Chic on the Cheap - A Table Lamp and Vignette

Good morning everyone!

The kids are back in school now, so I've been doing a bit of cleaning as well as catching up on some neglected projects during the little one's nap time.

I wanted to show you this table that I finished.  There is a corner in our living room that's a bit dark when the sun isn't shining in, but the space just wasn't quite big enough for a regular size table and lamp.

While out thrifting one day, I came across this table/lamp combo.

Perfect!!

For just $10, I took it home with me.

I already had a can of Amy Howard paint as well as a burlap lampshade so this turned out to be a very inexpensive project.

Here she is all pretty now, lighting up this little corner.  

Statuary - pulled out of the garden {it's actually one of those things that you hide a spare key in}

Baby Ben Clock - 25 cents

Old Books - already had on hand

Not too bad for a grand total of $10.25 - Chic on a budget!!

Have a great day everyone!

xo and God Bless,

Kathleen

All Because of a Burlap Lampshade

While in the Salvation Army thrift store one day, I came across this burlap lampshade.

I loved it but walked away because really, where was I going to put it?

But then, like I usually do, I walked back over and picked it up. There were lots of lamps just a couple of feet away from this beautiful shade and surely I could look through them and find the perfect one right?

I found it.  I had to look past the orange though and imagine it with a makeover.

{pardon the mess on the table}

I painted the lamp and then added the shade. 

Perfect!  Just how I had imagined.

I put it in our bedroom.  It fit right in with the new makeover in there.  I promise I will show you the room but there is just one more big project that must be completed before it will be "finished."

I will give you a tiny peak into the room though.

Here is my dresser.  Also a 

Salvation Army find that got a French makeover.

The color I was talking about?  You can see a tiny bit of it here to the left of the dresser and also in the photo above...behind the lamp.

I love the color and will tell you all about it in another post!

Have a great day!!

xo and blessings,

Kathleen

A French Coffee Table

Hello!  Is everyone just about ready for Thanksgiving?  Two more days!!

I have been working on projects like a crazy woman all weekend as well as yesterday and today.  I have completed a lot though.  I painted and finished three tables, finished 3 burlap table runners, reworked our coffee station, hung a menu board, worked on some really cool glittered birds for Christmas decorations(which I cannot wait to show you!!), did a little furniture rearranging and last but not least, I began just a teensy bit of Christmas decorating today.  Whew...that was a mouthful!  I promise you though, I did not ignore my husband or kids...I kind of worked these projects into a bit of spare time .  I typically don't go on project binges like this but I just had too many unfinished things lying around that needed my attention.  It was time to get them done. 

 Okay, I've gotten off track...so back to the French table

I found another wonderful graphic from The Graphics Fairy (love her!)  I have been wanting to paint this on a table for awhile now, but didn't know how to enlarge it without having to invest in an overhead projector or pricey photo software.  Well, as luck would have it, there is a website that will do this for you for free!  Wha??  Free?? 

Yes!  Karen has a complete tutorial on how to do this.  The site is called BlockPosters and you can upload any photo from your computer to be enlarged.  You just decide how many sheets of printer paper you will need to cover your surface and block posters will enlarge your photo into a grid pattern.  Then you print it out, piece it together and voila!  Instant pattern.

So here it is all taped out, ready to trace with my pen.  What you do is rub over the back of your paper with chalk, lay the image down on your surface as pictured above, then begin to carefully trace over the whole thing.  When you're finished, pick up your paper and the image is left behind.  Now you fill it in with a paint pen or a very thin brush and acrylic paint.

Here it is after I finished all of the lettering.  Notice anything missing?  Um yeah, the "DE" in between the first two words.  You see, after I spent a half hour tracing each little letter, flourish and scroll, I excitedly lifted my paper to reveal......a BIG giant smear of yellow chalk.  Yep, that's right.  I couldn't tell one letter from the next.  I couldn't see where one word began and the next one finished and since my hand was about to fall off  a little sore from all that tracing, I just decided to wing it...do the best I could and not worry about whether or not it was perfect.  It's supposed to look old and vintage anyway right?  Since I couldn't see the "DE", no "DE" went in there.  The funny thing is, I didn't notice it right away.  Something was off, but I couldn't quite figure out what it was.

