green dresser

This has to be one of my favorite pieces that I've completed! 

It didn't always start out as this.

It had a lot of chips in the paint, missing knobs, and scratches. But it has great bones and dovetailed drawers with curves I've never seen on a piece before!

I painted it with 2 coats of Annie Sloan's chalk paint in Antibes. Let me warn you that this color is green. Very Green.

Holy Frijoles!

I knew I had to tone it down, so I broke out my favorite glaze, Ralph Lauren in Tobacco. I've used this lots of times, one of my most well known projects was with the Avocado table.

I just wiped the glaze on with a cloth, and wiped off excess with a damp cloth. That is one of the reasons I love glaze. You can make it look exactly like you want it to, using more or less and you go.

After I glazed it, I waxed it with Minwax's Furniture Paste.

I just love the curves on this thing.

I love how the glaze brings interest to the top.

It also makes the details on the dresser more noticeable.

Because the dresser was missing some hardware, I filled in the holes on the top and found these vintage looking glass knobs to use instead.

Here's a Before Meets After shot!

It's for sale in the store if you're interested! 

pretty in pink headboard

First of all, I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving. By the time you're reading this, I will have been out shopping for hours (Yes I'm one of THOSE people, don't judge!)

I hope you enjoyed my island sneak peek. I'll post more about that next week.

But for now I have a sweet headboard to share with you!

I've had this headboard forever and a day. 

It came with the french dresser and nightstand I did quite a while ago.  

Don't you just love the yellowing paint and the gold trim???

My MIL was here recently and saw my array of paint colors. (I tend to stalk the oops paint shelves at Home Depot)

I had a dusty pink that I got for $1.00 and she thought it might be perfect for this and it could go in a little girls room.

So that being said, here it is now.

Can't you just see this is some sweet little girl's room? (Sorry it's not staged, I don't exactly have an extra bed lying around!)

I just primed it using my favorite primer Zinsser. Then I gave it two coats of the pink, and one coat of bright white on the inside.

I also took the little sliding doors off and sprayed the wire white. Then I used polycrylic for protection because it's a light color.

Here's a Before Meets After

It's for sale in the store if you're interested.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I am so blessed this Thanksgiving.


Happy Day to you and yours.  

I hope you're eating a lot of this

via

And this

via

And this

via

and then you do this

via

Of course in preparation for the shopping you'll do tomorrow! Are you a black Friday shopper?

kitchen island (sneak peek)

  I decided with the rush and craziness of the holidays that I would put off showing you my kitchen island until next week. For now, here's a sneak peak I think you're going to love!

Do you remember my inspiration boards from pinterest?

And we can't forget what it looked like when I started this whole kitchen renovation mess!

If you need to get caught up on our entire kitchen renovation, including the demo, backsplash, and countertops, click on the links.

I'll post pictures of the entire island reveal next week :)

In the mean time, I'll be the crazy lady braving the grocery store the day before Thanksgiving!

Christmas Guest Blogging Series

On the 12th day of Christmas my true love gave to me.......

12 AMAZING CHRISTMAS GUEST BLOGGERS!!
(wow that's a mouthful)

<a href="http://www.beforemeetsafter-frugalfinder.blogspot.com/" target="_blank"><img src="http://i1229.photobucket.com/albums/ee462/creativeindex/graphics/crafty-christmas.jpg" border="0" alt="Crafty Christmas"></a>

I hope you will join me starting Dec. 5th for some amazing Christmas crafts, treats, ornaments, and DIY projects for Christmas.

Hope you'll stop by!

I've also got some furniture projects in the works and tomorrow I'll post an island sneak peak from our kitchen!

out with the old, in with the new

  After living in our house for a year, I decided the paper blinds must go!

We put these up the day after we moved in as a "temporary" solution. Yes a year is considered temporary in our house.

 

We couldn't have plantation shutters or 2 in wood blinds here that are found throughout the rest of our house. The reason is because of these door handles I just had to have.

See that nice little overhang? (No, not the dirty doors or the leaves that need to be blown off the deck)

That prevents us from having anything deep on the doors. So my solution. Bamboo shades.

I  bought the ones form Home Depot that are labeled "private". The semi-private ones let a lot more light in, but I like to live in a cave sometimes :)

So yesterday hubbs tackled this project. Overall they were pretty easy, but I would not recommend putting them in a metal door like we did. Yeah, that was not fun. But hey, they look great and that's all that matters.

I'm even thinking I might now put these in our family room.

Yes, that's another "temporary" solution. A "temporary" shower bar is holding up my "temporary" curtains. See the pattern here???

So here's a Before Meets After!

Do you have any "temporary" decor solutions in your home?

 

It's the most wonderful time of the year!

  Yes I did it. I broke out the Christmas songs and decorations. I promised hubbs I wouldn't. He's one of those "Thanksgiving deserves it's respect" holiday kind of people.

But.not.me.

I love Christmas.

I have more Christmas decorations than I know what to do with.

Hubbs was gone for a work function and I decided I would just break out one little box. He wouldn't even notice.

When I opened the box, I was really confused.

I don't remember these ornaments.

Well apparently I knew I wouldn't remember them because I taped the receipt into the lid of the box. I had forgotten I went out after Christmas and bought a boat load of new ornaments. I bought all these ornaments for $6.23. Yes, there are 73 ornaments for $6.23. I love bargains!

We have a 2 story family room and last year we just had a teeny tiny tree that was from our old house.

Well I ran around town with my mom (sick as a dog I might add) so I could find one of those enourmous display trees for a ridiculous price.

Well I found one. Dragged it home. Left it in the basement until tonight. (yes it comes in 2 boxes!)

Then I got REALLY excited to see what the new tree would look like. So I started dragging box after box out. Each one I opened, I got a little more ADD and forgot where I left off. (Does anyone else do this, or just me??)

The new tree requires a different furniture placement. So now I'm starting to think hubbs might notice.

I swear all I was going to do was pull out one box!

I'll post pictures AFTER Thanksgiving of my holiday decorations. I don't want to upset those that think Thanksgiving needs it's respect :)

Do you have any Christmas decorating plans this weekend?

A year later....home tour

Well I can't believe it's been a year. The past 12 months have flown by with house projects, unexpected repairs, renovations, and more.

Our house search took over 6 months, 2 Realtors, and probably hundreds of houses before we found THE ONE. 

So I thought I would share some pictures with you of our house a year ago, and how it is now. Again, I have too many projects left to mention, but know there is a lot more to do!

Outside, we trimmed bushes, made over our front porch, and just did some general cleaning up and pruning.

When we walked in, this fireplace sold us. We've done a lot of work in here, but we love it. The TV stand was one of my first, and favorite, projects.

But when I turned around, I was not sold by the kitchen. Our realtor reminded us that it could be changed, so I looked the other way until we could start our renovation. After some sweat, grease, love (and money) it is looking the way I want it to!

This room has definitely seen the biggest changes.

Next up is the dining room. The before pictures were at night when we first moved in, so excuse the bad quality!

We've actually done a lot in our foyer, even though it doesn't look like it. We frosted the door with contact paper (just like Thrifty Decor Chick did), painted the trim white, and cleaned up the floors.

To the right of our front door is our living room. It has a full bathroom (weird I know) so one day it will be a main floor guest room. But for now, it's just my furniture staging room :)

This is why I never show this room!

This pictures show me that we have done a lot, even though sometimes it feels like we haven't and there's still so much to do! I've only shown you the updated tour of the downstairs, but I'll share with you the upstairs later this week!