Stuff N Thing, Part Troix

Before:  

*DRUMROLLLLLLL*

After:  

Coffee table.


The story is, and you got some of it a while back, that my existing coffee table, though lovely, and dear to my heart, was just too large for the current living room arrangement, and the furniture therein.  I plan to keep it, though I don't know yet what I'll do with it - probably just store it until someday when my living room expands again, or something.

Meanwhile, between an old trunk which became a shelf, (and then another shelf), a bulk-trash-day side table find, and a whole bunch of spray paint, a new, smaller coffee table was born.

the new table receives a cat scan

The dog loves it.  Her favorite spot in the house was under the coffee table, and I was worried that the new one would be too short for her to get beneath, but it works great for her.  Hee.

Truth:  it IS a bit small for the couch, LOL.  But honestly, functionally, it's *exactly* the right size.  And it's pretty.  And it looks awesome with the wing chair and the little gold side table between it and the couch.  Even though it makes the couch look enormous, I really love my new wee coffee table.  (And to be honest, the couch doesn't look so large without a bunch of old blankets draped over it.  Hopefully there's slipcover news in the near future).

I really  should think up a tag/label for "furniture that's been cobbled together from parts cannibalized from parts of other stuff."  But shorter.

Aside:  No shit, a friend of an ex, years ago, was the WORST at mis-using words.  One night while the boys were gaming, I overheard him describing a pirate ship that had been "galvanized" from parts of other ships, and I just could NOT keep from bursting out laughing.  I was dying laughing, and yes, I had to explain why - and then I had to explain what "galvanized" and "cannibalized" meant, and he didn't believe me,  and he was SO MAD.  Shitforbrains. 

A Ten-Minute Side Table Upgrade

You know what's awesome?

Spray paint.

This table is fucking boring.

Now it's awesome!

This is actually the original glass top for the thing.  I think I got this table at a garage sale for $20 like a million years ago.  It was white, and it had an MDF top under the glass that was SUPER gross and water-damaged.  I threw it away, and sprayed the table black.

It spent a lot of time being a table on my back porch, where it went great with the black wicker chairs.  Then it spent some time in my living room, being a pain in the ass with a silver fake-o Moroccan tray on it.

But it needed to be SHINY.  SHINY!!!!  


Now it is awesome.

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Stuff!

I know, I know, I haven't posted in a while. Blah blah sick blah blah blah bipolar blah blah crashburnsisboombah.  Anyway.

I did something REALLY cool on the 5th, though.  A friend of mine had her bachelorette party at a place called Painting With A Twist, which is one of those studio art classes places.  We noshed on veggies and cheese and cookies, drank wine and punch, and all painted a cute little picture of fireflies in a jar along with the instructor.

IT WAS SO MUCH FUN YOU GUYS.

At the end of the class, we all took a big class photo of us holding our paintings, and then there was a raffle in which the winner (randomly drawn name) got to pick a finished piece of a showcase wall of paintings done by the instructor.  Guess who won!  ME!

Instructor's piece on the left (Austin Skyline and town lake, Van Gogh-ish-ly;  my firefly painting on the right.  Hee! 

Also, I have an update for you on those bulk day pieces from the other week...um, sort of.  Actual photos of them instead of pictures from the internet that are kinda close.

the footstool thing

Trio of 2x4' sheet mirrors!  SO EXCITED. 

Grubby little side table
(see also: put away your extension
cords damnit;  flat bike tire) 

☼  
The little side table, I'm thinking, is going to become TOTALLY FREAKING AWESOME.  You know, once I get a spare five minutes to freaking work on it, which I haven't had lately.

☼
The mirrors are going into the master bath as I mentioned in the previous entry;  but that's going to be the end of a cascading set of projects:

• fix up a light fixture and install it in the guest bath
• move old guest bath fixture to master bath
• repaint the room
• hang the mirrors

☼
I have NO clue what I'm going to do with the footstool.  I mean, aside from refinish the wood and replace the upholstery.  I mean, what'll it be FOR?  It's tall enough to be a piano stool, I think.  I dunno yet.

☼
The secret project in this entry is what the footstool is propped on/in in above:  it's a counter-height kitchen cabinet, about 24" square, with drawer and door, and single shelf inside.  It's going to be the end piece of my new garage worktable, once I get off my !#@% and build the goddamned thing.

