Monday, March 4, 2013

I know, I know

The last few weeks have been so busy.  Last week especially.  I planned 2 events, helped with 1, gave two talks, 2 public comments...by the time Saturday came and went, I was in bed by 8PM.  I am not usually in bed by then.  Which leads me to why part 2 of the office refinish isn't finished yet.

opps! no real before picture.  Don't mind the messy background.
So, last post I told you about my desk.  This post I will talk about the refinishing.  When my mother called me to ask me if I wanted the old credenza from my grandpa's old office, I was of course jumping and saying YES!!  So, now I had two furniture pieces for my office.
I found a couple tutorials on refinishing without sanding, because I didn't want to sand all of that surface area.     Now I can't for the life of me find the pin.  I was pretty sure I pinned it.  Isn't that always how it goes?
Anyway, a few of them recommended a product by Rustoleum, Furniture Transformations, I did the glazed charcoal.  It was fairly easy, the instructions spell it out for you.  You use the step one cleaning, step 2 the basecoat, step three the glaze, step 4 the sealer.  Everything but the brush come in the little kit.  You have to have it tinted at the store, so don't leave without doing that first.  I think I was a little confused on that one.  I did buy some cheap plastic cups to put the paint in for ease.








I realized the coverage for the product was off from the surfaces I had to paint, but not enough to purchase 2 @ $40 each.  Which, isn't bad to not have to sand.  I after stressing much deliberation.  I decided I could mod podge the paper onto the desk drawers and save me some paint, as, I mentioned before.  I was going to use wall paper somewhere in my original idea for the desk anyway.  That made it so I had enough paint for both projects.



I am pleased with the finished product.

Now, to show the whole office.  Just need to finish the curtains...

Friday, February 15, 2013

     About a year ago we moved into a new house.  We have been busy over the last year making it our home.  The latest project is the office redo.  I promised a few people I would post pictures of my desk project.  I have been putting it off long enough.  So here is the desk project.  As soon as I have a few other small projects completed, I will show the entire office reveal as well as some things we have been doing around the rest of the house.

      I have to tell you that I came across this desk by accident.  I went with the husband to pick up an item at his uncle's auction for his mom.  They had been having a surplus auction of all of the things that the county was no longer using.  It was sitting on the law waiting with about 15 other desks to be loaded onto a truck to be taken where ever desks go when they are not wanted.  The hubs aunt and cousin saw me eyeing it and told me I should just offer the dude like $20.  So, I did.  He accepted, and she came home to live with us.
Before the refinishing.


 Desk drawers.  The handles were glued on so I had to hammer them off to finish them.  I was going to replace them anyway, lets face it.


I will tell you more about the painting later when I show you the matching credenza, but the story goes, I didn't have enough paint to do both pieces, so I decided to cover the drawers in paper.  I purchased this lovely handmade paper with gold dust from Paper Source.  . It was love at first sight.  Using Mod Podge, I covered the drawer fronts.  Then I finished it off with handles that I purchased at Pick Your Plum, an advantage to local pick up, is you get to see fun things.  They weren't this color, and I'm not sure where the before picture went.  I spray painted them with Rust-Oleum's Sun Yellow and then because it was a little too bright for the project I glazed them with Martha Stewart finishes, I think coffee bean.  It has a metallic shimmer to it.  

And the final product
I love it.  Can't wait to show you the rest.