Monster Dresser Project...

So I'm sitting at my friends house, who happens to also be my neighbor, and she starts talking about wanting to rearrange her furniture. She points at the behemoth you see on the left here and says, I just need to get rid of that.. Of course the wheels in my head start spinning like the little spinny thing on the power counter thingy when every light in the house is on.. I just knew I could change that 70's monster into a more modern, a la shabby chic, buffet. A little paint, some power tools, some elbow grease and voila, right?! So I jumped on the chance to take that baby home with me (with a little lot of help from her and her husband, (who by the way was more than happy to get it out of his house) ok they moved it with no help from me) I told her I'd be happy to take it off her hands and she said I could have it.. For Free.. Did I tell you it was FREE!! Woohoo!!

We've all seen the photo's of beautiful refurbished furniture on Pinterest right? 

Dressers turned benches,

dressers turned into kitchen islands,

and dressers painted funky colors and patterns.

You get the point. But with a project like this, it really depends on what you're working with and what you see when you're imagining what it could be. So this is what I did.

This is what I had to work with.  This thing is 6 feet long and is the same height as my kitchen table, which in my opinion is the perfect height for a buffet. I'm not sure how heavy it was but what I can tell you was that I couldn't pick up one end of it.. Very sturdy.. She said it had belonged to her parents and was part of their first bedroom set.. The plan, to remove the 6 drawers on the ends but leave the curly spiral detail thingie's.  

Inside the cabinet doors are these great little drawers that will be perfect for my minimal collection of table linens. Those will stay, as will the doors, and I will update the pulls with paint.

Here are the drawers that I won't need any more, I just dropped them off with Ashley and hopefully she will share a cool project with us when she figures out what to do with them. No pressure Ashley.. ;-)

                         

           

Here we are just starting demolition, at this point, in a project like this it's still fun, but the longer it takes to get things just the way you want the more worried you get. When it starts to look like a skeleton of it's former self, literally, then you want to cry. Here's a whispered quote from my husband,

 (yes whispered, even though we were alone in our own garage) 

"Maybe we should take it out in the backyard and burn it." 

                                     

But I didn't want to give up on my vision, even if he couldn't see it. So with a whole bunch of help from him, he was a saint and did everything I asked, we powered through. I did some light sanding, it didn't really take much, and I did a quick wipe down with some denatured alcohol (this step was pretty important and I should have been a bit more conscious about it but I wasn't, I'll explain that later).  I was really worried that my friend/neighbor that grew up with this dresser (I can imagine her sitting on it with one or both of her sisters as little girls and watching their Mom get ready for a date with Dad) would walk into my garage while I was in the middle of the ugly parts and be horrified, but thankfully she didn't..

 Now at this point I'm starting to feel a whole lot better about the entire project. After you slap some paint on something, the facelift is amazing, well usually. I was pretty happy, see I was starting to doubt myself, I saw doubt in too many people's eyes and unfortunately that affects me negatively. But when I got the second coat of paint on and stepped back, there it was, exactly what I had seen in my head, the very first day that I knew this monster would be mine. I'm in love.

View from the side before the drawers are painted.

Now it's totally done and in the dining room, it has made that large bare room into something that feels just a tiny bit richer, more like home. 

Ryan helping me attach the doors. The drawers are currently blue but will be painted black at a later date.

Earlier in the post I had made a comment that I should have spent more time on the rub down with the denatured alcohol. Well after the first coat of paint I could see some sort of stain coming through the paint, mostly at the wood grain. After the second coat it still bled through, but happily I actually like the effect. I screwed up, probably didn't do a good enough job sanding and could have cleaned it better but as it turns out, I really like the look. As I've described it, it's antiquing itself. 

After
*Love*

Before

So here it is, in it's new home. We have been living with it now for a few weeks and it fits in perfectly.

Next Project: 

 Stay Tuned.. ;-)

Fun with chickenwire!

                Today I was browsing Pinterest, as usual, and came across an old picture frame with chicken wire that you could use clothes pins to attach pictures, letters, etc. to it. As I clicked on the pin to find out how they did it, I realized it led me to a blog/website where the person was selling the items NOT giving you DIY instructions. Immediately I run out to the garage to go down my own checklist… Frame… CHECK! Chicken wire…CHECK! Paint…CHECK! I was determined to create the same product, if not better, than what I pinned. Just to paint a picture for you, there is me in my Picasso mad woman mode trying to start this project, my son throwing dog food ALL OVER the garage, and my min pin growling and running around trying to eat all of the dog food before it hits the ground. BUT I was determined! I had a goal!

I have taken pictures throughout the process in order to share with everyone the process I went through to create the frame with chicken wire.

Beginning with the frame; this was purchased at an auction for $15.00… It used to have a mirror in the frame but it was old scratched and useless, so I took the mirror out and have been gazing at the frame for months now trying to decide what to do with it. I sanded the frame and then using a damp paper towel (if you have tacky cloth use that, I unfortunately could not find it anywhere in my husband’s garage) so a damp paper towel works just as well. Make sure to let it dry before painting.

