A Little Girl's Dream

Nothing is useless.  Even if parts are missing...even if a substantial part is missing.  When you are willing to look past what others might see as limitations or defects the possibilities become wonderful.

I am sure that this piece when it was in it's full form was quite pricey, but after all is said and done, when half of it became worthless the other half became almost as much so.  For $12.50 we picked this fancy Armoire top up at the local Goodwill store.  Ponder, ponder, ponder.  It was beautiful, but what could be done with only half of an armoire.

Confession time.  My daughter and son-in-law actual came up with the idea and the 3 of us pulled it off.  A little sanding, a few balled feet, some paint and a miraculous fabric find at another Goodwill and voile'.  We turned this left-over, half baked idea into something beautiful.

What little girl would not want this in her room.  I wish I was 8 again.

Look beyond the defects and let the child in you see the perfection.

Handmade Dining Table

So the banquette is not done yet, but we needed a dining table for it.  Shopping on Craigslist is always a good thing, but finding the right size dining table just wasn't in the cards.  So I decided to make one.

The search was on for the right base.  Enter a Craigslist find for that...an antique Singer sewing machine base for $50.

So what to make the table out of.  I knew I needed something about 30 inches wide and 5 feet long and strong enough to withstand someone leaning on it without curving or bending over time.  Off to Stardust to find a solid core door.  I cut the door down to 60".  (lesson 1: I recommend 59 to 59.5" to accommodate the trim molding)

 

I centered the sewing machine base upside down on the door and marked and drilled holes to match those on the base.  In addition I drilled a 3/4" "sink" hole about 3/8' deep so that the mounting bolts would be flush with the door, then bolted the door to the base.

Next step...adding the re-purposed siding I picked up from a friend.  They were tearing down an old shed on their property and offered with wonderful chippy wood to anyone who wanted to pick it up.

 Because it was siding it was thicker on one side.  In glued and nailed small molding strips to the door so I could mount the thinner end of the siding and have level slats.

I glued and used black drywall screws to mount the siding to the door.  The screws served double duty because they also filled the holes for the old nails.  I centered the boards on the door to used the best part of the chippy wood.  When dry, I trimmed them down with a hand saw to the size of the door.

The last building step was to trim the door with casement molding that I painted white then distressed with the crackle medium and brown/black paint.

Here is why I recommend making the table slightly less than 60".  The glass topper was a little more expenses because the glass company had to order a larger size piece of glass to create at 60 3/4" x 32 3/4" piece.  Using a 60" piece would have been less expenses.  The glass made a huge different and I don't have to worry about any of the old paint chipping off during use.

A unique piece.  Since completing this project I have purchased an additional sewing machine base for another re-purposing adventure.  Have any suggestions??

Throw Something!

That's right.  Throw things all you want.  Why not throw cheap things.  Then you can throw things and not feel guilty.  Of course, with this kind of throwing you won't feel bad anyway. 

Most of our furniture is either hand-me-down, yard sale, or thrift store purchased.  With all this mix and match one might think they can't have a nicely coordinated decor.  Ha!  If you have recycled furniture of any type, try throwing it. 



A Pretty New Corner



Two Goodwill blankets dressed this ugly recliner up so much that even my husband, who looks at furniture only as a means to watch football, made a positive comment after I had fancified it.  Each throw cost $3.  The pillow is a Christmas pillow that my mother made that I turned around after the holiday.  About 15 minutes after I very carefully put this little corner together, our cat, Booger, jumped up and initiated the "new" chair with a nap.



This is what the ugly chair really looks like.

So why not rethink buying new or coordinated furniture.  Pick up a few blankets and give your old junk a whole new look.

Post Script 1/17/10 
Um, some one needs to tell my cats it's the same stupid chair we have alway had.  They are fighting over it now.

Post Script 1/21/10
It has also become a play platform for Bryndal & Booger

Go Toward The Light...

Turning something kind of tacky into something lovely to look at can be done in all sorts of interesting ways.  Take these lamps.  I found them a few years ago at a consignment store and I fell in love with the glass base.  The cut of the glass and the night light inside made me want to leave them on all the time.  But the ugly, dirty nylon shade left a lot to be desired.

