Stripped chairs

Chair progress!

You can't really get an accurate feel for how sad these chair seats really looked. This first picture just makes it look grey and dingy but the seats were actually dark green corduroy-ish material with who-knows-what caked on. I thought, "Oh, I'll just take that off and put something pretty on!"

And then I found a second layer of "oh-good-heavens" underneath. This layer was original and still smelled of old coffee. *shudder* Not. Pleasant. Also, not easy to take off. Industrial staplers are apparently better than inexpensive manual ones. Go figure.

Anywhoo. The old stuff eventually came off and made way for the new. It's much better, yes? The chairs have all been primed and painting has begun so it shouldn't be more than a couple hours of work before the seats can go back on and they'll be all ready to gather 'round a table near you!

Sneak-peek at my current night-stand project:

Skylight blue and Maison Blanche Cobblestone. :) 

Saved by the bell!

Sometimes I just don't know when to stop.

I picked up a cute little kitchen table/chairs set at a local Goodwill the other day and it sat in the car for 2 days, I think. Why, you ask? Because I didn't actually have any room for it in the garage. *sigh* My husband said, "I thought we agreed on no more furniture until you move some pieces?" He was right, of course, but I rationalized it by thinking that I really have no control over when something will sell and turning down something that should sell quickly seemed a shame.

Fast forward to today and I have one piece out of the house and three more spoken for. Woo-hoo! Now, this wasn't magic. It helps to renew Craigslist postings once in a while (oops!) and talk to friends about pieces that don't have destinations yet. But I'm excited to be able to work on a few new things and have a direction for others.

Oh! and a lovely lady messaged me about consigning a few pieces to her booth in a near-by market. I am SUPER excited about that. I need to get some pictures printed so I can show her what I have and we can make some real plans.

Anywhoo... here's what's new:

Maybe this desk isn't technically 'new' but getting to work on it is! It's going to be orange. Cannot wait!

Yup. My little helper had to get in on this shot. Isn't she cute?

This table isn't in bad shape at all. Some scratches and maybe a few tiny dents (I'm just assuming... I haven't actually seen any) but over all, it's still cute. 

I'm thinking it'll end up looking something like this when I'm done: 

This next one is just a refresh of an old toy of mine. It was several shades/coats of white and the last one, I think I put on when I was like 10 and it was AWFUL. I've come a long way. I hope. haha

My first 'small'! I was so tickled to find this darling little jewel box. It was actually in great shape when I found it and just needed to be a different color. It almost matches a jewelry case I bought from another local vintage business so if it doesn't sell, it'll just join the collection. 

Sweet accent tables

As hot as it's already been lately, I haven't felt much like stripping, sanding, or painting anything outside. So what do you do when you don't want to go outside and sweat with grit and grime all over you? 

You bring the smallest things you can find into the house and work on them in the kitchen! I still had to do a little prep-work outside on these babies but nothing that took more than 20 minutes or so. That's enough to render one's morning-shower completely obsolete. Ugh

Anyway. Here we go! 

Table No. 1 was a random find at a local trade-days event. Totally unexpected. So what did I do? I bought it and wandered around with the three kiddos for another 40 minutes. ha ha. 

$40

Isn't it sweet? I would love to see this on a landing with ivy trailing from the top and this little birdy peeking out. :)

 I don't know exactly what you call Table No. 2. Is it an accent table? An occasional? What is it?? It folds over to one side to make it easy to move out of the way but I don't know what that makes it. Oh well. It was too pretty to pass up so I bought it and sanded the HECK out of the top of it to get off the old super-dark stain/varnish. It wasn't its most attractive quality. 

Once I got it down to bare wood on the top, I thought about re-staining it with something already on hand but then I remembered this lovely idea: Vinegar Stain

I neglected to remember to use apple cider vinegar but I think it turned out really neat anyway. Also, I don't know off hand what the difference is between white vinegar and apple cider vinegar. They both smell equally gross. Thank goodness the smell doesn't linger in the wood for this process. 

$40

So, thoughts, anyone?

Custom table

This table might look a little familiar to those of you who have been following for a while. (And by the way, please 'join' my page if you're reading!) I did one very similar to this that happened to be my first lucky-find at a CCA reSale store here in town. I'm using the same unknown 'antique' white on this table and I'm currently trying to figure out what kind of filler to use where the leather inlays used to be. 

Aren't the details on the legs awesome? SUCH a find!

Don't you just love the 'grills' on this one? I'm so glad they're both intact. I went ahead and gave them a quick coat of the same old white but I'm thinking to sand most of that back off to reveal the original brassy tones. 

It just occurred to me that I could try a fabric touch on one of the open spots. A toile, maybe? What do you think, dear reader?

Here's a look at the first table I did: 

It's that time again - linking up!

Participating in French Country Cottage's Feathered Nest Friday. Have fun looking at all the other creativity going on in blog-land.

 Feathered Nest Friday

A Versa is NOT an SUV....

I need more staging room. This business of moving the girls' toys around to take pictures and then hauling the furniture back out of the room is cah-razy. Seriously. Anywhoo... here's "Claire" in all her finished glory. 

I think I'll add another coat of wax before selling her but all the hard work is done. I really like how Paris Grey and Pure White work together. I'm a little disappointed with the wax because it seems to buff uncertainly but the shine is great and it's easy to work with so maybe it'll just take time to work out the kinks.  

I just love the hardware on Claire. I found these at Michael's several months ago and intended to use them on my own dresses when I repaint them but they seemed to fit the vanity's personality. What do you think?

This next piece is a FIND. I had gone to pick up another table and this little nightstand? was just sitting there with its own price-tag, waiting to be loved. I asked what they'd take for both pieces and the lady gave them both to me for the asking price of the table I was there for. How awesome is that? I wanted to friend her right there! 

This is the table I went to pick up. Awesome, isn't it? I'm not sure if I understood the owner correctly but I think she said her husband bought an antique shop and these were pieces that came with it. Something like that. Anyway. I'm excited. My FIL has had me on the look-out for something like this and I thought I was going to have to buy pieces that were already done and just repaint them in the color he wanted but I'd much rather dress this fella up. He needs it. 

And yes, then I smooshed three kids into the backseat of my Versa and put this table in the front with me and the night stand in the back. And tied the hatch down. Yikes!

So, dear reader, what about you? Picked up anything fun lately and then crammed it into your car with three kids? :) 

Linking up at Miss Mustard Seed - Furniture Feature Friday

Hall-lelujah! ;)

Hooray! The hallway/entry table is finished. It looked a little rough when I picked it up but it's pretty fancy now. 

Before: 

The stain on the top was uneven, there were some pretty noticeable water/ink stains and the legs just looked a little dry and sad. 

After:

$65

The top sanded down pretty easily and the red mahogany stain just made a world of difference, don't you think? I debated trying to sand and stain the legs but with a few chips out of the veneer on the little foot accents, it made more sense to paint it. I'm glad I did, because playing around with the Annie Sloan waxes was fun. 

Have you ever come across a table like this? I wish I could find out something about it but so far, I haven't managed any Google image hits.