DIY Dresser Ideas :: For a First Timer

Hey there party people!

Steve and I have been working on clearing out future baby's room. And we have furniture in there that either needs to exit our lives or be DIY-ed and refashioned.

Enter: This dresser.

I believe Steve said that all his brothers have used this dresser. And trust me, it shows. It looks like either little ones or a dog have chewed on some of the edges, and there are chips all over it, drawings inside the drawers, some of the drawer tracks are skeewhompus, and one of the back legs is broken so it wobbles.

Originally I was thinking of making this dresser into the changing table for the baby's room. It has a lip on the top that would be great for the changing pad to rest against, and then other things won't fall off while I'm holding on to baby. However, I just wasn't feeling it. Also, I have never repainted/refinished furniture before. I didn't want to screw up on something for the baby's room. Also, I didn't want to feel bad if I changed my mind and gave up before the baby came.

We were just going to put it on the curb or donate it, but then we came up with a brilliant plan. Ok, it's not that brilliant, and I've seen it done lots of times. It just felt brilliant for us. We have been wanting a taller TV stand for our television in the basement ever since we moved in. We measured and this dresser is a great fit for the spot where our TV stand would go! DING DING DING!!! It would create some great storage and be something new-ish for our home. Wins all around!

Now the question remains - what do we do to the dresser? I only have a couple vague ideas at this point. I decided since it was going in the basement, and it was my first attempt on DIY painting a dresser, I wanted to try something fun and maybe a little "out there." However, it can't be too time consuming because I'm afraid I'll lose heart in the middle of the project.

So does anyone have any ideas? Send me pins, pictures, comments, emails, etc. so I can see what you've seen and imagine. I'm having trouble really attaching myself to an idea for this.

Spring cleaning/organizing updates

Earlier this year I made a goal list for spring cleaning/organizing. I wanted to update you on any progress or changes that have happened... because many have. I'll cross out the things I have done or have changed.

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1. Weed/clean up flower beds (again)  This is never ending, and we finally gave up. We'll try again next year with Preen and stuff.
1a. Get the mulch and big flower pots for the flower beds  I decided against mulch this year. But I'm going for it next year. heehee.
1b. Actually plant flowers :)  I planted flowers in the pots, but not in the flower beds yet.

2. Organize our craft room and spare (guest) bedroom  I am in the process of organizing the craft room. It's looking much better. More to come on that soon.

3. Clean out/organize garage
3a. Make shelves in garage for storage bins

4. Make the tub into a shower in the pink potty
(Yeah, it's currently only a tub. So I want that functional for any guests so they don't have to go into our bedroom to shower.) This has been put off to save money for AC.

5. Start saving for/deciding on cabinets for kitchen Again, postponed until we get an AC.
5a. GET A DISHWASHER
5b. Put some cabinet doors back on

6. Paint upstairs living room/dining room (finally!!)  FINALLY AND IT LOOKS INCREDIBLE!!!  :D :D :D

7. Donate more clothes/shoes/accessories - really...

8. Finish painting the forgotten cabinet in the kitchen

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Reading my list reminds me about my true dream of being the ultimately organized woman and wife in all the land.

We changed our priorities for what we are saving money for. After it started getting warm this spring, it got CRAZY HOT. Much worse than last year! So we decided to put all other savings on hold and save for an AC for next year. Holy Kansas we canNOT do another summer like this one!! Our swamp cooler simply couldn't keep up. 

We didn't get quite as much done this spring/summer as I hoped. But I'm really fine with that. It was seriously so HOT that I could not have handled doing more upstairs and outside. Maybe now that it's Autumn we'll get more motivation to do things. So perhaps I'll have more updates in a couple of months. I am really looking forward to the cooler months of Fall. 

Not to mention my birthday!

Let there be light!

And Steve said, "Let there be light!" ... in the dining room!!!

When we moved into the house a little more than a year ago, there was no light in the living room. That's pretty average for most homes. But there was also no light in the dining area that is just off the living room. There was a ceiling fan, but no light. What? Am I supposed to eat dinner in the dark?? It always irked me -- even though it's really not that big of a deal.

