Off With My Hinges

There it is. My newly door-less door frame!

Got right to the point that time, didn't I?  I was a little excited.  Now I'll back up a bit.

Remember when I posted this picture just a few posts ago?

I actually really like this area just off my kitchen. But as you can see in the picture, it contains a very lot of doors. The laundry door, the power room door, the garage door and a door in the mudroom right where I am standing to take the picture that closes the whole area off from the rest of the house. For four years we have almost never closed that last mudroom door. Mostly it just swings inward and conveniently bangs into the garage door every single time a person attempts to enter through it. Every. Single. Time. To the point that the door knobs like to catch on each other and occasionally try to rip each other out of their respective doors. So the other day, a light bulb dawned in my brain. We need to take that door away! Yes, it took four years for that bright idea. So after waiting for about two seconds for Tyler to get around to doing it, I just woke up one morning and took that door right off the hinges all by myself. And...I LOVE IT! Why the crap didn't I do this four years ago?

  And as always happens when I have finished furniture for sale patiently waiting under sheets at my house, I can't resist playing around a little.  This is the beautiful vintage dresser I finished last month.  I am drooling over how awesome it looks in the mudroom.  Not to mention the storage!  But alas, it is still for sale in my shop.

I have a before picture of the mudroom with the door and the bench that usually lives there, but blogger insists on loading it sideways!  Why?!?

Now I have some patching and painting to do.  Blah.  But worth it.  And a tip learned through trial and error from a door-remover novice?  If you are permanently removing the door from the frame, just leave the hinges attached to the door and unscrew the whole thing from the frame.  That way you're not removing twice the number of screws.  Unless that's not the correct way to go about it.  Then that's not what I did at all.

Just a silly picture from the playing around.  I love this picture of me and my dad when I was little.  Yes the bow is whatever.  And a tarnished butter dish from Tyler's grandma that I will probably never put butter in.  But it makes a gorgeous little spot in which to put keys and such when coming in and out of the house. 

So what lesson have we learned here?  We have learned that just because the builder put it there, doesn't mean it belongs there.  After about eight minutes with a drill, I have a lot more light and a lot less door in my life.

The Dresser That Goes

A few weeks ago my cute friend Lindsey took one of the Molly Tables home to live in the room shared by her two little girlies.  She mentioned that they were also sharing a dresser that had belonged to her husband as a little boy, and that she'd like to it have refinished to match the table.  Remember how the Molly Tables were all pink and cream and girly curves?  Well, a few days later she dropped off this dresser:

Can you say Total Opposite of pink and cream and girly curves?  And then she said something along the lines of, "Oh, just do whatever you think will make it look good with the table." Hmm.  It took a few days of contemplation.  Here is what I came up with:

 I thought about white with pink drawers, pink with white drawers, white top, pink bottom you name it.  None of it seemed right for this piece. Because the dresser has a completely different shape than the tables, I didn't want to do an exact replica of their paint job. I decided it would be best to keep a simple dresser  simple and do something that would just "go".  Besides, its not really chic for everything to be exactly matchy anyway.  At least I'm pretty sure I've heard that around:)

So I painted the whole thing the same white as the tables, distressed it, stained it with the same Dark Walnut, and coated it in polycrylic.

To bring in the pink and a touch of  girliness I played around with a bunch of appliques and ended up again keeping it pretty simple by adding just one, similar to those on the tables, painted that sweet Ballet Slipper Pink and stained.

  For fun and just a tiny bit of curve I added feet, and painted just the balls of them pink as well.

 

 And of course pink glass knobs, the perfect finishing touch. Larger roses on the top three drawers and smaller round knobs on the rest.

Can you picture them living in a room together?  I hope so.

 Thanks Lindsey!  I hope you love it!

Linking up to Cassie's party :)

And

And

Exciting Times

My super exciting news for today is that the beautiful and talented (and so very, very nice) Cassie of Primitive and Proper asked me to guest post!  I'll be there on Monday, May 16 and  I'm so excited, so please head over and check it out!  And while you're there, take a sec to look around at some of Cassie's awesome work, she's great! 