Stay tuned!


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A Quick Check-In (To Laugh At Other People)

I'm pounding away on the SCA projects, and I'm also right in the middle of building a table for my electronic keyboard, as well as a new workbench for my shop! Whee! Busy!

If you'd like to see the SCA stuff, it's over here.  

The table and bench will be up as soon as they're finished, and I'm hoping to get at least one of them done by this weekend.

Meanwhile, I went to Texas Thrift Store last night, killing time before I had to be somewhere else.  TTS is one of my favorite thrift stores in town.  It  was recently featured on Refashionista and is mentioned often on Thrift Horror.  I follow both blogs, and I have to say, Thrift Horror in particular cracks me the f#ck UP, often first thing in the morning when I need it most.

Because schadenfreude and coffee are just a match made in heaven, dontchaknow.


Anyhow, I discovered a couple of my own thrift horrors, and I thought I'd share them with you: 

I'm sure someone made this with love.  Or something.


Just...why?


Was the bottle cold?  Do you shake this at football games when your team scores?


Who's out there scouring thrift stores for a beer bottle covered in dirty yarn?


It's too bad the bottle isn't blue.

I very nearly said something out loud when I saw this.  Then I had to pretend to admire it while I made sure the guy admiring a dish drainer four feet away wasn't watching me take pictures of thing, lol.  (I do, actually, often photograph items I'm interested in in a store, so that if I don't buy them, I know what to come back for).

I know they sell lampshades like this, but this one is homemade.  Someone glued a bunch of really cheap polyester rose petals all over this poor bell shade, and then whole roses all the way around the lip, most of which have fallen off.


Also the glue was...greebly...and peeling, and separating from things.  Which I guess was why the thing was falling apart.  I was tempted to buy it and clean it up just to make it feel better.



What I DID buy, though, was a couple of really zesty dresses, one which is fabulous as-is, and the other needs a tiny bit of "refashioning" to be completely fabulous.  I'll show you when I'm done.  It's at the end of  a loooooong to-do list.  :)

Lub yooz!

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Master Bedroom Vanity Cabinet

Drumroll, please!

*drdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdr*

Okay, okay, wait.  

Before: 

White and very dirty $9 thrift store medicine cabinet about which I
posted on Monday.  

Vanity table with round dresser mirror and jewelry on
the wall - which I loved, but the various jewelry boxes
(more on two other surfaces in the room!) were a bit
ridiculous.  Too much walking around to find stuff.  

*drdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdrdr*

After:

Yay!  Plain ol' black paint - in fact, it's the same off-black that I used on the table beneath the cabinet, so they match perfectly. It took more than paint, though.  I scrubbed the entire cabinet inside and out, did some very minor repairs to small stains and water damage spots, primed the entire thing, and gave it three coats of the off-black paint. 

But wait - there's more! 

Yes, I'm a total nail polish junkie.  

Necklaces hung on rings on a tension rod at the top, a whole row of nail polish bottles (I can see them all now!!), and...well, to be honest, a bunch of other random stuff crammed in just for the photo, because I'm nowhere near decided on what will end up going where, and it'll take me weeks to get the new system to where it's comfortable to use. :)

Same with the arrangement on the table top - it's going to take work.  I'd like to have everything for my morning routine all here in the same space, but, we'll see how it goes.  :) 

This was just for fun, and because I had a tiny bit of black chalkboard paint that was getting too thick to work with, and I wanted to use up as much as I could before trashing the rest.  The face makes me giggle every time I see it, so, I guess this is working, morning-cheer-wise.  ^_^

I'm also a total lip gloss junkie.  

*

So, I have no idea what I'll do with the round mirror that was here before.  And I have plans for the dresser in the room as well; but that's going to have to wait a week or two while I turn my attention to the 12th century side-laced pendant-sleeved gown that I haven't even started working on, that I need to wear on the 7th.  OOPS.  

Back soon! 

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Look What I Found!

Ladies and germs, I give you:  one 36x40x4" bathroom medicine cabinet, with three hinged and mirrored doors, two interior shelves, and all mounting hardware included.

For nine dollars.

NINE DOLLARS.

The thrift gods have smiled down upon me.  I had a thing to do Tuesday night, halfway between work and home, so, rather than waste gas running back and forth, I dawdled, and decided to check out a Goodwill I hadn't been into before.  I scored a couple of pretty sweet finds, but this was the best.  

