Free Side Table

I picked up this side table for free at my local dump.



The top and sides had some water damage and the finish was peeling and flaking in spots. I used some stripper I had left over from a previous project to get the rest of the finish off.



My sander seriously got a workout with this one. But I was left with a beautiful oak top.

I left the top but painted the rest of table off white (what else is new?). I really wanted to use some stain I had on hand to complete this table and make it truly "free" but I only had a reddish stain and an ebony stain. The colour of the wood looked so great with the paint that I had to go and get some clear stain to finish this project. I ended up with Minwax Honey Pine, bought from the Mistint Motherload for $3.49. There's also a bunch of stains there that have been discontinued.



This Minwax product is a stain and poly in one and awesome to work with. I love how the wood looks with the paint!





I re-used the drop pulls since they had a nice finish and also looked great with the paint colour.



This really is a fantastic table, solid wood and very well made. I can't believe someone left it at the dump!



Linking with Piece of Work Wednesdays at Primitive & Proper


Frugal Friday at the Shabby Nest

Nightstand Makeover

I picked up this cute little guy at Goodwill for $5.99. It was not half off day so I almost passed it up but then decided even for $6 it could still be a good project.



I have a feeling this was high school woodworking project or something. It's definitely homemade. But it's solid wood and came with a key for the little lock on the drawer.

At first I was going to go with a bright colour for the paint but in the end I just went with boring old off white. I have painted so many things with the same gallon of off white paint it's ridiculous!

I applied this striped paper to the drawer front which I have had in my scrapbook paper stash for over 5 years. Sometimes it pays to hold onto things! It's the exact same colour as my paint, it looks perfect together!





It came with a giant ugly handle in the middle so I took that off and used some wooden knobs that came off another dresser. I used the wooden knobs because it was hard to match the finish of the lock. It's a very light brass colour but looks silver sometimes.



I love these little projects and everything I used I already had on hand.

Party like it's 1999!

Thrifted Pillows

When we purchased our sofa it came with some interesting accent pillows. When I say interesting what I really mean is fug. Straight outta the 80's with radical geometric shapes. I immediately went to Ikea and bought some covers for them. They were okay, just plain brown, nothing fancy. They were good enough for a while. But then they really started to show some wear and it was definitely time to replace them.

Pretty pathetic looking, right?



I drew some inspiration from a couple pages I had torn out of Canadian House and Home and/or Style at Home and headed to Goodwill.

I really love the texture of these pillows and thought they would really add to the room.





I went to the mens sweater section and looked for some neutral knits in good shape. I found a nice cableknit and a plain knit both in beige. I also grabbed a plaid skirt and a red cardigan sweater from the womens section. I took everything home and threw it in wash. When it was all dry I got to work.

I don't have any "befores" of the sweaters but you've seen sweaters before, right?

I took a measurement of the old covers and then measured and cut from the fronts and backs of the two beige sweaters. I put in the pillows and sewed them in. Unfortunately they do not come out for easy washing. One of the sweaters had leather buttons down the front so I took them off and sewed them back down the side of the pillow for a little added interest.





I had new inserts for the red sweater and the plaid pillows. The red cardigan was actually a little easier than the beige sweaters. And it just unbuttons if you want to take the pillow out.





All new pillows for under $10! I love them, they're so cozy.

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Apron Thrift Girl, Thrift Share Mondays

Show and Shell

I found this little dresser on Kijiji. It was advertised as free and was only 10 minutes away. I emailed right away after it posted but, when I heard back from the girl, she upped the price to $10. Uh...okay...I told her I'd still come to check it out and if I liked it I would pay the $10.

When I got there it turned out to be a girl from my mom group. I haven't actually talked to her much but I still felt like I had to buy it since I knew her.

It wasn't in too bad of shape, there's a chunk missing from the corner of one the drawers but that just adds character, right? The knobs had to go, they didn't match and there was one missing. I still had 6 oversized wooden knobs from the ReStore waiting for a 3 drawer dresser.



It didn't need much in terms of preparation so I quickly got to painting. It got a couple coats of the same off-white that I've been working with for a few dressers. That gallon has been lasting forever!

Then it sat...and sat....and sat. I was waiting for inspiration. It was almost exactly the same as the antique dresser I did but it didn't have a mirror.



I realized it's the perfect height for a change table so I went with that idea. I tried to make it bright, fun and gender neutral, I really like the way the colours turned out!

Party on, Wayne

Piece of Work Wednesdays at Primitive & Proper

Alphablue Dresser

This is a dresser that I picked up at Goodwill for $5.



By the time I came back with a salesperson to put a sold sticker on it there was someone else looking at it. I kinda felt bad but those are the breaks on 50% day! You gotta be stealthy, like a ninja.

Since I usually do dressers more geared towards little girls I thought it was time to do a dresser for a little boy. So I used the Benjamin Moores, Montpelier that I picked up in the oops section.



I gave the dresser a really good sand (since it had a really thick, super shiny, bad stain job on it) followed by the usual prime & paint. After I painted I was left with a beautiful blank blue/gray canvas. Hmmmm. I really went back and forth on what to paint on the dresser. Numbers, letters, elephants, robots? The possibilities were endless! I was thisclose to doing elephants but, in the end, the alphabet won out. I just thought it would appeal to more people.



I re-used the handles that came on the antique dresser. They're not very pretty but they're masculine and I thought the brushed nickel would look nice with the paint colour.



For the letters I used my super high-tech method of tracing the letters right from my computer screen (because I don't want to waste toner) onto paper and then cutting out the letters and then tracing them onto the dresser. I then painted in the letters with a small brush using acrylic paint.



Hopefully it finds a home in some little guys room.

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