I have no idea where this idea came from, but I really wanted to create something that used the light of the lamp as part of the decor.  Somewhere in the cortex under my hair the idea of a "slide" popped up.  How or what that would result in took a day of idea shopping and thinking.  More on this later...


After bringing in one of the usual suspects, thrift store fabric, I splurged a little bit on this project and spent about $15 on two different coordinating fabrics that match my bedding.  I didn't use this fabric on the lamp but it did help me create that unique light effect.  I also picked up some trim and some ribbon for an additional 8 bucks or so.

The first step was to grab a pair of scissor and remove the cheap nylon strips from the frame of the lamp shade.  Eye sore gone, yeah!  I ripped my cheap cotton fabric in strips and frayed the edges.  Yes, I do like to do this a lot.  It's because I am too lazy to sew things.  I stitched the strips together by hand with the seams facing out and frayed those edges as well.  After wrapping the fabric all around the shade frame I stitched the end onto the rest, again by hand, and frayed the edge.

Here is a tip.  Be sure to count the number of wraps between each support bar on the top so that the strips of fabric are evenly spaced all around. Count the number of times you wrap the fabric around the first frame and duplicate that count around the second. 

Now for the light effect.  I scanned the fabric I bought into my computer and created images of the moth's, butterflies and bees on the fabric and printed 6 color images on a piece of paper.  Since I live close to everything (one of the better features about living in this neighborhood) I made a quick jaunt over to Kinkos and printed 1 copy on transparency film.  Another jaunt over to Mystic Paper and I cut 12 small frames out of Idea-ology Grunge Board.  I made six slides gluing the transparencies between the grunge board with the top piece wrapped in the coordinating fabric.   With a grommet punched into either end of the slide I ran ribbon through and tied 3 slides around each shade.  When the light is on it creates a pretty soft picture on the shade.

Finally, I stitched a coordinating trim to the bottom of each shade and topped them off with a cheap $3 antique finish finial from Home Depot.

 

Originally my plan was to refinish the brass base as well.  I'm so happy with how pretty these turned out I've decided that it gives it a little bit of pizzaz and have left it alone.   It's very romantic.  Oooo, la la.

Mucho, mucho better.  Most of the time I do leave these lamps on now.  I just love walking into the soft light warming my bedroom.

$12.50 Coffee Table

So your dog chewed up the furniture.  Big deal!

Talk about keeping stuff out of the landfill...I found this great coffee table at Goodwill.  I had obviously been chewed on a little by a dog, and three of the four bolts holding the table to the base were missing bolts.  The regular price of this table was $25 but it was half-off day so I picked it up for $12.50.

The heavy base was in great condition and other then some teeth marks the oak was a little scratched but in otherwise good condition as well.  With some help from my son and his truck (save more dough by borrowing a friend or family member) we brought it home and dropped it on the back patio.

I pulled out all four bolts and put the base upside down in the yard.  This allowed the wood top to extend out over the base and all the sides and corners were easily accessible for sanding.  With an electric sander I gave it a once over on the whole table and a little extra focus on sanding where the teeth marks were.  There were a few spots with glue or something else dried onto the table, but these sanded right off.  I don't think it was more the 15 minutes of sanding overall. 

I then used Glidden brand house paint in a Satin finish, in a basic black, painted the inside corners and dips in the wood with a brush then quickly rolled on one coat with a lint free paint roller.  I did a final roll from end-to-end without stopping to get rid of "roll over" thickness.  The next day I did the same with a second coat of paint.  (I waited an extra day due to the cooler temperature)  On day three I used a light sandpaper to distress the finish in a few places and then hit those spots with a very light coat of a matte finish spray.  I think the distressing helps to "cover-up" the dog's rustic treatment.

After a week or so, I will hit it with some spray pledge to give it some protection.  If its gets a little worn down the road I have left over paint and can easily touch it up again.

Not bad for less then $13.