Mind you, it was freaking FILTHY.   

One of the things I find the most entertaining about thrifted furniture is the forensic exploration portion of the job.  For instance, in the process of cleaning the heinous nastiness from this piece (seriously, these people must never have cleaned their house. Ever), I discovered not only lots of globs of toothpaste, some of which were in places that wouldn't have happened accidentally, but also glitter lip gloss smears, tiny fingerprints, and the dust-and-crud-encrusted rings of small bathroom glasses, along with impressions in the gunge of small toothbrushes, and some water damage.  This hung in a child's bathroom.  More than one child, likelier than not.

Thankfully, the water damage was minor, and easily repaired.  This cabinet is MDF through and through, which means all I had to do was slice and patch.  Another wee blessing:  the gook came off this thing with very little effort, revealing a factory paint finish in surprisingly good shape for how vile it looked from the outside.

Nearly all the work on this piece happened yesterday, : disassembly, cleaning, repair, priming, and painting.  I haven't hung it in its new home, but I'll be doing that this week*  and showing you the results as soon as I can.

Here's a hint:

via Pinterest, from efurniturehouse.com

* tonight? Maybe.   Stay tuned. 


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My Bug Collection. Let Me Show You It

Say it with me now:

Ewwwww.  

That's the light fixture on my front porch.  Gross, huh?  Also tiny, boring, and dim (mostly because of the bugs).

However, I found this baby at the thrift shop the other day for nine dollars:

I know, it's all blurry.  That's why it was nine dollars.

BFF, when I posted this pic on Facebook:  "I've always wanted a
light fixture that would make me coffee."   Womp womp. 

Man, do you guys KNOW how many parts are in a freaking fixture like this?  I didn't even take it completely apart.  The insert where the bulbs go I left assembled, and just taped over the wiring and the bulb holders, because I didn't feel like undoing all that wiring.

Today's spray paint of choice is Rustoleum's  hammered metal finish, in black.  I've used the silver on some of my doorknobs, and to be honest, I haven't been impressed - but the black came out beautifully!

new chain.  hell if I was going to try to spray paint a chain

This took me an evening - far less drying time than I'd expected, actually.  After that, all I had to do was put it up the next day:

Isn't that awesome?  I've always wanted a pendant like this on my front porch.  Heart!  Also, I'm hoping that since it's open on the bottom, it won't get full of bugs like the little box thing that was there before.

Pretty shadows, too. 

So what about the little box light that was there before?  I'm glad you asked.  That question boggled me for exactly two hours before it spawned like eighty five new projects.  I'll be getting to that.  Between the fans in the bedroom and kitchen, the garage light, this porch light, the things it inspired, and that blue ginger jar lamp from the thrifty store, it looks like this is officially The Summer of Lights.

More soon.


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While We're On the Subject Of Lighting...

...which won't last forever, I promise...

Let's talk about the new ginger jar lamp from the thrift store.  

The blue one is the new one.  The pink one is the one I talked about back in March when I stripped the paint out of the inside and painted it white.  It currently resides on my living room sofa table: 

Sweet Pea acting innocent after bumping the shade askew

They're the exact same lamp.  Literally the same lamp, same maker, just in two different colors.  I put the blue one on my bedside table for the time being; and I've been wondering what color to paint it (that blue is pretty, but, nuh-uh).   Then it dawned on me that I have a pair of matching lamps.  

Now I'm wondering: 

• Do I strip both and finish them to match, and use them in the living room as actual, proper, matched set? 
• If I do, what color do I paint them? What shades? 
• Since I'm going to be moving the sofa table to another room soon, if I make them a matched pair, then where will I put them? 
• Or should I leave the blue one in the bedroom and refinish it to go with that room?  (No, because it's too tall to reach the switch when I'm lying down)

Meanwhile, I've been testing out different colors on the inside of some scrap glass jars (jelly, mayo, etc.), and different finishes.  Lately I've been playing with a mercury glass effect with silver spray paint and water/vinegar.  

Pottery Barn

So there's this idea.

Lowe's

 ....Mercury glass with a fun blue shade?  Maybe a burlap, like in the top picture, but a teal burlap? 

