Antique Desk Makeover

Awhile ago my brother-in-law came to visit and he got recruited to go with hubby and pick up a GIANT desk...freebie down the road.  I got the kids in bed while they picked up this...

It sat in the garage for far to long while I decided what to do with it.  Then one day I got busy.  I really liked the wood on the sides and back and so they stayed and everything else got a single coat of paint and light distressing.

Aren't these drawers awesome!

I painted the insides of the drawers a lighter shade...

Check out this pull out shelf!

I love these knobs from Hobby Lobby.

Linking up here:

Black Beds

Well pretty much right after I published yesterday's post, I found this big boy bed for our oldest...right down the road...

Perfect!  I love it...he loves it!  Actually, he told me today "I like my bed, but black and not brown."  Yes, he wants me to paint it black...his current favorite color.  He has also mentioned the possibility of me painting it orange...dream on son!!  I told him I could do black, but no way for orange.  We also need to make some bed rails.  What happens to bed rails?  There are a lot of headboard/footboard sets that are missing them. 

Speaking of black beds...I picked this headboard up for free...by myself...

Somehow, I do not know how, I managed to get this into the back of our suburban.  I am pretty sure the man across the street watched the whole time out his window!  I had some black paint left over from this dresser and thought it would help this beast look a little more elegant.  What do you think?

Daughter's Big Girl Bed

Wow!  Look at me...two posts in a row...I hope your impressed!  =)  Today I decided to share daughter's "new" bed.  I got this bed way back in November.  Here is the story...

One lovely winter morning I was driving the kids to school and we passed a bed with a "free" sign.  I slam on the brakes, realize I am going to be late if I stop and so keep going.  It did not look very exciting anyway.  Then driving home I had Mom with me and we drove by the bed.  Hmmm, it actually had kinda cool legs.  We turn around and stare at it from across the street.  Neither of us had ever picked up a "curbie" before...guess there's a first time for everything!  It's quite exhilarating picking up a curbie!  Anyway, here she is...

 

I just stuck her in the garage and hoped hubby would somehow not see her.  He came home and no mention...until dinner.   We are sitting there eating and he turns to me and says "so you picked up that bed.  I saw that bed this morning when I left for work and I just knew if it was still there when you drove by later it was going to end up in our garage."  Me "well how come you did not just pick it up for me then??"  Hubby...the look.  Me...the grin.  We finish dinner.

If you notice in the first picture, the side rails are short...we found this out the hard way.  I had everything painted, hubby and I put the bed together, and it looked good!  I told him I wanted to just put our guest room full bed on it to make sure it fit okay...HA!  Too small.  Since this is an antique bed the side rails are for a smaller mattress.  A 3/4 full mattress would work great.  Only problem...they are over $500!  So Dad came for a visit and we put him to work!  We made new side rails that would fit a standard full mattress.  Here are the boys hard at work...

And here they are celebrating bed rail completion with some cheesecake...ahem...at 10:30 in the morning! 

Then we had to put it together and test it out in daughter's room...

Yep, we still have the dresser...in fact, it is off the market.  I had one lady interested and when I told daughter we might be selling her dresser she cried.  And that was that.  These are the mattresses from our guest bed and they are WAY to big.  I think they are taller than daughter!  So the bed was taken down and put away for awhile until we got a smaller mattress.  That happened yesterday...thanks friends!  ;)  This morning I took apart the crib and set the big girl bed back up.

I think she likes it!  And yes, if you look real hard you can see tiny daughter in the big girl bed.  The white dresser was mine growing up and will eventually get a makeover...someday.

This pink chair also needs a face lift...someday.

Finally I got her off the bed for one picture!  Another someday I'll make her some bedding.  Until then we'll make do.

Now we just need to find big brother a big boy bed!

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Girl's Bedroom Set

I've been getting scolded for the lack of posts recently...sorry!  I promise to be better!  (Haven't I said that before??)  I have been working on LOTS of projects, so I am going to try and post a little about each one over the next few weeks days.

I love the French Provincial style, but have not been able to find any cheapo pieces (you know how I love my deals!).  Until this set came along...

I decided on a homemade chalkpaint in pale green.  I found some super cute fabric and lined the back of the bookshelf and drawer bottoms.  The mirror sadly did not make it though the put-back-together phase in one piece.  I had some extra wood from making replacement drawer bottoms that was the perfect size...then I sprayed it with chalkboard paint.  I thought about putting it in daughter's room, but refrained...I may not have wanted to take it out!

Wood File Cabinet

I love to browse other blogs and see what my fellow bloggers are up to.  I then tend to fall in love with some random piece of furniture (my library stairs for example) and it becomes my new Craigslist obsession mission.  So here is the latest.  This is a solid wood file cabinet Michelle at Knot Too Shabby redid...I did not even know these existed!  Beautiful, right??

I am in love!  Nearly every file cabinet I have ever seen is metal.  So my hunt was on.  Imagine my surprise when I found an ad for a Wooden File Cabinet...for free!  I dragged poor Hubby and kids out in the drizzly weather to pick up this:

Nice, huh?  I excitedly opened the drawers and found this:

What?!?  It is like a mutant file cabinet!  Where are the sides and bottoms of the drawers??  Upon closer inspection this is an Ikea wooden file cabinet.  We took it anyway, it was free after all.  I think I am just going to resell this one...I am really quite irritated at it!  I know Mom I should paint it, it would look better, but I really just don't want to!