When it was done, I kept looking at it, feeling like something was missing. 

When it dried, I distressed it a bit and then I glazed it.  Despite the missing "DE" I still really like it!  There was a lot of love put into this table and now she's sitting all cozy in front of the sofa in the basement family room.

 

Would you believe it took me two days to figure out that the "DE" was missing?

Go figure!

Have a great week!

xo and God Bless,

Kathleen

My French Provincial Makeovers

 Okay, so I'm finally getting a post up for you.  I finished three of the four pieces of furniture and even though the fourth is only partially done, I really needed to post something.  Right?

So here's the story...two of the four pieces, I already had.  They were cream in color with some antiquing glaze on them as well.  While they were pretty as is, I really wanted to incorporate some French grey color into the room.

The other two were recently found treasures that begged to be made over and used in my craft room.

More on those in a bit...

So here is what I did on the first of the three...it's a night stand.

I painted the top of it in Alaskan Husky by Benjamin Moore {I had this color left over from our bedroom makeover so I decided to use it up} Then I painted the sides, front and drawers too. 

I painted the hardware white and left the top edge white as well.

and here you have it, an old nightstand turned end table.  I love the contrast between the grey and the white.

Alright, now on to the other two fabulous pieces of furniture. 

 Here they are (well one of them anyway, they're exactly the same) in my garage waiting to be painted.

Here are the drawers all lined up.  You know that old French Provincial style furniture that is white with those gold accents everywhere?  Well, I'm not a fan of all the gold so I decided to give them a fresh coat of white.  These are being used in my craft room where the walls are painted Light French Grey by Behr so I went with white.

Here they are and they've got all kinds of scrapbooking supplies, tags, note cards and other goodies tucked neatly inside.  I love how they turned out!

I've got one on each side of a bookcase that will soon be painted white as well.

One of these days, I will get the fourth piece of furniture painted and the bookcase too - but that will have to be for another post.

~ ~ ~

On another note, I received requests for a tutorial on the window awning that I did recently.  To answer your requests?  Absolutely!  I would be thrilled to share it with you.  I was actually hoping to have a tutorial post ready for you this week but it's been a hectic week and as you can see, I don't have it yet.  If you'll hang in there with me, I'll get it ready very soon - I promise.

~ ~ ~

Okay, I'm off now...we've got a hurricane to go and prepare for.  Yep you read that right...a hurricane and that's just a follow up to the earthquake we had the day before yesterday.  Uh...yeah...that's a whole other post.  Really, I smile as I write this.  It's been quite the adventurous week but we are blessed :)

~ ~ ~

Have a wonderful day everyone and enjoy your weekend!

xo and God Bless,

Kathleen

French Provincial Love...Almost Finished!

Just wanted to let you know that I haven't forgotten about showing you my finished furniture.  I'm almost done.  Bare with me!  Thank you for your nice comments about the french grey piece two posts back.

Have a wonderful day!

xo and God Bless,

Kathleen

French Provincial Love

I love these curves...

I love these handles...

I LOVE the contrast between the cream and the light french grey!

~ ~ ~

I can't wait to take you on a little tour of my newest painting endeavor.

Stay tuned...I'll be finished very soon!

 ~ ~ ~

xo and God Bless,

Kathleen

Children's Rockers

You may remember these rockers from last spring. I had painted them black and lived with them for awhile. I soon tired of the dark color and decided to paint them white.

After painting the chairs, I painted numbers on them to add a little whimsy - I'm loving numbers and cool graphics these days! then I sanded and distressed them... I'm loving their new look! Have a great day!

~~~

xo and God Bless,

Kathleen

~~~

I'm linking up to Miss Mustard Seed's Furniture Feature Friday. Make sure you stop by the party to see some awesome furniture makeovers!!

