardware I chose for doors.  I love that it looks like it was original to the piece.

And the other hardware I chose for the drawers...

 And here is a view from a previous post, showing how the console looks in the whole room...

I have been on the hunt for lamps to set on the console, and the chevron fabric laying on there will most likely become a runner for the top of it.

Piece by piece, our home is coming together! :)