Home is where the Tardis.

This is still one of my favorite gifts I've made for someone. My manager and I share a mutual love for Dr. Who so I thought this would be awesome. Hand drawn & painted with watercolors.. kindergarten style.

I should win an award for procrastination.

Hahaha, so what a joke my last update was. "Yeah, I'm going to keep up with this blog now!" .......... 8 months later, here I am! ....... Oops... At first, for whatever reason, I was thinking I needed to strictly keep this blog for my finished furniture. I'm not sure where that rule came from, but it obviously didn't work for me. So I'm scratching that rule. New rule: There are no rules. Update when I want about whatever I want. I'm sure it will mainly pertain to crafting in some way... or procrastinating. :)

While we're on the topic of procrastinating.. I've recently realized that my procrastination stems from a fear of failure and self doubt. Once I finish a piece, I feel like it is so final and for some reason that is scary. Maybe it is because it won't be perfect. Maybe it is because it gives people the right to judge it and I believe it will be negative. Whatever the reason, I have been trying to overcome this. It is difficult & something I'm not sure if I'll ever be completely over. I'm trying to do the things that I love, enjoy the process, and become somewhat detached from the results. I'm realizing that I will fail and from this I will learn lessons and grow. It's funny because it's really all just in my head. There really is nothing stopping me. This information is liberating yet frightening.

Now, onto some photos of a commissioned bedroom set I did for a client way back in October '12.

Before:








After:

Finally!

After hours and hourssss of staring at this computer screen I'm finally (mostly) done. Out of the 44 entries here, I think I just did 37. That includes: finding all of the photos on my computer, uploading them to flickr and THEN updating this blog... Now all I have to do is keep up with this thing.

60's/70's Chest of Drawers

I found this little guy at a local thrift store.

Before:


I wasn't sure what color to paint it so I just used my trusty mint green. The color is actually a little more mint in real life. I kept the original hardware because it's awesome. I left the top the original veneer because it's no fun to mess with.

After:

Deco Chair

I re-did this for the shop I work at.

Before:


I chose a glossy dark grey paint and reupholstered it with a vintage floral fabric.

After:

1970's Mirror

I saw this and instantly knew it could be better. I only had to do one minor repair on one of the "finials".

Small 60's Shelf

I re-did this for the shop I work at.

Before it was just dark brown.

50's Dresser with Mirror

I re-did this for my manager. I also forgot to take a before photo of this too. It was just a plain very light wood color.

60's Dresser

I re-did this for the shop that I work at. I forgot to take a before photo of this.

Plain Chest of Drawers

I re-did this for the shop I work at. It was a pretty plain, simple, vintage wood chest of drawers. I've never painted anything large yellow before so I decided to try it out.

Before:


After:


I think I went a little too crazy with the grey glaze on the bottom 2 drawers.... Oh well..

Mirror Makeovers

I found a couple of mirrors while out one day thrifting and thought they could be a little updated..





I really like how this one came out. I painted it a light blue with grey glaze. You can't really see the glaze that well. It looks much better in person.



This one looks a lot better in person too. I need to work on my mirror photo skills... I actually think I like the before better for this one but oh well.

DIY Hairpins

I recently made a couple batches of hairpins using assorted vintage pieces. Some are old earrings, some buttons, some jewelry findings. All are layered & glued together with super strong glue. I really like the way they came out.

Deco Nightstand Makeover

So this little vintage deco nightstand, which I'd found at a garage sale, had been sitting around for far too long. I finally decided to give it a well deserved facelift.

This is the before:


And after a little TLC & elbow grease:


&an upclose of the knob, which I think may be my favorite part:

Early American Style Vintage Desk Makeover

This, too, was taking up space in my garage for a long time. I decided to quit being lazy and just get this over with. I've never painted a large piece red so I thought what the heck.. This piece, to me, was rather boring so I thought it needed something bright to help it out.

Desk before:


Desk after:

I like the way it turned out. I didn't really like how many coats it took to cover the primer and be a true red. All in all, I think it worked out.

1940's desk

I wish I had gotten a before photo of this. It was absolutely awful. It was somebody else's diy project gone terribly wrong. The bottom half was painted a bright flat pink, the top a baby blue, and pink & purple butterfly knobs to set it all off.

I sanded it all down, primed, painted it mint green & put a coat of clear poly on it. I had to buy some new knobs as all the originals were missing.

Vintage French Provincial Vanity

I found this and instantly fell in love with it. I knew from the yellow stains of nicotine that it would be a bitch to get clean.

Before:




There was way more nicotine on there than I originally thought. These photos are after I scrubbed the whole thing for about an hour.

After:




This is probably my favorite piece so far. It looks so much better in person. It was really hard to convince myself to sell it.

Small Things

This was just a boring brown before I got ahold of it. Of course, it ended up blue. I put some black glaze on it to make it more interesting. I really like the way it turned out.


Vintage wicker shelf painted a funky pea green.

Chunky Chest of Drawers Makeover

This is another piece that was laying around my garage taking up a large amount of space. My neighbor was moving and had thrown this guy to the curb. One of the drawers was falling apart and some of the hardware was missing. Like a seemingly crazy person, I asked him to help me move it to my garage.

This is the before:


And the after:

I had someone repair the drawer for me. I then removed the middle pieces of the hardware and patched the holes. I really love this mint green color, probably too much.

1970's Headboard

1970's headboard before:


after:

Vintage 3 Drawer Chest

I really love small chests like this. There are just so many different ways you can use them around the house.

Before:


After: