83. Plans for “new” TV stand.

Jason and I are in the process of getting ready to move (more details about that soon!), and I’ve been busy selling off a lot of our current furniture so we can upgrade to new(er) stuff.

I’m really digging this TV stand.

South Shore Reflekt TV Stand

I am not, however, digging the ~$216 price tag.  You know how I love getting what I want for as little as possible.

My solution is to just update out current TV stand, which is an older Ikea Besta model:

Ikea Besta Adal TV Stand

The shape is pretty close already, right?

The plan is to paint it white, add some wood veneer to the front of the drawers, and update the legs.  The hairpin legs I picked out were delivered yesterday, and they are gorgeous.  I’m planning to work on this project over the next few days, so I’ll hopefully have some before and after goodness ready for you lovelies by the weekend!

XO,
Gabriella

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79. Before and After: Tiered Shelf

Guess what? I turned that trash shelf into something gorgeous!

I think this might be one the quickest furniture makeovers I’ve ever done.  There are still things sitting finished in my apartment that I haven’t written about yet, but this one I got done in record time AND actually took proper before and after photos.  I’m patting myself on the back right now, you should see it.  I look pretty ridiculous.

Let’s start off with the before shots:

Meh.

Definitely not in the best condition, but definitely not awful.  It just needed some tender loving care!

I started off by lightly sanding to the whole thing and giving it two coats of Behr Premium Plus paint in the shade “Mountain Pine”.

Image credit: thehomedepot.com

I really like this color.  It’s even prettier in person!  Just wait.

After the second coat of paint (which I let dry for ~24 hours), I distressed all the edges by sanding with a light grade sand paper.  Super easy.

After that, I decided that the finished piece would need a little more pizzazz, something to make it look more expensive…or at least like I did something else to it besides slap on a coat of paint.  The solution I came up with: stamped aluminum sheets.  These are sold in the building supply aisle of hardware stores; I got mine at Home Depot (exact here).

I measured the inside portion of all the shelves and cut out the appropriate size from the larger sheet using tin snips.  A word of caution: Definitely wear gloves and eye protection when cutting!  I tore up my fingers in the process and am still wearing bandages.

After I had the sheets cut out to the sizes I wanted, I used contact cement (exact here) to adhere the sheeting to the inside of the shelves.  I chose to close off three sides, but doing just two sides or just the back would also be a great choice!  This stuff works really well, but it is SMELLY.  Definitely use this stuff outside if possible, or at least somewhere you can open a ton of windows.  It’s fairly simple to use: paint both surfaces you want to stick together, let the stuff dry until it gets “glossy” (i.e. shiny), and then press the two surfaces together.  The only downside is you can’t really readjust once you put the surfaces together, so try to be as precise as possible!

The finished product, which I absolutely adore:

So, what do you think?  Did I do the piece justice?!  I honestly think it’s super cute.  I was going to sell it, but I’ve decided to keep it instead.  What the crap…I’m turning into a hoarder.

Thanks for reading, check back soon for more transformations!

XO,
Gabriella

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77. Whoops.

Life caught up with me, and I [obviously] haven’t written anything in a longgggg time.  My bad.

Anyway, my new job is going really well.  I’m having a blast, actually!  Now that I’m back in the swing of things and used to my new schedule, I can get back to doing all kinds of fun projects.  The newest one?  A gorgeous tall shelf that I pulled out of my neighbor’s garbage.  That’s right folks: Yours truly has now become a trash picker!  In my defense, this shelf is still in great condition.

Free shelf? Worddddd.

See!  Why on earth would you just put this to the curb?!  There are a few minor nicks and a water mark or two, but other than that, there’s really nothing wrong with it.  If it were me, I would have at least dropped this off at Goodwill so someone else could maybe get some use out of it.  I’ll never understand why people insist on being so wasteful.

I already have big plans for this baby, but you’ll just to have wait and find out what they are when I post about the finished product. 😉

I also plan to write about more than just my DIY projects.  I’ve got too many interests…I’m excited about them all and want to share them with you!  I know it’s considered a “no-no” in the blogiverse to write about more than one topic/theme, but honestly…IDGAF.  It’s my life, and my blog, and I can write about whatever I want, yo!  If I wear a cute outfit, I’ll write about it.  If I redo a piece of furniture, I’ll write about it.  If I played an awesome show with my band…you guessed it, I’ll write about it.  All of those things are part of my life and my persona, so of course I would mention them!

Okay, rant over.

Have a lovely evening, kittens!

XO,
Gabriella

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66. Plans for the spare bedroom.

The spare bedroom in our apartment is pretty much our dumping ground.  Don’t have a place for that box of random cords?  Just put in the back room.  Folding tables?  Back room.  Stuff you might eventually list on eBay?  You guessed it, back room.

But that’s all going to change!

It’s always been the plan to use the back room as a little studio for my jewelry and as a space for overnight guests to feel cozy.  I’ve been putting the transformation off for quite a while, but my dad will be visiting next week and I figured it’s now or never.  I think he might want an actual bed to sleep on.

I set up my studio space against one wall, which leaves plenty of room for a full-size bed.  We decided on this one from Ikea:

Fjellse bed from IKEA

It doesn’t have the greatest reviews regarding durability, but I’m hoping it will last us a bit longer since it will be used pretty infrequently.

Since the walls are painted a dark gray, I wanted the bedding to be bright and fun.  I ended up choosing this set from Target.

Room Essentials Chevron Bed in a Bag from Target

I was surprised to find that the actual color is more of a seafoam green, not true mint green.  I was on the fence about it, but I think it still looks nice enough to keep.

As for the mattress, we took a gamble and ordered a mattress in a box from Walmart.  Yep, you can order a mattress that comes rolled up and vacuum-sealed in plastic.  I was pretty apprehensive as to whether it would be of decent quality and at least somewhat comfortable, but I’m pretty impressed, especially for the price.  If you want to check it out for yourself, this is the one we ended up going with.  For reference, we got ours on sale for $149.  Not bad for a full-size mattress, especially since shipping was only $5 (it was actually free, but I upgraded to make sure it got here on time).  We will see how it feels once we get the bed set up.

Speaking of which, the bed frame is getting delivered today!  After tonight, we will have an official guest bedroom…something I have never, ever had before.  I’ll make sure to take some photos once everything is set up…and organized. 🙂

XO,
Gabriella

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65. Before and After: Thrift Store Art

I bought a really cool framed art print at Goodwill a while back.  You can see it hanging behind our dining room table.

I love the print, but the frame is not very appealing.  I mean, it’s fine as-is, but it’s just…boring.  Nah mean?

I finally got around to painting the frame last week, and now I think I love this print even more.

The color is called “sea life”.  It’s of course by Behr, my favorite paint.  Tip for getting small amounts of paint on the cheap: just ask them to tint one of the testers for you.  It’s actually quite a bit of paint!  I bought one for a previous project, used the leftover on this frame, and there is STILL about half the container left.  Much cheaper than buying acrylic paints in the little tubes.

As I do with every other Before & After post, here is a side-by-side comparison.

SO much better.  It seemed so solemn before, but now I think it’s much happier.  Hooray for happy art!

XO,
Gabriella

 

61. Before and After: Vintage Dressers

So…yeah.  I’ve been really terrible at keeping up with this blog lately.  I blame the nice weather!  And going to the gym.  Both fabulous excuses, if you ask me.

Here’s the next post in my furniture series: a lovely makeover involving a set of vintage dressers.  Vintage Kroehler dressers!  That I found on Craigslist for $65.  (You know I’m patting myself on the back over here…)

Here’s what they looked like when we first got them home.

I sanded them and gave them a couple of coats of Behr Popped Corn, which is a nice “warm” white.  I also gave them a bit of distressing with a sanding block and a cheese knife shaped like a miniature meat cleaver.  My tools known no bounds.

Don’t they look perty?

I’d eventually like to switch out the hardware to something a little more modern, but they work for now.  Drawer pulls are expensive, and mama’s gots bills ta pay!

Happy Monday, fools.

XO,
Gabriella

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60. Before and After: Antique China Cabinet

Happy St. Patrick’s Day!  I’ll be joining the festivities later this evening, but first, a blog post.

I promised to make last week all about furniture.  I failed to keep this promise and only wrote one post.  Shame on me!  Let’s try this again.  Hopefully I’ll find the time to write up everything on my list!

Today’s before and after is a lovely antique china cabinet I found on Craigslist.  The young lady who sold it to me only wanted $35!

It’s hard to tell from the photo, but the wood was not exactly in great shape.  I decided to paint the cabinet, and decided on a deep turquoise from Behr called “Caribe”.

Source: Home Depot

Jason ended up being the one who painted this cabinet; I had a lot of projects going on at that time, and we just wanted to get them DONE.  I think he did an excellent job.

This cabinet got painted almost two years ago.  I use it for storing all my yarn and knitting accessories, and the fact that it didn’t have a handle was super annoying.  Last month, I went back to Home Depot and bought an antique-style cabinet pull, drilled a few holes in the door, and installed the handle.  Much, much better.

You’ll notice that the paint job has gotten quite a few dings.  We moved since acquiring the cabinet, and it’s moved around a bit in our new place.  Battle scars, my friends.  Battle scars.  I think they add a bit of character, so I probably won’t fix them.  I also don’t have any more of this paint, so I’m sure that also has something to do with my lack of caring.

I seriously cannot believe it took me so long to show you this cabinet!  The worst case of procrastination if I ever saw one.  Make sure to check back tomorrow, because I’ll be showing you another furniture makeover: a set of vintage dressers!

