Thrift store rehabs revealed

We bought this house about 5 years ago and have slowly worked our way around the house redoing everything. Most of this was cosmetic, consisting of taking down wallpaper (kitchen and bathrooms), painting, redoing the floor, etc. We didn't get to the guest bath until about 2 or 3 years ago. We took down the wallpaper, pulled up not one but TWO layers of linoleum, smoothed out the walls, painted, put down ceramic tiles (hubs rocks) and changed out fixtures. I couldn't figure out what I wanted to put on the wall over the towel rack, so it's remained empty since that time. I thought about painting some canvases, but that never happened. I actually bought a piece of funky metal art at a Dallas art festival a year ago, but decided it didn't work for me in there.

Then last week I found these at the thrift store.



I loved them the minute I saw them. I knew I'd paint them silver....I could definitely see the potential. They reminded me of those retro midcentury modern starbursts from the 1960s (photos courtesy of etsy).





I originally thought I'd put them in the dining room, but tried them out in the guest bathroom and loved them there. (side note: I don't know why my wall colors always come out so funky on camera...the bathroom isn't apple green...the 2nd picture is more true to the actual color)







Not everyone's style, but I love a little funkiness in every room. Not bad for $4 thrift store find.

Remember this hideous gold mirror?



I love it now. It resides in our bedroom. (again, my wall color isn't Texas Longhorn orange..though I do love the Longhorns since I grew up in Austin :) , it's actually a pretty pumpkin color, though you wouldn't know it by these pictures!)





Then there's the $3 hook rack I found at Goodwill last week. This didn't need a rehab, it simply needed a lot of cajoling, prodding and begging for me to have hubs hang it up outside. It works out *perfectly* for hanging our towels by the pool! This eliminates the need to lay the towels on the ground, having ants crawl up in them and then doing an "ants in my pants" dance when drying off. Not that that's happened or anything. ;)



I feel like I've gotten quite a bit accomplished this week. My "to do" list is getting shorter. It feels good. But then I will have to make another "to do" list for next week. So the fun starts over again. :)

Before and after: antique nightstand

There's nothing better than finding a great project in the making, especially when it's unexpected and cheap. Several months back, hubs and I went for a drive one afternoon. We ended up at a junk/antique store in a small town. I happened to see this cute little nightstand in the back of the store covered up with lots of stuff. I liked the size and shape of it. It needed a lot of TLC, but it still appealed to me. But I didn't know what I'd do with it. I'm really out of space for furniture pieces. The price tag said $12. Sold. For that price, I'd find a place for it. When I told the shop owner I wanted it, she said I could have it for $5.



After sitting in the garage for a month or two, I brought it outside, gave it a good wipe down and sanding, then painted it a light cream color. The top of the table has a leather inlay with some gold design, but unfortunately, whoever owned this piece before me decided to STAIN THE LEATHER when they were refinishing the piece. Sinful! I thought about just painting over it, but decided to leave it as is. If I change my mind, I can paint over it later. Hubs tried to strip the stain from the leather, but it just didn't work.



The original handles on the drawer were broken, and they really weren't my style anyway. I suppose handle sizes have changed over the years because I haven't been able to find any new ones to fit the hole sizes. And I really don't feel like patching the holes and drilling new ones. Too much effort for a $5 table. So instead I found 4 cute ceramic knobs at Hobby Lobby (at 50% off) and I think they look great!



We decided to use this as a TV stand in the bedroom (I know! a TV in the bedroom!). It's a lot cuter than what we were using before.



Whatcha think? Nothing special or fancy, but I love how it looks now.

Chalkboard paint project (thrift store rehab)

I scrambled to get my project done for Chrissie's Chalkboard Paint Party. And I do mean scrambled. Our weather has been really ugly lately, so I haven't been able to get outside to paint.

I had found this really blah plaque at the Goodwill.



It was simply a matter of peeling off the paper that was glued to the front, sanding off all the sticky residue and painting.



Eh, I'm not too thrilled with how it turned out. It looked much better in my mind's eye. That seems to happen a lot! I'll probably rehab this rehab eventually.



If you want to join the party, visit Chrissie's blog and see what cute projects all of these other creative gals have come up with. Mine really pales in comparison. I just don't have the knack for this one. But I had fun!

Sew, what's up? (and a blog question)

A few weeks ago, I bought about 5 or 6 wool sweaters at the thrift store. And that particular day, they were 1/2 off. As I was checking out, a lady behind me said "I guess I got here a few minutes too late." I said "pardon me?" She asked "are those wool sweaters?" I told her yes, and she mumbled some comment about there not being any left, except the one she had in her hands. That wasn't true...there were many more left. They just weren't very pretty. ;) I didn't want to tell her I had plans to cut them up use them in craft projects.

So in an attempt to try to get out of my funk, I worked on a little something last night.

Wool sweater #1, washed and dried. I probably should have run it through again, because while it did tighten up, it was still a bit misshapen, which you will see in my finished project. But I couldn't be bothered to do it the right way, I wanted to do it the quick way.



After a lousy, quick attempt at embroidering, I sewed the sucker up, stuffed it and I was done. Now I can feel good that I got my butt off the couch and did *something.*



Can you even make out what that embroidery is? Probably not, so let me tell you. It's an "F" for our last name. I just quickly free-handed it while watching Forensic Files. As you can tell, I was more interested in Forensic Files than paying attention to stitches. Oh, well. It has "character." ;)

Today, I looked at the leftovers from Wool Sweater #1.



Let's see, what can I do with a sleeve? Make a leg warmer? Tie it around my neck as a scarf? Fill it with stuffing and make a breeze protector for my front door? While those might fun ideas ;), I made an iPod case.



I used the waistband portion to make a tiny pocket inside the case to hold my ear buds so they won't get tangled.





Sew on a button for a closure.



Stitch up the sides and bottom, and then remember that you forgot to double-check that the iPod would fit (it does).



Notice how misshapen it is? That's called character.

Take a peak inside.



The end of Wool Sweater #1 project. It may not be pretty, but it's functional, and more importantly, it's done. Now my iPod won't get tangled up in my purse.



Blogger question:

Twice today I tried to add blogs that I want to follow, and I get an error message saying something like "you are trying to follow this blog, but it appears that there is no feed." But then I show up on their list of followers. But they aren't showing up on my end. What gives?

My cheap, er, inexpensive interpretation

Hello girls! Here's a project I've been planning for quite some time.

I was flipping through a catalog and saw this cute pair of art pieces.



Wow, I thought. I must have this for my house!

However, I was not willing to pay $89 for something I knew I could replicate easily myself (though I *do* want you to pay $89 for this because it is from my company and I want my company to have good sales so I can have a job and afford the luxuries in life, like food, my mortgage, you know).

I've been a rubber stamper for, oh, about 18 years. I knew I could make this on the cheap.

I went to the thrift store to find a pair of matching frames, and this is what I found.



Eek. U.G.L.Y.

But the frames were nice, solid wood frames, so I knew they'd work.

I tore two pages out of an old book, busted out my rubber stamps, and here's what I came up with.



I think they turned out ok, but I'm not totally in love with it. Maybe I should have paid the $89 afterall.

Maybe I need something other than butterflies. I have lots of butterfly stamps, but this was the only one I really liked for this project. It doesn't have enough "umph" though. Maybe I'll do some tweaking. We'll see.