Saturday, July 6, 2013

Reading to Olivia


My sister-in-law and her husband are getting ready to move into a new house, and in the process they are getting rid of some of their furniture.  She made me a great deal - she gave me a really big old dresser in exchange for painting this bookcase for her granddaughter Olivia, and refinishing another bookcase for herself.  She wanted a gloss white for the main part and then do whatever else I wanted to it. 

Here is how it started.









Not too great, kind of old fashioned country.  Yech! It was supposed to have these buttons covers over the screws, but half of them were missing, and the handles did not look little girlish.


















So off to the button store (OK Home Depot).  Of course the buttons I got didn't match exactly to the few that were still on it, so I popped out the remaining ones, sanded everything down, and put the new ones in.  Some fit better than others so I ended up gluing in all 16 buttons.  My husband helped me pop off the back so I could paint it with some spring lilac paint that I had left from a little rocker I did earlier this year.  Then the easy part, or so I thought.  I wanted to use spray paint on this to give it a nice smooth gloss finish and figured I could knock it out in a day.  WRONG!  Like I said, I sanded it, then I primed it, then I put on the 1st coat of paint.  It started to alligator, or crackle on the bottom skirt, so I stopped, let it dry, and sanded it off.  I thought it might have been too cold or too humid to spray paint, but now I just think there was something wonky with the original finish.  Oh well, after three coats of paint it turned out pretty good. My husband suggested to highlight the details on the door with the same lilac paint as the back.  Wasn't that a great idea?   I had planned on getting some pink glass knobs for the doors, but I forgot to plug the holes before I painted.  I knew the old brass handles weren't going to cut it so I sprayed them silver. 

Now for the candle on the cake, so to speak.  My husband found this little plaque inside a vanity I did a few months back.  I thought it would be nice to have Olivia's name engraved on it and put it on the top border.  Now this should have been a pretty easy thing right?  Five trips to town later (remember I live in the sticks) and it was finally done.

 So here she is all done.  I think she is adorable, what do you think?  My husband thinks it looks like one of the characters in Beauty & the Beast, I kind of agree.

Linking up to:



No comments:

Post a Comment