Thursday, March 27, 2008

For the Love of a Project Finished!

After a loooong drive this past weekend from Austin up to Ohio, we are "settled in" for at least a few weeks at my growing up "home" with my parents & brother. The last month was crazy as usual (I wish that I could post *just* once without the past few weeks having held such craziness!) with 3 weddings, one that called for a weekend road trip to Oklahoma, and numerous projects and chores around the house as we continue the process of trying to get "settled in" to our new-ish-now home. The process feels like it's been dragged out forever because we only stop in for a few weeks at any given time before we are packing our suitcases, cleaning out the refrigerator and heading out for another trip!

I don't know about you, but one thing I love is the feeling of accomplishment when I am able to see a project (especially a creative one!) through to completion! I was able to finish a couple of creative projects during this little stint in our house, which helped us to make some significant progress in getting things that still needed a place unpacked and organized.

Another thing that I love is taking an old piece of furniture and giving it new life. I also enjoy the thriftiness of finding a piece for a good deal with good bones that just needs a little face lift. I thought I'd share one of my furniture projects as an update of some of what we've been up to in the weeks since my last post. I have another fun project that I'll save to share on another day while we are away. This piece is at least 40-50 years old, as it belonged to the owner's grandmother before she gave it to him when he went away to college.

Here are some pictures of my Craigslist find before:

And after, in it's new home in our master bathroom:

We had a large empty nook in our master bath that needed a piece of furniture to hide away linens and towels. This armoire was a perfect fit!

I wanted it to have a rough, antiqued look, so I used a whitewash technique rather than painting it with a solid coat of paint, and sanded some of the paint from the edges to give it a more aged look. We also picked out some new hardware to replace the missing and outdated original hardware.

Now, if I can just wrap up a few more projects around the house once we arrive back in Austin, our house will begin to feel even more like home!

Hope you have a wonderful weekend!!!