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Sunday, April 14, 2013

One Night Stand

I know what you were thinking!  Get your mind out of the gutter ;)

This guy has been sitting around our house for, I don't know, a year and a half?  Wow, its painful to admit that thats how long it took me to finally FINALLY give him a makeover.


This nightstand was passed along to me by a friend who no longer needed it.  I thought sure, I can do something cool with that!  And then he sat in my spare room, just being neglected.  Poor thing!


It had some wear and tear, but I really wanted to paint it a fun color, so that didn't bother me.


Oh, and ugly brass hardware.  ::shudder::


First things first, he needed a light sanding.


I didn't sand too deep, just a nice light all over buffing.  I wanted to scuff up the finish so that the paint would stick and stay for the long haul.  A little bit of 320 grit sand paper, and my handy DeWalt sander, and I was off!


A philips head screw driver was all I needed to take the hardware off of the drawers.


And then I stored the pieces inside the drawer, so I wouldn't lose track of them.  I know me, I could have very easily finished the project and then spent 45 minutes trying to remember where I put the dang hardware!!  So, into the drawer it went!


There he is, nekked and lightly sanded all over!


Next I took a dry cloth and just wiped up all the dust.  You always want a nice clean surface to paint on.


The paint color!  This was actually a clearanced test pot I picked up at Lowe's for a dollar, so I don't know the name of it.  But it looked like a nice neutral gray, and the price was right, so I went for it!


I read somewhere recently that you should cover your paint tray in a plastic bag to make cleanup easier.    Whoever came up with that, you are brilliant!  It worked like a charm!  My least favorite part of painting is always the cleanup, but not anymore :)  I used a foam roller for all of the flat surfaces, to help keep my paint nice and smooth.  Then I had an angled brush on hand to help get into all of the little cracks and crevices.

Sooo pretty!  Not too brown, and not too blue.  A perfect neutral gray.


After one thin coat with the foam roller.


You can still see the finish through this first coat, but thats okay.  Keeping it nice and thin, but doing more coats, helps to insure that you don't end up with big globs or drips in your finish.

And this is where I kinda messed up in my picture taking.  But I'm new to this blogging thing, so please excuse my oops!!

 As you can see in the picture above, this nightstand has some dental molding detail across the front of it.  I was trying to use my angled brush to get paint in there, but it was just too big.  So I had the brilliant idea to use a craft brush!  I rushed inside to grab one from the office, and skipped back out, feeling triumphant.  I sat down in front of the nightstand, picked up the paint pot to get started, and DUMPED PAINT ALL OVER MYSELF!  Way to go self!  I frantically tried to scoop paint off my shorts, and then hobbled into the house while trying not to drip everywhere, so that I wouldn't have to remove my pants on my front lawn!!  Did I mention that I was wearing one of my favorite pairs of shorts when this happened?  Yea, that should be DIY 101, don't wear anything you are fond of when painting!  Lesson learned.  And up until this point it had all been going so well!

Oh, and while I was failing big time, my wonderful hubby was busy spray painting the hardware.  So I never managed to get a shot of that action.  Fired, I know.


Here's a quick shot I grabbed later of the hardware. It's a nice glossy black, with a bit of texture due to the hammered finish.

So after an outfit change, a second coat of paint, and several hours outside drying, here he is!


Hello Handsome!  I'm really pleased with the way it turned out.  And the longer he sits by our bedside, the more I love him!  The traditional lines with the updated paint and hardware make me happy :)  And this whole makeover happened for one dollar, since we were given the nightstand, already had the spray paint, and found that little test pot on clearance!  

So what have you made over recently?  Anyone else like to spill paint all over their nice clothes?  Only me?


4 comments:

  1. This looks amazing! So excited to start following you and your creativeness! Make sure to post some recipes too :0)

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