This next step is completely up to you, I decided to tape it off where I didn’t want the paint to go. I still liked the “antique” look of the frame and didn’t want to completely cover up the color it already had. SO if you feel the need to create a design of some sort feel free! J

The next step, of course, is to paint! This was very rushed due to my child needing to get ready for bed and going crazy running circles around the frame (which yes he did end up with a little bit of paint in his hair). When I was pregnant I had the urge to paint EVERYTHING. I had some lime green and blue paint left over from my son’s dresser so I mixed it together and got this color. Now is the waiting process… I let it set over night.

So it’s been a few days since I’ve been able to “mess” with this project due to life… After peeling the tape off and revealing my work I quickly realized I HATED IT! It was not at all what I imagined in my head…

I knew that I needed to do something to try to fix this PROBLEM. I decided it would be best to sand it down (rough it up) and do a white wash…

Here is the result of the sanding (the roughing up) with my little helper in the background who was up to no good (surprise surprise)

I white washed the frame with ½ water and ½ white primer/sealer, and an old baby wash cloth. I let the first coat set over night then did a second coat in the morning.
After letting that dry I had my husband assist me with attaching the chicken wire to the back… Now that it is up in my kitchen/dining room I plan to add plenty of pictures using clothes pins. I am VERY happy with the finished product and can’t wait to add the pictures.

Cake in a Cup??

So I'm sitting here, minding my own business, trying to get some crochet done. Oh who am I trying to kid, I'm watching a movie while Pinteresting on my phone.. Fine, jeez, the movie was on in the background and I wasn't watching it at all.. Whatever...
The point is, I came across this picture..

Oh My Goodness!!

It just jumped at me through the phone and I knew that I just had to pin it.. I mean, would ya look at that thing.. OK, so normally I pin and move on, which is why I have over 1000 pins now.. :-0 But I had to know what the deal was with this pin, so my first mistake was clicking on the pin instead of just moving to the next best thing. As soon as I read the recipe, I kid you not, I jumped out of my recliner (which by the way is fairly large and jumping out of it is no easy feat) scared the giggles out of the neighbor girl who was watching the movie with me and said, "Come on, we're going to go play in the kitchen."
 I'm pretty awesome, in case you didn't know, so when she asked what we were going to make  I said, "I'm not tellin'.."
So I pulled out all the fancy ingredients..

Fancy Ingredients..

And we got to work...

Good entertainment.. 

This seemed to be a pretty good activity for a 3rd grader. Don't expect them to be able to get all of the ingredients thoroughly mixed and make sure you count the number of scoops of each ingredient that  goes into the cup. My helper and I made a pretty good team though so it worked out. Don't forget she had no idea what we were getting ourselves into, but she was a good sport..

So here we are with our cups full of mud and what do you think we did with that mud.. Well we microwaved them babies...  (disclaimer: not the best picture of food cooking in nuker)

3 Minutes in the microwave

And this is what came out of our cups..

I'm not very bright, so I didn't think to take a pic before it came out of the mug, I am bright enough though to know better than to just dig right in without knowing whats below the surface, so thats why I dumped it out.. It looks like cake, smells like cake, and sorta has the same consistency as a cake, so it must be a cake, right? Well to be honest, it was really too bitter for my taste, (and my helpers taste as well) if I was a better foodie I would figure out how to remove about half the cocoa powder and maybe add a tiny bit more sugar.
Once I topped it with the whip cream, it did add a bit more sweetness, but it didn't help with the cocoa powder aftertaste (don't act like you don't know what I'm talking about).

Sure does make a pretty picture though, doesn't it?

All in all, while we had a good time, I don't think I would do this again, I'm not gonna lie, unless my teenage vacuum cleaner eats it, my mug cake is going in the trash..

Oh How I Long To PIN..

Right now I'm stuck in the middle, well I'm past the middle, of a crochet afghan I offered to make for the high school football team to raffle off.. I have procrastinated for a few weeks now, and could have had it done much sooner, but lately I've had a pretty bad case of ADD. (please do not take offense to the reference, I do believe it is a real problem, usually) Anyhoo, I've been on Pinterest so much and found so many cool things I can't wait to do. The list just keeps getting longer and yet, I won't let myself do anything until the afghan is done.. You see the problem here, I'm not getting anything done because of Pinterest.. Damn you Pinterest..
Here's the culprit in all it's Panther Pride..

Panther Pride Afghan for Raffle

Now, just so there's no confusion, those colors are red and black..  And since I claim to be someone who actually tries the things I pin, well I went ahead and found a pin that takes you right to the book where you can find this lovely pattern. Here it is.. >CLICK HERE<.. This pattern is called Winter Warmer, but since I don't have the book anymore (because I've made entirely to many of these and now it's burned into my brain forever) I can't tell you what page it's on..
So, now I really must get back to the crochet that's obviously not going to finish itself (hmm maybe there's a pin for that). I'm looking forward to all of the DIY projects in our future, until then, I hope you have a lovely day and enjoy your weekend..
PS
I'm hoping to have Ashley set up this weekend so she can blog starting Saturday, she has already been working on some cool things to share with us. I think I created a monster, I noticed her pins and boards have really grown since I invited her over to this blog.. It's going to be fun..
Happy Pinning!!

