My last thrifty Thursday for May

Hello people, I hope I didn't scare anyone off with my venting in my last post. I try not to treat this blog like my own personal journal. But sometimes I just have to vent somewhere other than talking to the dog.

Here are my projects and thrifty finds for this week,

Remember the laundry bin that I picked up for $5.00 at a yard sale

Here it is with a coat of paint, the colour is called Pistachio, don't you just love it

Although I love the pistachio colour I decided to ad some dark wax (my own creation of dark wax) just to tone it a down a bit.  Now I have a new bin to store Maggies dog food instead of a big honking bag of dry dog food in the kitchen

I picked this stool up for $5.00, not sure what I am going to paint it yet but it will definetly get a makeover. I couldn't leave it behind, not for 5 bucks

Not sure what this is supposed to be it looks like an old child desk, the pic below shows that it opens up, thats why I was thinking it is a desk

I could not resist this little table, I paid $3.00 for it and will most likely paint it, it might be a good lap top table. If anyone knows what it is or what it was used for please let me know.

I know you are probably looking at this thing and trying to figure out what it is?

I plan on using this to make a home made chandelier, I want a unique one that I can hang in a barn or garage

Now I just have to find the other parts, may take me a while, but I will post the results when it is done or give you updates along the way. I can't wait to get started on this thing

I also finished the chalkboard for the couple that are going to get married in August

They are going to borrow a few more items from me for their special day

This is the mirror that they picked for their menu board. They want it to sort of match the other chalkboards that they bought

These are the chalkboards they bought and they asked me to paint the trim of the mirror white like these chalkboards

And here it is finished, it was not an easy job, I had a few problems with the chalkboard paint not  going on smooth, and I had to strip it all off at one point and do it all over again. That was not fun....but I left it for a few days and went back at it and now it is done

I hope they like it

And how was your week? what thrifty finds did you find this week? Would love to hear from my followers about what great deals they have found.

hope your having a great week

hugs

 

What do I do all day ?

Where did May go, did you have a list of things you wanted to do in the month of May. Well I certainly did and unfortunately I did not get to check all of them off my list. It seems like I never stop during the day but I just can't get caught up. I swear I work harder now that I am not working at a job then I did when I had a job.

I have actually had people say to me, aren't you bored what do you do all day lol. Well there are my soap operas and then laying on the couch eating bon bons........ seriously people.

Here is an account of my day, I get up at 4:30 am make hubby his breakfast and his lunch and drag him out of bed and send him off to work. Then I feed the dog, and take her out for her morning ritual. While I am out there I fill the 3 bird feeders and put clean water in the bird bath and feed the ducks, put out the trash and the recycling. Then back in the house for laundry, dishes and house work, have a shower get dressed and then back out with the dog.

Bye dear, be safe and have a good day at work

this pic was taken in March, see the leaves on the grass, I raked leaves and cleaned up the yard for a good month

 this is my driveway now

This is Maggie who acts more like a toddler than a dog, Maggie wants to be entertained constantly and she thinks I should be that entertainment and play with her, she is a demanding little thing (our fault, we have spoiled her since she was a pup and we still do )

After all of that I head out to the garage and work on stuff for a few hours, then while Maggie naps I run errands, do groceries etc, then back home to entertain the dog.
It is in the afternoon while Maggie naps that I try to hit a few thrift stores and on weekends I try to hit some yard sales.
We live on 3/4 of an acre of property and that takes some maintenance, watering and grass cutting. I weed the garden every couple of days and clean patio furniture, because we have a million birds that fly in and out of the yard....and I clean up after the ducks and the geese, I think you get the picture.

My workshop/ garage

(see the pic of this hutch all finished at the end of this post )

A few of my feathered friends, I have named these two geese Fred and Ethel they are here everyday and stay all winter

And this is Ricky and Lucy who are not supposed to be in the garden, this is their way of saying there is no feed left by the bird feeder

part of the property, the pool is not operational, landlord says it needs to much work

side yard and garden

Driveway and house

If I have time I try to squeeze in some more work in the garage before I have to get supper ready. At night after supper when the dog is resting and hubby is vegging on the couch I try to get some computer time or work on projects I can do in the house. I also have ads on kijiji all the time selling stuff, so I have people coming here to view items and pick them up.That usually happens in the evening because people want to come after they get off work, but sometimes they want to come during the day.

My husband works 12 to 13 hours a day for a month straight without a day off. Its a hard way to earn a living so I do everything around the house . When he gets home he eats and then he is asleep, poor boy is so burnt out. When he gets his two week off he tries to make up for it by doing some of the stuff I can't do around the house. Yes there are some things I can't do, but not much lol

As I write this I am watering the lawns and rotating the sprinklers every 15 minutes, takes me about 2 hours to cut the grass and about 3 hours to water it all.