Lowe's

Or teal lamps (I actually have spray paint this color), either with white shades (paper, linen?) or with the cute embroidered  Ikea shades like I have on the white ginger jar lamp right now?











Hm.


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Still In Lighting Mode

Not that this is a great photograph or anything, but here's that fluorescent fixture that used to be in the kitchen, now in the garage:

Seriously NOT a great photo.  But there it is, all huge and extremely bright.  I can see what I'm working on now!!!  And it's all the more apparent that no, I never finished priming the garage, because I ran out of primer, hehe (I have a ton now, though, so it's back on my list).



In Other Lighting News...

Guess what I found at the thrift store yesterday?

On the left is another ginger jar lamp, just like the pink one I picked up (also at a thrift store) a while back.  This one's blue, and, lacking any better ideas, I'm leaving it as is for a while.  I'll update when I get a shade situation worked out. :)

On the right is a lovely and brand-new silver/nickel finish pendant fixture that I picked up for NINE DOLLARS.  I am not even kidding.  As much as I actually love the silver, I plan to disassemble this, paint it black, and hang it on my front porch.  More on that as I work on it.  :D

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This Is a DUMB Chair.

I didn't even think this fabric pattern, and those like it, was cool when it was new and supposedly "hip" and "contemporary."  Gag-nacious.

The cats started fighting over it the second it was in the house. 

But, it was free!  Tomorrow's bulk pickup in my neighborhood, and I scored this hideous thing a few blocks over.  The fabric is narsty-looking, but it's clean, and comfortable, and in great shape, aside from a bit of cat damage on the front corners.

And it's a fabulous shape.  That's why I grabbed it.  It's just a little club chair, and while I haven't yet decided if it'll remain in the bedroom, where I stashed it for now, or if it'll eventually live in the living room, but one thing's for sure:  this is SO getting reupholstered. As soon as possible.

Yay!

This is what I see when I look at this chair:

overstock.com

Or something more like this:

countryliving.com 

To be continued...

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For Butts and Feet

So, this happened:

Rabi approves. 

That would be a $24.99 dark olive green chenille big-butt wing chair from the thrift store!  I went for jeans, and I came out with a wing chair (and a ceiling fan, but we'll talk about that another day).  

Getting this chair into the room (thank goodness it's very lightweight) finally got me off my butt and got me moving rugs.  I have an old, faded green, cotton "chindi" style rug that I've actually been using for camping (lol) that I went ahead and put back in this room.  Because of the chair, yes, and also because I wanted the red rug in my bedroom: 

I also put the "day sofa" thing in the bedroom, to make room for the wing chair in the living room:

And so now my bedroom actually looks more or less the way I want it to, at least floorplan wise:

It should be staying this way until moving day;  except that I do have some decisions to make regarding art in the room (especially since I broke the glass on one of my favorite big frames yesterday), and a new dog crate to set up.  

But for now...

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I DIDN'T DIE, I SWEAR.

In fact, after a necessary break from house-y stuff during which I sewed my ass off for the SCA, I've gotten back to work around the house.  (Finally).

Thing #1

I picked up this mirror from Goodwill last week for $5.99.   It's meh.  Nice wood, not crazy about the color, or the style, to be honest.  But it was six bucks, and the right size.

zzzzzzz...

But with a couple of coats of plain ol' black paint:

hey, look:  potential!

You guys remember the long entry hall, right?

long hallway is long. 

coat rack from salvaged headboard

 





















I flipped all this business to the opposite side of the hall (the coat rack was already on that side, actually), and hung the new oval mirror next to the "Moroccan" one that was already over this "landing strip" shelving unit.

YAY.  I like this so much better.  It feels more balanced, and everything is all on one wall together.  I can now use the outlet that was hidden behind the shelf before.  And, best of all, the two mirrors catch light from the dining room and bounce it down the hallway, so it's not so cave-like with the door closed.

granted, I'm shooting against the light here,
but this is about how dark it normally is. 

Yay!

The only thing I didn't move was the picture frame that was up there. I'm not sure what to do with it just yet, but I'll let you know.  Meanwhile, check out the awesome light patterns the two mirrors throw onto the opposite wall!

That. Is freaking cool.  I think this wall needs some art - something big, not this little Buddha painting all by itself.  I'll have to come up with something that will be enhanced by the nifty mirror reflections.


Thing #2 tomorrow...



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