Ta Dahhh . . .

Here she is . . .

. . . I'm really proud of this piece!! To see it in person!! If any of you are in this neck of the woods, please feel free to stop by!! The window treatments still need to be pressed out - so ignore those free flowing looking things. The actual pink on the chest is in the fabric, but you can't see it from this distance. I'm looking for some plain jane lamp shades to go on my vintage, crystal lamps - any suggestions as to where I can find some? I plan on sprucing them up, but I just can't seem to find plain, white, bell type shades?! The search continues!!

On to the how-to part!

First off, let me say that I got the furniture at an unfinished furniture place {that was going out of business} for half off. I'm pretty sure we only paid $134 {plus tax} for it. The crystal knobs were found at Home Depot for $3.99 each. The paint -Behr 1 quart flat paint - around $10. Everything else - I already had! So, this little project cost me around 210 bucks!! The question really is how much would you be willing to pay for a chest with this type of paint treatment - a color of your choice??

So here is how I did it -

I did not prime the piece at all and I only put one coat of paint on it. The big secret is picking out the right color of paint - remember, once you put the stain/glaze mix on it, it's not going to be the same color! I picked a very light and subtle shade of pink.



I normally use the same stain color, so I have a pretty good idea what the final color will be. Uhmmm . . . that is WHY I use the same color of stain everytime- if you get my drift! I let the paint cure for 24 hours {everytime I do something like this, it's the longest 24 hours of my life .}

The next day, I took a sanding block and rubbed all the edges. Now, I also lightly sanded the entire piece, but not enough to knock off any major paint. Since it did come from an unfinished store, it did have a few rough spots. It is easier to lightly sand it after it is painted {than before it's painted} because you can really see where you need to bump the rougher spots harder.

I then vacuumed and wiped {with a wet rag} the entire piece. I took a mixture of 1 part glaze {Behr is my choice of paints} and 1 part stain {my all time fav - special walnut} and brushed it on with a sponge brush. I then took a dry rag and wiped it off - PERFECT-O! You can see the finished looked immediately.

It takes about 24 hours for that to dry. Once the tackiness is gone, I put 1 coat of semi-gloss polyurethane. After about 4 hours it was dry enough to put the knobs on and put the drawers in place. I still waited another 24 hours to move it in it's spot on the wall.

And that's how you do it!! I did everything by myself - my husband did paint the top of the chest and 2 drawer fronts with the light pink color. But the rest was done by my prego-self!! So, what I'm saying is that you can do this toooooo!! On a scale of 1 to 10 {1 being extremely easy and 10 being leave to the professionals} This is definitely a 2!!!

If you have any questions, just comment - I'll get back to you!

Now, it is on to tackle this crib!! It is covered in paint - so the rest is my part!! I will be doing it the exact same way EXCEPT I will be using my trusty palm sander!! There are WAY TO many spindles to do that by a lil' o sanding block!!!! I'd rather shoot myself!