Ikea Toddler Table Re-Do

I saw this red Ikea table and chair set in someone's trash the other day and nabbed it. There were 4 chairs, but I just took 2.

 The red didn't match my house, so I saw what paint I had on hand: gray chalk paint and  green spray paint.  I tried a much prettier shade of green first, but the can jammed and I switched. It was nap time, and I knew my painting window was not going to last forever.

Not my best painting job ever. I just noticed one of the chairs needs another coat. But that's the nice thing about free-- It FREES you up to do a half-way job and not feel guilty about it.  I think Andrew likes it!

Multi-Tasking

If you've ever wondered whether one can scratch a shingle-y head while spray painting, I thought I'd introduce you to 2 of my newest buds.

Gladys:


And her little sister Ethel:


Both were super sturdy and super comfortable.

After a little priming, painting, and stapling, they have a new lease on life.

Gladys now goes by "CoCo," and Ethel would prefer to be addressed as "E-Dawg."


When and if I find the baggie where I put the screws to hook the seats back on, these 2 are going on Craigslist.

Chasing the Blues Away

What to do when your decorating has stagnated and you have neither the time nor the $ for a big project?

Just find something on your wall, spray paint it, and stick it right back up.

Remember my laundry room turned office?


Well, there was a mirror on the opposite wall that needed a little fun.




5 minutes with Krylon Blue Ocean Breeze and we're both feeling perkier. In need of some Windex, but definitely perkier.

Dust and cobweb removal always optional.

DIY Day-- Dumpster Dive Edition

Here's my latest dumpster dive project. I pulled this chair out someone's trash. I liked the shape, but the suede was marked on with pen and had a few small tears. The picture doesn't really show the stains, but trust me on this one. I also thought it looked a little formal for me.

I glued the ripped suede down with a glue gun and then spray painted the entire chair, suede and all, with my favorite Heirloom White spray paint. The arms got oversprayed b/c I was trying to cover up some pretty gross stains and got carried away.

If I had it to do over again, I would have at least tried to clean the suede before I started spraying. It has kind of a mottled look about it, which I like.

Molly doesn't like how the paint feels on her feet when she stands on the chair in her dirty bare feet to look at herself in the mirror each day. Hmmmph!

And Tom thinks it looks a little trashy.

But I'm loving it! And even if it's not our most dramatic transformation, or the loveliest piece of furniture in the house:

1. it was free

2. it is comfortable

3. it's not in a landfill

4. the whole project took under 5 minutes, if you don't count the minute it took to wrangle it into my car

5. the living room isn't lit well enough for close inspection anyway

Be sure to check out the other DIY projects at Kimba's blog.

Home Alone

So while many of my blogging friends were whooping it up at a little convention called BlogHer, I was having alone time.

Tom took the kids to Cleveland for the weekend to see family. I initially thought I had to work this weekend and couldn’t go, but when I realized I didn’t, I decided to stay home anyway.

What I did:

Pedicure! Sure, the only appt I could get was at 8:30 on a Saturday morning, but still.

Dinner and a movie with a friend. “The Ugly Truth” with Katherine Heigl. Raunchy and over the top, but I laughed a TON!

Small home improvement projects like taking the plastic film off the French doors that have been up in my office for 15 months. “I can see clearly now, the film is gone.”

Jaunt to Home Depot for 8 cans of spray paint! It was a spray paint bonanza in the carport. Tables, baskets, knick knacks. Some things look good, some crappy. My fave is this chair, but considering I painted right over the dirt and rust, it won’t look this pretty for long. Immediate gratification, baby!






Cleaned out basement storage area and scoured every drawer and closet in the house to make a towering mountain of yard sale stuff. I hate to think I’ll probably net like $80 on all this stuff, but I hope the house will seem less cluttered. Whatever doesn’t sell, I’ll donate to my favorite thrift shop and probably be tempted to buy back again. Psycho, I know.

Watched several Lifetime movies with very little guilt, oh yes I did.

Started 2 new books.

Cooked and froze lasagna, spaghetti pie and chicken enchilada casserole to try to “get ahead” on meal making. If it has ground meat and cheese, it’s an artery clogging “go” here at Casa See.

Missed church. Am thinking a drawback of working at a church is that worship can start to feel like “going to work.” I’m not thrilled about this development.

What I didn’t do:

Open my briefcase to do any “work work.”

Blog

Exercise

Decide where to send the kids to school next year. Aargh.


What I realized:

Shadow and I generate virtually no laundry. I didn’t do wash the entire weekend. I guess it helps that I sleep in whatever shlubby clothes I wore the day before.

Although it was awesome to have an entire weekend to myself, I need people! I missed my family. I should have scheduled more activities with others. Friday movie night with my friend Jane was energizing and fun, but I found myself getting more and more sluggish as the weekend alone progressed.

And although I felt too insecure to go to BlogHer (jr. high dance, anyone?), I probably would have had a blast.

Tom and the kids just called from the Pennsylvania turnpike, just a few hours from home. The worst part? It'll probably take about 5 minutes before the bloom is off the rose and I'm craving some Alone Time.

I'll Take Cream With That

Here’s my latest dumpster dive. The fun part is that I’m friends with the woman who threw it away. I think it will be cool to invite her over and see if she recognizes this old dresser, now a console, that I plucked from the curb.