The Bedroom Makeover...Revealed

I know that I promised this post earlier, but I've been run down lately with a bad cold.

For the most part, the room is finished, however after looking at the photos, it needs something else. Funny how a photo will do that isn't it? Truth revealed through the lens. I'll tweak it a little here and there and then we'll see.

~~~~~

So anyway, before I show you the before pictures, I feel I must provide the following disclaimer:

The before photos of this bedroom that you are about to see are beyond hideous, outdated and well, just plain ugly. The color was named "Old Gold" and believe me, it was old and it was gold! Also, I almost forgot to take before pictures until I was well into the throwing around and moving of stuff, so the room is a huge mess! I assure you, I don't make it a habit of keeping our room in a state of disarray with clothes all lying about. It just so happens that I had already begun to tear apart the room before I remembered to take the pictures. But that's okay, better to keep it real! So, without any further adieu....

The Before:
.

See? I told you. I had already started to remove the curtains, move the furniture etc...

~~~~~

The After:


Ahhhh....much better!

The wall color is Alaskan Husky by Benjamin Moore.

I painted my husband's dresser in a creamy shade of white and then went back and sanded the edges to distress it a bit. Then I went over it with a mahogany stain which I applied and quickly wiped off. I painted the hardware black.

Below is the nightstand...

I painted it exactly like the dresser. I was going to paint the bed as well, but then decided to leave it as is. I thought that the bed and the television armoire would look better in their original stained wood finish. After looking at the photos though, I may go back and paint the bed too. I have to think about it. The armoire will definitely stay as it is though. The wood is too pretty to touch on that one!

The lampshades were originally plain white but I added black ribbon to the tops and bottoms of them to dress them up a bit.

An old, vintage fan that I found years ago at a flea market. I added it to the top of husband's dresser along with a miniature globe.

Here is my dresser that you may remember from this post. I liked the way the black handles looked on the nightstand and husband's dresser, so I took the hardware off of this dresser and painted them black as well.

So there you have it! The finished room. Thanks for joining me in the makeover reveal! I'm sure I'll be adding a few things here and there...such as putting the rest of my photos in the frames - I'm guessing you probably saw some empty frames scattered about - haha! The printer ran out of ink :)

Have a great weekend!!

~~~~~

xo and God Bless,

Kathleen

From Yard Sale to Fabulous

Okay, here it is as promised...my fabulous yard sale dresser!!

I found this beauty at a yard sale right at the end of my street. How about that for luck!

~~

Below, you can see the dresser exactly as I found it. White... yes... but not the shade of white I wanted.
So I got to work!

I put it out in the backyard, removed all of the drawers and turned on the sander





I painted the dresser in Ivory Satin by Krylon. Yes, spray paint this time. I didn't feel like messing with the power sprayer for this project so I pulled out the spray paint cans. I gave her several thin coats. When spray painting it's better to go light and easy in lots of smooth coats than heavy and thick. If you spray too much you'll get those drips and runs and we don't want those!

When the paint was completely dry, I sanded along the edges where it would normally get lots of wear and tear to give it a distressed look. Then I went over the whole thing with a glaze of acrylic paint mixed with water.
I used Apple Barrel brand in Brown Oxide #20511

I just put it into a plastic container and mixed it with a little water. Then apply the glaze with a damp paper towel and wipe off with a dry paper towel {very scientific...I know}

Work in small sections as you go.

Here, I've sanded the edges and added the glaze.

Be sure to get the glaze into all of the grooves and details to make them stand out!

And when you're done, enjoy your dresser!

Happy Friday and enjoy your weekend!

~~

xo and God Bless,

Kathleen

~~

I'm linking up to Miss Mustard Seed's Furniture Feature Friday

and My Romantic Home's Show and Tell Friday

Make sure you head over there to see all of the really cool stuff!