Saran Wrap Wrap...

It was a dark and stormy night... 

I find myself on the toilet, stuck in a cocoon of plastic wrap, trying desperately to remove it from my body before Dexter comes in and makes me pay for my sins. The feeling of suffocation is terrifying, I just can't get it off fast enough. I should turn the light on, but I know that it will just blind me for life, and I have so much more life to live.. I claw at the plastic, trying not to mess up the polish I had done the evening before, you just never know if it's totally set, a week could go by and I will still question it.  Finally the plastic wrap starts to give and I frantically pull it off, a few tiny pieces at a time. I can breathe again, the pressure on my bladder dissipates with each tear of plastic, when the last piece is removed I sigh with relief and stumble back to bed but sleep doesn't come. So like any self respecting, sleep deprived woman, I jump on the iPhone and enter the world of Pinterest, giddy with excitement at the prospect of new and delightful DIYs just waiting to be found. All the while thinking, I'm not wrapping myself in Saran wrap again, heck, it probably didn't even do what it was supposed to.. 

Ok, so it wasn't stormy, but it was dark, and yes, I wrapped myself in plastic wrap..
According to this PIN, which takes you to this website,  Body Wrap at Home, wrapping yourself in plastic wrap will help remove inches from whatever part of your body you wrap. I happen to have the worst trouble spot ever, so I measured first and then wrapped myself around the middle. Let me tell you this first: THIS WAS THE MOST UNCOMFORTABLE NIGHT OF MY LIFE... Although, I did sleep, it woke me up at 5am which is when I found myself in a Dexter nightmare. It felt like I was being cut at the top and bottom edges of the plastic, not comfortable, I still had angry red lines on my skin 2 hours later.

After the nightmare was over I had no doubt that this was a pin that was just plain silly, probably didn't work, and I would never do it again. I wasn't even going to measure myself but decided I might as well since that was the whole point.. Well, just hold on a second while I eat my hat..... I lost 1.5 inches, overnight, by wrapping myself in plastic.. BUT.. Me being the skeptic that I am, tonight before bed, I'm going to measure myself, and in the morning I'll measure again to see if this is just a normal overnight occurrence.
*UPDATE*
So the next evening I measured again and was still down 3/4 of an inch, the following morning I was the same as the day after the wrap.. So, what I take from that is (and I'm no scientist or doctor) our bodies fluctuate at least 1/2 inch between morning and night. My weight does the same thing most nights. It's possible that doing this regularly would help, but the question is, is it worth it? I'm still not sure about that...

Homemade Liquid Hand/Body Soap

The pin for this tutorial led me to this blog for a Homemade Liquid Soap.. 

It didn't work for me. I ended up with a gallon of very watery soap.. Before I tried it I read most of the comments, I changed the amount of water it calls for, choosing to use less at first since some of the other readers had said that theirs ended up very watery as well...
I started with 6 cups of water, 1 bar of soap, and the glycerin as called for in the recipe.. It was actually fun grating soap.. After everything was mixed, I set it aside to let it thicken.. It smelled amazing.. I checked it in the morning, the next afternoon and the next morning still just watery soap.. So after 24 hours I added a second bar of soap, 2 more cups of water (so I could melt the second bar of soap) and more glycerin, I let that sit 24 hours and it still never thickened up..
What did I do wrong? Well apparently it matters what kind of soap is used.. So I might revisit this tutorial because I would love for it to work. Next time I'll use the soaps that the other readers (that were able to accomplish the right consistency) have used.. Any suggestions?
To be continued...
Valerie

We All Do It....

I can honestly say that it took me quite awhile to get signed up for Pinterest.. I don't like to admit that I follow the crowd like a good little lemming and do what everyone else is doing.. ok Ok OK.. I do follow the crowd, but I'm more of a hard headed lemming that asks why ten times before hanging my head and doing it..

So now I have my own Pinterest, with 24 boards, 934 pins (I should actually have a ticker tape on that) and 9 followers... I signed up on my computer, I downloaded the app on my phone and I can even go from Facebook to Pinterest in one quick click.. I Pinterest at work, I Pinterest when I'm cooking, cleaning, and crocheting, and I Pinterest in bed right before I fall asleep... I'm a sad sack huh? What can I say, I have an addictive personality.. I get a little thrill scrolling through the ever changing images just waiting to be clicked, ready to take you to new places and show you things you've never seen and try things you've never done.. The unbelievable amount of eye candy for every type of crafter, foodie, photog, fashionista, animal lover, the list is endless...


Often times I feel bad when I say, "Oh I found it on Pinterest" and some innocent soul says "What's Pinterest?" Then, after explaining, I feel like I have taken part of their freedom away... Now they too will be addicted and I will be the dealer that's to blame.. 
What I can say in all honesty is this.. "I try what I PIN." 
Well except the guys..*wink wink*
So I've decided to try and blog what I try and how it works out for me, I'll even try and post pictures of the results, maybe even before photos when available.. So I hope you enjoy, pass me on to your friends, and leave a comment now and again.. 
Tomorrows post: Making Liquid Soap From a Bar of Soap..
Valerie