When we painted the living area, we went out and picked up a light to attach to the ceiling fan from Lowe's. We fiiinally got around to attaching it. We Steve were a little unsure about it because we are not very handy in our household. We try really hard. And it turns out good probably about 60% of the time. So we were nervous about our first encounter with electrical DIYing.

But here is my handsome handyman:

And it worked!!! Steve was very excited that it worked and was so uneventful. (Read: we didn't burn the house down.)

Here is a close-up:

What? You noticed that the two brass finishes don't match? Actually you can't tell that much in this picture. But the brass on the fan part and brass on the light part are different. We knew we wouldn't get an exact match. So we were glad we had painted the fan blades. Now it's just a quirky little fan that we can replace whenever we have a little extra cash. (Read: Whenever we have a little extra cash -- in many, many years.)

I cannot tell you how happy I am to have light somewhere in our living area! Now I can actually read my music when I play piano. (Major plus!) I love the light, no matter how funky our fan looks.

The hang up

I'm getting closer to getting my living room to be more like a home than a sterile room that we sit in.

I debated quite a bit what I wanted to do on this wall in my living room. Originally I wanted to paint this entire wall (that goes from living area into the dining area) an accent color or something bold. After finally figuring the color for the entire living area (which took many hours days) I was sooo tired of deciding on paint colors. So I just decided I would paint it like the rest of the room and do it a different color some other time if I really wanted to. 

Then I decided I could just paint right above the fireplace -- to make it look like a chimney and make it have something bold on that wall. I even got some paint for it. Then I painted the mantel brown and loved it so much that I didn't want to mess it up with anything else. Oh well. I'll have some pretty paint for something else. Perhaps for that end table I got from my mom-in-law....

Here is a before the of gross tan mantel: (with suuuper awesome lighting)

Here is the after of the brown color: (luurrve it sooo much!)

The day after painting the mantel brown, I had gotten a couple glass vases from DI for flowers. I decided to make the mantel area about family/faith. So I got some old pictures of family to use (I still have a couple more to add.)

I used frog tape to measure my pictures and put it on the wall to get a sense of what I wanted. I was going to try and go for the asymmetrical/perfectly imperfect gallery type of look. I just centered the biggest picture and randomly arranged the rest around it. It stayed like this for a month:

I told Steve I didn't want to start anymore new projects until I had at least hung up the pictures above the mantel. (We still have all the pictures in the hallway and at the top of the entry/stairs.) But at least this part makes me feel more homey. Here is the possibly-temporary look:

I've already changed it in the last 24 hours since putting it up. And I know that I'll change all the things actually sitting on the mantel many times before I'm totally satisfied. I'm not 100% on board with this asymmetrical look, but right now, I'm loving it. It's taking all my courage to leave it this way. But when I come up the stairs and see it, I smile. So I think it's good for now.

I love the antiques and old pictures I got for this. Especially love this picture of my grandpa and my uncle. We are a John Deere family. Also loved finding those books to help me add some height and horizontal interest on the mantel.

And I super duper love this antique hummel of my grandma's that my mom brought out for me to keep. So sweet looking!

So we'll see how long this whole asymmetrical thing lasts. Right now, I'm digging it even though it makes me a little uncomfortable. But maybe that is a good thing!

The ceiling fan

There is a fan over our dining area, and here is what the fan blades looked like:

The person that lived here previously was apparently a smoker. Seeing that shadow of the white that the blades used to be really grossed me out. So I cleaned the blades as best as I could and suddenly decided I was going to paint them!! It was totally spur of the moment at the end of the day when we were done with painting for the day.

So after cleaning them off (and being totally grossed out with the orange/brown crud that came off) I taped each blade a different pattern.

I didn't measure anything. Mom was freaking out about how not the same the lines were. So we agreed that I would make each blade a little different. I didn't care because I just wanted it to be a cool new quirky thing in my house.

I painted them the wall color (twice, to cover the gold flourish stuff). Then taped, them spray painted them black. But it was not looking so awesome, but my mom was thinking quick! She got a brush and brushed the spray paint so it was all evenly black. And it wasn't really for wood, so I was afraid it wouldn't dry. But it's just fan blades, right? So I wasn't too upset if I had to buy some more.

BUT - they turned out pretty shaweet!!