Yep I am bored all right...............


While I am venting lol Does this ever happen to you and how do you handle it?

I have a beautiful hutch for sale right now on kijiji, I have to sell it because it is one piece and too big to haul back to Ontario. I bought it last year and painted it inside and out and added new hardware. I am asking $200.00 for it, which I believe is a steal because it is gorgeous and offers so much storage.
Well last night a girl emailed me and asked if I would take a $100.00 for it and could I deliver it?
Its a good thing she asked me in an email and not in person lol. I emailed her back and said NO to both.
I guess she had to try, but it really bugged me, still does. I am hoping she does not email me back because I don't want her to have the hutch now. I know its silly, but I put alot of sweat and work in the hutch. And I also buy alot of stuff on kijiji and I would never ask someone to deliver something and also insult them by trying to get it for a ridiculous price .
I bet she thinks I watch soap operas all day too lol

This is the hutch she called about that I am selling for $200.00

I painted the hutch with black milk paint that I could not find in BC and had to order from Ontario

I added the vintage hardware, the hutch has tons of storage and a plate rale on all shelfs

ok thanks for letting me vent , now I really have to get back to my couch and my soap operas, where did I put that box of chocolates



hugs



I wonder if this is how Annie Sloan got started?

Most of you will remember that I can not find chalk paint in this area so I made my own and it worked really well. I have also seen quite a few projects done online with Annie Sloan's dark wax. Well Annie Sloan products are not available in this area. You can order them from a town about 4 hours from here, but the price for the paint is about $40.00 a litre and then another $40.00 for shipping costs. I know the paint and the wax will last for a quite a few projects but I am just to cheap to pay all of that. So I figured if I can make chalk paint, how hard would it be to make dark wax.
I have paste wax, that was about $9.00 for one tin, I added some black craft paint and some glaze that my daughter had sent me. I mixed it up in a small container and it sure looked like black wax to me. I tried it on a piece of wood and let it dry, it tinted the wood the way I wanted it too.
So now came the big test, I tried it on a chair I had just painted and it gave it the look I wanted. Once it was dry I went over the whole piece with clear wax to seal the chair which was painted with my home made chalkpaint.

This is what the chair looked like when I bought it, I am not into the green but I liked the style of the chair. The fabric is pretty but not what I wanted for my diningroom.

Here is the chair with a coat of primer and two coats of my chalkpaint

I don't know if you can see the dark wax effect in this picture, but it did bring out the detail in the curves of the legs and the detail in the back of the chair. I didn't want alot just enough to tone down the white paint and age the chair a bit.

I am quite happy with the results, not bad for home made dark wax if I do say so myself. Maybe I should start a line of my own paint and waxes lol

Annie Sloan seems to have the market on chalk paint and waxes, maybe she needs some competition lol

Here is  the chair finished except for a little bit of sanding to distress it and the fabric, I laid a piece of fabric over the seat for the picture. I want something similar to it, I want a vintage looking material with faded roses. I am still hunting for the fabric and will post a pic when the seat is recovered.

One chair done 3 more to go

I saw this fabric online and thought that might work for the chairs

And I saw this fabric too, I think you get the look I am going for, now I just need to find the fabric around here

These chairs will be painted in white and have the same fabric

I know they don't match I don't want them too, just in paint colour and seat fabric.

Remember this little stool that I got for $2.50

Here it is all pretty, I painted it with my homemade chalkpaint and sealed it with clear wax.

Yes that is the material that was on the green chair in the first picture, I don't like to waste anything (whole point of upcycling don't you think ) and it is a pretty fabric. The fabric was not something I wanted in the diningroom but I think it will look cute in my bedroom with the vanity. So I removed it from the chair cushion and had enough to recover the seat of the vanity stool. The top of the stool lifts off and there is a little compartment underneath.

And here is the stool with my vanity, the vanity is in my sunroom. Our bedroom here is too small for the vanity , but I am taking it back to Ontario and I hope our bedroom there is bigger than a postage stamp. I think the stool looks so cute with the vanity.

