Today I want to share one of them with you.
I walked into Goodwill not too long ago...ok, a couple months ago really but who is counting? I fell in love with this piece before I even completely saw it! I saw it from the side/back and wasn't sure exactly what it was but I knew something important: it was different than any other furniture piece I have AND there was a good chance that it was pretty inexpensive (I was at Goodwill after all!) :0)
When I first saw it though there was a couple standing at it, looking it over. All I could think was "Walk away, walk away, walk away....and as SOON as you do, I'm grabbing that tag off of it!". Sure enough, I walked over close and waited...they turned and walked away (I think I gave them time for approximately 3 steps away) and I grabbed that tag. THEN I looked the piece over better. I lifted it and found it to be heavy and made of solid wood, I noticed the price...$34!!! (that's good in my book), and there was nothing broken on it! YEA YEA YEA!
I paid for it, had it loaded in my car, and brought it home so I could transform it (2 months later...but again, who is counting?).
I was so excited about the piece I showed it to my neighbors and friends. I was happy that other people had the same excited and awed reaction that I did.
I finally decided to tackle this baby! I knew I wanted to paint it and put a color wash on it. I wasn't sure what colors but I knew that first I needed to figure out where it was going to go in my home. I brought it inside and figured that out, which helped me decide on what colors to paint it.
First I primed it. I thought I was going to sand it...I decided to give primer a try. SPRAYPAINT primer at that....it took two cans, a couple of coats...and the priming was done!
The I decided to paint it green. This is the green that I used in my guest bathroom many moons ago, it's called Herb Tea. I love it in my bathroom so I figured it can't be too bad. I painted just one good coat on it.
Last I had to figure out how I wanted to "age" it...I saw all over blogland about glazing furniture. You use 4 parts glaze to 1 part paint. I ran to Home Depot for a quart of glaze and talked to one of my favorite employees there...she does a lot of refinishing of furniture and she told me how "addictive" color glazing can be! She told me how she does it: a chip brush, dry painting, and sometimes a little rubbing with a cloth....and I got what I needed. I decided to use the dark brown paint that I have left from painting my formal dining (we don't use it for that though) room.
I grabbed a rubbermaid container (so I could close it up and keep the leftover paint) and mixed the glaze and paint. Super easy.
Then I started painting. I kind of dry brushed, kind of not....did a lot of rubbing off with a wash cloth. It wasn't hard BUT I did learn a lesson...I started painting around 8:00 AM and it was going great. Then it got much warmer outside and the glaze started drying MUCH faster by 9:00 AM....so it didn't turn out perfect. I have some areas that are darker than I wanted, some areas that needed to be rubbed better.... but they dried before I could get to them.
Here is a leg of the bench...before the color glaze and after the color glaze...
BUT it was my first time doing a color glaze, first time doing any sort of painting technique on furniture...and I LOVE the result. It looks so much better! I just love it.
When I was almost finished Caleb came outside (I paint on the front porch) and said "Mom, it looks a lot OLDER now since you painted like that, it looks OLD!" I smiled and said "YEA! Good, it's supposed to!" He was so glad that I liked his comment and he laughed that I wanted it to be that way.
Here ya go...before and afters....
Thanks for stopping by!
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Oh, I LOVE it!! It's terrific. I'm so impressed with all you've learned. Way to go!!
That's my favorite piece so far!
Thanks! I love it too and it was SO much easier to do than I thought it would be! YEA! :0) Let's find some things to do for your home! :0)