And they make a really cool psychadelic [sp?] pattern when I turn it on. LOVE IT.
Next goal: put lights on our fan so we not eat in the dark.

Painting the day away

So my mom came to visit from Indiana, and I obviously put her to work while she was here! She so lovingly agreed to help me paint my living room/dining area/hallway/entryway. And the reason I have to ask her to help me whenever she is here is because my dear hubby does not enjoy painting AT ALL.

So here are all the paint colors I was trying out. I ended up using the one that is like, right in the middle of all the colors. I won't tell you the entire story of how I chose the colors. I wanted a gray color. But I wasn't opposed to it having a blue tint. But I didn't want it to be TOO blue (like the color second from the left).

This is the biggest area of the house, and it's all connected. So I can't just paint part of it. I was very intimidated to start the project. But I did it - with my wondrous mom's help.

Here are some before pictures:
(I had to paint sample colors all over the walls because the light is so different all over where I was painting. So it looked a little ridiculous for a while, but it helped.)

Look at that form!!

You can see the new white on the ceiling and the old tan color that was painted EVERYWHERE in our house - baseboards, ceilings, bookcases, railings, EVERYTHING!!!

Good thing we had my awesome hubby that was still willing to help us on the parts that mom and I were too scared to do on the ladder. Mom was nervous and hovered over him most of the time he was painting.

I got brave enough to paint the walls in the entry.

I just realized that I don't have a legitimate "after" picture of the painting. So when I get everything back in place, then I'll post that.

Flower Power

Well, a while ago I was called to be a Den Leader in the Cub Scouts for our ward. Everyone was telling me that I was brave to accept or whatever ... but I was secretly really excited. My dad grew up doing scouts and it always seemed like a blast. (Except for the times when they camped out in the blizzards...wasn't jealous of that.)

For the Scouts, they needed to plant flowers/gardens and learn about plants. Oh hey! I had a flower bed that I was planning to plant soon - I guess I'll donate my flower bed for the Scouts to learn about planting. Free labor? Holler. ;)

So I was nice and did all the weeding where we were planting:

I love these little Supertunias.

Pink with green on the outsides!! :)

Here is the ground cover - I can't remember the name.

It was quite the experience having 8 boys help plant my garden. It's a good thing I don't have a green thumb, because otherwise I probably would have freaked out. Haha.  But it was fun - whatever.

Here is the after:

Now, these Yucca plants (I'm pretty sure that's what they are) are in my backyard. I thought they were super ugly and I wanted to rip them out. Then my sister told me they flowered. I left them in to give them a chance so I could see what they looked like. And can I just say - I love them!! I am never taking these out! 

Someday I will have an awesomely cool yard with flowers and lovely things everywhere. That will mostly likely not be for a long time. But it's okay!

Next yard goal: actually keep weeds out of my flower beds....whoops.

Spring cleaning & projects

Alright everyone. I know that I talk about my house a lot, but it's fun because it's our first house and it's been an adventure already. So now that it's the first Spring season since we have been moved and settled, I have some goals for cleaning, organizing, and updating. I figure I'll share them, mostly for my own benefit in not forgetting them. If I just write them down at home, I lose the list and then I just give up.

This is not in any real order, and I may keep updating this list as I come up with more ideas, but this is it for now. I don't care if these all get done in the spring, but I want to maybe get them done some time this year. At least started! Hopefully!

So here goes...

1. Weed/clean up flower beds (again)
1a. Get the mulch and big flower pots for the flower beds
1b. Actually plant flowers :)

2. Organize our craft room and spare (guest) bedroom

3. Clean out/organize garage
3a. Make shelves in garage for storage bins

4. Make the tub into a shower in the pink potty
(Yeah, it's currently only a tub. So I want that functional for any guests so they don't have to go into our bedroom to shower.)

5. Start saving for/deciding on cabinets for kitchen
5a. GET A DISHWASHER
5b. Put some cabinet doors back on

6. Paint upstairs living room/dining room (finally!!)

7. Donate more clothes/shoes/accessories - really...

8. Finish painting the forgotten cabinet in the kitchen

I know there are more I'm forgetting. I'll let you know how all these things go since it's starting to warm up and be lovely enough for open windows! :)

Pink Potty : Cabinets

Well, I believe that we have discussed the pink potty before. I think it was when we had just moved in. Since then I have been on a very slow journey to "update" this bathroom. I say "update" because I decided since we can't yet afford to just completely rip it all out, we can't officially update it. I have to live with the pink sink, tub, and toilet for a while. So I'm rolling with it and just "updating" it while keeping it a little vintage.