And now, a beauty: 

 A pretty little vintage four drawer dresser with details that almost make me want to lay down and die. Finished in my new favorite soft, subtle gray with slight distressing and no glaze or stain.  I wanted to keep this piece really light and I love how this gray is just a nice take on a typical white or cream.  Still so versatile. Topped off with paste wax for protection and beautiful luster. All new glass hardware.  Killer in an entry, as a buffet in a dining room, extra storage in a bath, or beautiful in a bedroom.

Of course there must always be a shocking before.  I had to admit to my husband that yes, I did pay actual money for this.  And not really just a little, either  But look at that top!  Those legs!  Those adorable, fantastic keyholes!  It took at lot of sanding, repairing and sanding some more.  But the after made all the effort so completely worth it.

 The keyholes had me at hello.

And the gorgeous moulding on the top.

 Beautiful turned legs.

 This beauty is now in my shop!   Check it out for all the details.

And I just couldn't resist a little sneak peak at my Primitive and Proper guest post!  Its a fun one!

Sharing my furniture:

  

And by the way, as I was perusing some linky party participants at the Feathered Nest Friday party, I came across The Shanty Girl. Do any of you wear aprons? I am sooo an apron girl and she makes absolutely gorgeous ones! Like, as in pretty sure I couldn't bring myself to wear to to do housework or cook dinner. She's having a givaway here. You should check it out!

Thanks for stopping by!

Part One

This is Part One of a big project that I've been working on for possibly the nicest client ever. Really. She actually contacted me a while ago about refinishing some furniture but I was pregnant and had to turn her down. Fast forward a whole year and here we are. She called me again! How great is that?! She had a whole list of pieces that she wanted done, starting with her bedroom furniture.

This is the before of the dresser that she sent me. It was quite a pretty dresser in great shape, she just didn't like the stain.

And after.

Please excuse the not great pictures. They were sort of a quick afterthought this time.

She expressed an affinity for distressed black furniture and wanted everything in her bedroom to match, so that's what I did. Black with a lot of distressing, a khaki glaze, and poly for shine and protection.

A thumbnail of the bed before. She had actually painted it herself in a flat black finish and was unhappy with the outcome.

So I redid it.

Also there's a Sad Headboard Story-right before she came to pick it up it tipped over and SPLIT. Crap! I might have said a swear word. But just a little one. I hate it when things like that happen-swear words and splits. I felt so terrible and she was so very gracious about it.


Foot board


Working on pieces that belong to someone else is both highly fun and highly stressful. After spending so much time and energy on something I'm always afraid that it won't be what the client is expecting, or that some part of it won't meet their expectations. I love doing this, but I often doubt myself. I want so much for clients to be happy with my work. So thank you so much, Vanessa, for being so awesome to work with! I'm beyond thrilled that you and your husband were excited with the end result.



Now on to part two, after which I hope you will be equally happy:)

Thank you!

A Cute Girl's Dresser :)

My adorable friend asked me to redo her dresser and night stand. Here is a before of the awesome, solid wood pieces. Notice the used-to-be awesome flowers:
She wanted an antique white finish with glaze and distressing. This is what she got:

As aways, I feel like the pictures don't do the furniture justice. The glaze and distressing don't show up a ton in them, but I really thought they turned out beautifully. I used a gloss poly to give them some sparkle, which I like a lot with a distressed piece. She wanted to pick out some new hardware and I can't wait to see a picture with it, hint hint!

Thanks Rachelle and Cody! I hope you love it!

Bedroom Set

I got the chance to refinish a beautiful bedroom set for a client. It was a little bit of a mess when I got it, but it turned out gorgeous. Here are a few of the befores:

It was originally a stained wood finish, then it had all been painted black. The headboard and part of the dresser had stripper applied but never scraped off.

The client wanted creamy white with lots of dark glaze and distressing.

The results:

Headboard

Footboard

Dresser (yes, I know some hardware is missing, they had it at home)

Two nightstands

The project also included the side rails for the bed.

I am not a photographer and I wish I knew how to get all the detail to show up in the picture. The glaze on these was rubbed in and really created some beautiful dimension and gave them a nice time-worn look. The client is in the process of moving, but promised to send some pictures when she is settled and has everything all set up and put together. I can't wait!

Thanks Ashley! I hope you loved the result as much as I did:)