The garage is still full of projects that need to be worked on but at least these two are done now

Time to do my non rain dance so I have nice weather to work on stuff outside for the next couple of days

Hope everyone has a great weekend, if your bored you can come paint with me lol

or better yet come entertain my demanding little bulldog so I can get some work done

hugs

 

Thrifty Thursdays

Welcome to Thrifty Thursdays

This week I am going to combine my thrifty finds with some makeovers and projects that are in the works and a few that are completed. I have spent so much time on the garden and the yard work that my projects have been piling up. Hubby has also been off the last two weeks and we have been out on the bike alot.  All of this means that the garage is over flowing with unfinished projects, it is getting hard to close the door lol

So in this next month I plan on dusting the cobwebs off a few old projects and working hard on some new ones

I keep seeing these chairs in magazines and on other blogs and I think they are so cute, so of course I want one in my yard too

I copied these two pictures off the web sometime ago and have no idea where I got them, so I am sorry I can not link to the creative person who made these

I picked this chair up at the Salvation Army for $7.00, the lady there said "how many chairs do you have in your house now? lol " When I told her this was not going into the house that it was going to be a flower planter, she looked at me almost the same way my husband did when I told him what the chair was for

I know it is a cute chair, but I have lots of cute chairs, I had to paint this one when hubby was at work, poor boy almost cries when he sees me paint wood, I used to be the same way, there are some pieces I will never paint but this one is getting a paint job

Here she is , isn't she cute, I stuck those flowers in there for now, I will have to get a container and some flowers that look as pretty as the chair does.

I have a milkcan and a birdhouse in that flower bed that have robins egg blue on them, so I decided to paint this blue as well.

I wanted to tone the paint down a bit so the chair would look weathered and like it had been outside for years. So I mixed the blue with a bit of white chalk paint and added a bit of black chalkboard paint.

Once it was dry I sanded it in wear spots and sprayed it with a lacquer.

The blue paint and the black chalkboard paint, where spray paint, I like to use what I have so I just sprayed them into a margarine container and added the white paint, worked great

See the little chicken in the right corner, I sprayed it blue after this picture too hehe

My hubby shook his head when he saw the chair, and then asked me what happened to the chicken lol

He said, where have you ever seen a blue chicken?

I said, right there in the flower bed silly

Men, they have no imagination

I will call it our little blue bird of happiness

I know this flowerbed is getting a little crowded, but the landlord is anal about his yard so this is the only place I can put them. I can't wait to move back to Ontario and have our own place, so I can go wild and do anything I want.

poor hubby

OTHER PROJECTS I AM WORKING ON THIS WEEK

I know this is cute but the colour is not what I want in my diningroom so this chair is getting a new look, I am on the hunt for just the right fabric for the seat, I have 3 of other chairs to make over as well. The other 3 chairs don't match this one in style but I think they will look great once they are all done.

This stool will look great with a vanity that I have after its makeover, I got this for $2.50 at the Salvation army, do you believe that, can you say  SCORE !!

This I picked up at a yard sale for $5.00

Could be a hamper or a garbage can, but I want to use this to store dog food, now what colour am I going to paint this? 

Hope to have these projects finished for you to see by the weekend, as long as the nice weather stays,

I have no room to work in the garage and I have to paint outside, so I am hoping the rain holds off 

Hope your having a great week

hugs

Freaktastic Furniture

Two posts in one day, you lucky lucky followers lol

I wanted to enter the freaktastic furniture challenge on vintagerevivals.blogspot.com , so I decided to designate this post to the challenge.

I bought a baby dresser online really cheap and had plans on repainting it and selling it. That was before I saw it. When I got to the womans house to pick up the dresser, I couldn't help but notice something a little strange about the dresser. From the front it looked like a normal small dresser, but when I looked at the back, the design and the wood told me that this dresser was old. Because the drawers were peeling the lady gave it me even cheaper, I guess my poker face did not show her how excited I was looking at the dresser. Even when I got it home, my hubby looked at it and said its a piece of crap, why did you buy that?

This is the back of the dresser untouched, to the seller this was a flaw, to me it was a lightbulb going off in my head saying I am a treasure waiting to be discovered, I have history and charm take me home

This piece of plywood was nailed over top of the dresser, it was yellow, not one to waste anything you can see I have used it as a base for a spray painting job, I did not take good before pics of the dresser, I am trying to get better at taking before pics.

These pieces of pressboard were nailed and glued over each one of the drawers, lots of nails and glue
ggggrrrrrrrrrrrrr

this is the dresser after I removed everything, it is an ugly yellow colour with lots of nails holes, definetly needs some lovin

This is the dresser refinished, all nail holes patched, glue scrapped off and painted and waxed, do you see the gorgeous design on the drawers that was covered with the pressboard. I decided to go with the wear and tear it already had and distress it, after all it has gone through an ordeal and I thought that should show.

The dresser had the original wood knobs on it, I thought they should stay

I painted it with an antique white and kept the original nicks and scrapes and wear and added a bit of my own distressing.

I have this dresser in my livingroom and it is one of my favorite pieces, I can not believe someone would have covered up this gorgeous old dresser and I am so glad I found it and revealed its hidden  beauty.

My hubby could not believe that this was the same ugly dresser that I brought home for 10 bucks

happy picking, look beyond the ugly for the treasure beneath

hugs

Tobey