XO,
Gabriella

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59. Before and After: Vintage Desk

I’ve decided to dedicate this week to furniture.  There are actually several finished projects in my flat that I haven’t showed you!  How terrible of me.  Today, I’ll show you the newest addition to our household, a beautiful vintage desk for my husband, Jason.

My husband recently started working from home, and he was in need of a new desk.  A real desk.  Something better than the cheapo Ikea tables we had sutured together like Frankenfurniture.  I stopped by our local ReStore on Friday afternoon, and found this handsome fella.

He was a bit tired and had some broken hardware, but overall in great condition and very sturdy.  The price tag said $40, but lucky for me green tags were 20% off.  The final cost was $33.79 including tax.

I couldn’t bring this guy home that night (I had a performance with my dear friend Lex Allen), but I made a pit stop at Home Depot on the way home to pick out some paint.  I decided on “Curry Powder” for the main body and “Ethiopia” for the drawer fronts, both colors by Behr.

Source: homedepot.com

I bought a quart of the main color and a tester for the drawer fronts.  The total for paint was $19.24.  I wanted to buy new hardware while I was there, but I wasn’t able to measure the current hardware in order to purchase the correct size.

Jason and I picked up the desk on Saturday morning, along with some hardware from Home Depot.  Four new drawer pulls came out to $21.04, bringing the grand total for the desk to $74.07.  A steal, if you ask me.

I got to work as soon as we got home.  Jason helped me sand all the surfaces with medium grit sanding blocks.  After wiping off all the dust, I gave the main body of the desk three coats of paint; the drawer fronts got two coats.  I let the desk sit overnight to cure before adding the new hardware and moving it to its “permanent” position.

I really love how it turned out, don’t you?

Make sure to come back all this week to see my other furniture transformations!  I’ll also be posting tutorials for our platform bed (finally!) and a cute ottoman I built from scratch.

Happy Monday!

XO,
Gabriella

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55. Before and After: Shutter Door Jewelry Storage

Remember the door I showed you on Friday?  I finished its transformation today.  I turned it into a display for my jewelry and heels!

To refresh your memory, this is what I started with:

And this is what I have now!

I’m super happy with how it turned out, and can we talk about how EASY and INEXPENSIVE it was to make?  Okay, let’s talk about it.

How to make a shutter door into a jewelry organizer!

Materials:

window shutter or shutter door
pliers
paint
crackle medium
wood glue
small clamps
s hooks

Directions:

1.  Wipe down the door with mild cleanser to get rid of any dirt and grime.

2. Using a pair of pliers, remove a few slats from the bottom half of the door.  (You can skip this step if you don’t plan on using this to store any shoes.)   Admire the destruction you have created.

3. Here is what the door looked like after I took out three of the slats from the bottom.  You may be able to take out more or less depending on your door.  In order to figure out the spacing in between slats, I just hung a pair of shoes from the top row in order to figure out where to take out the next piece.

4. Paint the door to give it an aged look.  Here’s what I used, and the steps of my painting technique:

1. Raw wood.
2. Streak on brown paint.
3. Layer on tan paint.
4. Add crackle medium + white topcoat.

5.  My door had a hole for a door knob, and I decided to cover it up.  I found these wood accents at Home Depot for a little under $6 for the pair.  If you decide to use these, make sure to paint them to match the door.

6. Once the accents are painted and dry, attach them to the door using wood glue and clamps (or heavy books).  Allow to dry completely.

7. Prop your door up against the wall of your choice.  It’s now time to add all your trinkets and pretty shoes!

8. To hang necklackes, bracelets, etc., add s hooks to the slats on the top half of the door.  Add necklaces to your heart’s content.

9.  Hang your shoes.

And there you have it!  You made your very own storage unit for loads of pretty jewelry and shoes.

I can imagine this project being used in so many different ways.  You could:

– make a bunch and line them along an entire wall…imagine all the shoes and jewelry you could own! 😉
– create a pot rack for the kitchen
– use as a towel rack in the bathroom
– hang family photos with clothes pins

It’s such an inexpensive way to create more storage, I’m considering making another one.

Here’s the cost breakdown:

shutter door – $8.45 at ReStore
wood accents and s hooks – $12.53 @ Home Depot
paint and crackle medium – already owned

Total cost = $20.98

What would you use this for?  I’d love to hear your ideas!

XO,
Gabriella

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54. I bought a door today.

I’ve had an idea for a new project stuck in my head for the past few days, so I pulled the trigger and bought the supplies today.  The biggest item is a door.  This is that door.

I picked it up at Habitat for Humanity’s ReStore for a mere $8.45.  I have big plans for this baby.

Can you guess what I’m making?

Your best guess will have to suffice for now, because I’m not telling you what it is yet!  I’m taking the rest of the night off to hang out with my Valentine. 🙂

XO,
Gabriella

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