Refinishing Dressers - Part Dos

Justin & I spent nearly all weekend working on these bad boys and I'm very happy to announce that they're almost done! We still have to sand, paint another coat of poly, give it time to cure and attach the new hardware - but you'll be seeing the finished results this week. Or early next week. Hopefully.


. . . I really shouldn't make any promises seeing as how this entire project has been a series of unexpected setbacks.


To recap- once the dressers were free of the old varnish & chipping paint, we gave them a good sanding. This is pretty much how they looked.

At this point in time, I was stirring up the primer and Justin was shaking his head at my eagerness. These fellas were not ready to be primed because they were a bit worn down from years of use. Several of the drawers didn't open and close smoothly because the tracks were broken and there were spots where the wood was cracked and peeling. So, even though I wanted to just slap the old primer bandaid on and forge forward, I knew we needed to sure them up first.

We used these wire brads and wood glue to reinforce the door tracks.

Some of the door tracks were completely shot though and needed to be rebuilt. So Justin made and secured some new ones.

For the areas where the wood was peeling and there were large holes, we used All Purpose Spackle. 

This whole process took a little over a week and a lot of patience. But, once the dressers were all sured up it was finally time to prime and rhyme :)


I gave the dressers a final good rub-down to get all the little dust particles and then got my prime on.

Ready for the shocker of the century? We used Bulls-Eye 1-2-3 Primer for All Surfaces. What, you're not shocked? 

Okay, we love this stuff and it will always be our go-to primer. 

After priming both dressers & nightstands, they were ready for painting! Anyone want to guess what color we painted them?


I'll give you a hint . . . it's not blue.

Refinishing Dressers - Part 1

It's time to talk about it - our never-ending project. The refinishing of our master bedroom furniture. Here's a little back story . . . I inherited this furniture from my great-grandfather. Since I was a young girl these dressers have been in my bedroom, and now they are in our master bedroom. The problem with them is that when I was in 7th grade my mom and I "distressed" them. Yes, distressed is in quotes for a reason. They looked wonky. Like dalmation dressers. At the time, we thought they were fabulous but they were truly way too distressed and I wasn't a huge fan of the white color either.


Justin and I attacked them so quickly that we forgot to take a before picture. The first thing we needed to do was scrape off all that old white paint.  We used this handy-dandy scraping tool and a lot of elbow grease. 

It took us about a week of scraping to get all the paint off. Granted we were only scraping in the evenings after work, but it still took a tremendous amount of time. Then we were left with dressers that looked like this.

See that residual paint left in the corners and along the edges? We had to scrape that off using a putty knife and, again, a lot of elbow grease.


Once the dressers were all free of their spotty white paint, they looked like this. (I don't have a picture of the other dresser, so this is the smaller one)

Well, we actually kept scraping until all the paint in the corners was off, but you get the idea ;)

At this point I was saying "Okay Justin, let's prime and paint them. They'll be ready by the weekend for sure. No worries."

So naive. 

While we continued to tackle issue after issue with these dressers, our bedroom looked like this. For weeks.

Oh and trust me, clothes are just thrown everywhere willy nilly. Let's all cross our fingers and pray that order returns soon. Although it has been super easy to put the laundry away :)

Anyone else start what you thought would be a quick project only to run in to several issues? 

Cranium Cushions!

I finally pulled the trigger and got some new throw pillows. I'm an indecisive gal sometimes and couldn't seem to find any ones that spoke to me. Well, these two beauties didn't just speak to me - they called me by my name. So I brought them home and we became best friends.

Here's a full shot of the couch now.

We've still got quite a ways to go with this room - but it is slowly making progress. If you check out our to-do list at the end of our living room reveal post you can see we've done 2/5 things (see the braided entry rug here).

Justin and I are still working on that project I alluded to earlier this week. We've had some unexpected setbacks, but I'm hoping to start sharing the whole shebang with you tomorrow. So don't run away. Unless you don't like this site - in which case, I'm sorry and goodbye :)

What do you think of our pillows? What changes have you made at your house lately (small and big)? Any house projects taking way longer than expected for you? Please don't say it's just us.

24 Days!

Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus. ~ 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18

Now that Halloween is behind us - there are 24 days left until Thanksgiving. I don't know about you - but I am so excited for it! The turkey, cranberry sauce, sweet potatoes, corn, rolls, stuffing - just pass me the fork and let me enter the food coma right now :)

But despite what my belly may think, Thanksgiving is about so much more than the food. It's all about giving thanks. And even though I try to have a thankful heart everyday, it's nice to take some extra time out and really be grateful for all that I have. It's a reminder that I need far too often to slow down and just give thanks.

So this year I decided to do a little "giving thanks" craft. Yes, this is something you normally do with children and no, my husband and I don't have any kids. It's for us. Because we too need to remember to be grateful.

We had a lot of scrap cardstock left from our wedding invitations that we made so I just cut each piece with an exacto knife down to 9" each. 

After that I was left with a lot of plain squares of paper. (This is where the trusty stamp pad enters the scene)

In order to jazz up the squares, I decided to darken the edges by pressing them onto the stamp pad. Then they laid out to dry.

When it was all finished, I was left with a stack of beautifully darkened squares.

Then all I did was plop the stack next to a glass vase. And wahlaa! Now, each day until Thanksgiving, Justin & I can write on a card one thing we're thankful for and then drop it in the vase. At the end of the month, we'll have a whole stack of blessings to share. 

I am really looking forward to doing this each day! So what about you - any thanksgiving crafts going on at your casa? What are you thankful for today? 

PS: We had snow this past weekend. I still can't get over having snow before Halloween - craziness.