The bottom drawer was broken, so out it went, and I tucked a cute little stool underneath. I switched out the old knobs for cut glass ones. I'm totally bummed that the creamy white paint made the crookedness of the drawers stand out so much, but overall I'm happy with it. Cost: $3 each for the knobs and a little white paint. Here's the cute but a little broken original. I don't feel bad about tampering with it, since it was going to a landfill anyway:

My grandma and grandpa have lived in the same house since the 1940’s. It has 2 bedrooms, a living/dining room, kitchen and a bath. Grandma’s secret to keeping it bright and airy? White paint on everything. I don’t know how long it took Grandpa to get on board with the white paint, but he’s surely been at peace with it a while, since they’ve been married over 70 years.

Most men are more than a little reluctant to embrace putting paint on anything other than walls, while women want to take the plunge. “But it’s such nice wood!” is the line heard ‘round the world when wives propose painting wood trim, cabinets, paneling or even an old chair. The “nice wood” label is certainly debatable, but men, perhaps from the earliest ages, have prized their wood. That last line did not come out the way I intended, but I think you know what I’m saying.

I bet that back in the day when some guy came back to the hut with a dandy new catapult, his wife tried to convince him to jazz it up by rubbing a little limestone on it or even some mashed berries for color.

Tom’s not too psyched about my spray painting proclivities, but he doesn’t say much. He knows he is NOT the arbiter of decor in this house. One reason my getting stuff out of the trash or at the thrift store works so well for us is that whole paint thing go. Until yesterday.

See, my latest dream is a creamy off-white kitchen. My current kitchen? Nice, dark wood cabinets. It’s easier to take the plunge and paint kitchen cabinets if they are old and dingy, but our remodeled kitchen (in a 1960’s house) is very well done and was a big selling point when we bought the house 6 years ago.

I just didn’t stop to consider that within a few years I’d be yearning to tweak, to change, okay, to paint those cabinets! And Tom? Not coming on board with tampering with them. Here he is enjoying them. Please excuse the mess.

Tom is right to be reluctant (or adamantly opposed) to my painting the cabinets, because when I paint things, it is usually pretty shoddy work. I’ve toyed with the idea of selling some of the chairs and other stuff I’ve “made over,” but I know other people’s standards would be more exacting than mine. They might expect the bottom of things to be painted, or for me to wipe off cobwebs before plunging in. None of which is a given.

If I’m doing a particularly crappy job on a project, Tom will sometimes swoop in to save me. Seeing my drips bugs him. Not that I would ever do something like this on purpose, but I will tell you that when Tom and I were dating and I burned a big hole in his pants with an iron, I sealed my fate of never having to iron again. Well played, I think.

So, my dream of off-white cabinets, black soapstone or white carrera marble counters, and gorgeous open shelving (yea, try organizing plastic Ikea cups on those!) remains just a dream for now.

Maybe when I’m an old lady in a cottage by the sea.

And as for my next half-arsed spray-painting project? I think I need to give Tom a break and start small.

With the coffee table, perhaps?

Give Me a Staple Gun, I'll Give You a Chair

A month or so ago I bought a run-down 60's or 70's dining room set at my favorite thrift shop. I was initially pumped up by this awesome score, but I got bummed out when I realized they reeked of cigarette smoke and "old taxi cab." Ick.

A lot of Murphy's Oil Soap helped cut down on the stench, and replacing the foam seats helped, too. They either smell much better now, or we've just gotten used to it, much in the way we don't smell the dog anymore.

Tom stained the table dark brown with gel stain that was a vast improvement over the old orangey color. I spray painted the chairs and made new seat pads and covers with my glue and staple guns. I did a pretty crappy paint job, but the overall effect looks pretty decent. The nice thing is, with all 3 leaves in, and using a hodge podge of chairs, this bad boy will seat 10 people!

Here's the tab:

Table and 7 chairs: $44

New Foam: $15

Zebra Fabric: $18

Blue Velvet: $0 (already had)

Gel Stain: $0 (already had)

Spray paint: $40

$117 for the whole shooting match seems like a pretty good
deal.

Here's an "after" shot:

One Man's Trash...

Having spent $1200 in the last 2 days on car repairs, I feel pretty bummed. So, in an effort to make myself feel better, I'd like to share a few of my recent thrifty finds with you. I don't think they add up to $1200 in savings, but who knows? Humor me!

Here's a cute little side table/plant stand I snagged out of a neighbor's trash. In broad daylight.

...And a $1.99 vintage bamboo magazine rack from the thrift store. The red spray paint cost $3.00. I'm thinking of painting it another color to match the tan family room.

Here's an old sideboard I thrifted for $24.00. I think it looks great painted white against my new "mocha" walls. What do you think?







Also, this $4.99 mirror from the 1940's was painted gold. I fixed some broken spots with putty. Spray painting it white cost $3.00. I'm hoping it adds some light to my now dark room.

This mirror was a fun find, also at the thrift store. I had been looking at star burst mirrors for $100 and up for above the bed. It may be a tad small, but at $1.28, who cares? It really completes our room.



The newly painted family room needed an entertainment center. I found this in the trash. Very ugly, very dark, very heavy. One coat of off-white spray paint, and I think it looks pretty good. It's just waiting for a flat panel tv, don't you think?I'll probably sell our $900 armoire on Craigslist to justify keeping this little freebie.



And last, but not least, I snagged these film canisters curbside WITH THE KIDS IN THE CAR. I thought they'd be fun. One says "Warner Brothers, 1968" on it. Okay, so I have absolutely no background in film production, but I thought they were cool. The kids did, too.


Soooo, with that, I think I'll call it a day. To those of you who leave stuff by the curb, or donate it to thrift shops rather than just carting it off to the dump, I thank you!