I'm sticking with the white/black/gray/pink colors. So I decided to kick out the preteen shade of pink and replace it with a more elegant shade of pink. Really, I just wanted it to match the pink of the toilet and tub.

Before:

I forgot that this was inside of one of the drawers. Pretty, right??

On its way:

After:

So, there ya go! Much better. We found the cheapest handles we could at Home Depot and slapped them on. SOOO much better. Some of the old ones were like, fuzzy. Gross. Glad we got new ones. Except I just realized that the drawer handles are in two different places. Oh well!

So glad I did it and it only took me a few hours! I also only had to get two sample sized paint cans to do it all, and I have extra. So it turned out to be pretty cheap too!

Closet Curtain Doors

Well we've had these nasty orange wood sliding doors for our closets in our master bedroom - and I've always disliked them. I had been talking to Steve about either painting them, wallpapering them, or getting curtains to replace them - and he didn't object.

 

Well, long story short: One day I wanted to kick and punch things because of those STUUUUPID doors! They were just too much in the way. And I like to see my whole closet at one time. So I'm a diva. Sue me. In a fit of rage, I decided it was time for curtains instead of doors. I asked Steve to remove the doors, and he used his manly strength and did so easily.

 

Well, then I was left with looking at the unorganized, messy closets. Great. I did not think that through.

We got the curtains (white to be safe with future colors). Well they were a few inches too long. But thanks to my trusty new sewing machine, I could easily sew them to the correct length. Holla! And here are the new closet doors that I sewed and put up today. I still need to iron them. And when the rest of the bedroom colors are chosen and finalized, I plan to dip dye these or paint a stripe on them or something. We'll see what Pinterest persuades me to do later on.

Next project: actually organize the inside of the closets.  :)

New Desk

Now that we have a big old house to ourselves, I have been making one of the bedrooms into a crafty space. It's so awesome. And Steve also got me a sewing machine for Christmas, and I was SO EXCITED!!!

 

I used to just pull out all my crafting/scrapbooking things and craft on the dining table. But since I had the sewing machine, I wanted a more stationary spot to put it. So we had been going on somewhat regular trips to the DI to see if they ever had anything nice enough to have in our house and something that would actually work.

 

We FINALLY found it last weekend. I love it so much and it doesn't smell! yesssss. I think I might paint it one day, but I'm loving the retro vibe it's giving off for now. Now I'm on the hunt for a good chair to match.

 

Here it is with the new sewing machine on it! YAY!

Please ignore the rest of the mess around the desk - I'm in the process of organizing/de-junkifying this room.

Snow and ice

This winter has been quite snowy and interesting weather has happened that I don't usually see in Utah. Our new house is really good at fostering icecicles off the gutters...

 

These were on the back of our house and were about 3 feet long.

Here is the front of the house with more 3 foot long ice spears.

Then there was this death ice harpoon hanging outside our front door. Huge! And it got thicker a while after I took this picture.

Then we had an ice storm - which NEEEEVERRR happens around here. I had experienced something similar in Indy, but I don't even remember it being like this. It was IN-SANE. This was the day I was telling myself not to fall down the stairs, and I did anyway ... and the neighbor saw me. But I lived, don't worry!

Ice rink in the driveway

And we got a STINK LOAD of snow. I'm sure Utah has gotten this much snow before, but I was never really around to witness it. But it just seemed to dump on us all at once. A lot of shoveling our new driveway this winter.

 

The snow even hid the mailbox!

Needless to say, this winter was a very snowy and icy one. Our heater was also on the fritz. It would just stop working for a few hours, even though it was still turned on. Awesome. So we called and got it "fixed" on February 4. Then it stopped working for a whole day and they came back and hopefully actually fixed it the second time. We're just hoping we'll have the warranty when the heater actually dies...since it's pretty ancient already.

Happy winter everyone!!