Turquoise LOVE Marquee

This is nothing new to the blog world, but I LOVE it! Last year I had my eye on a JOY marquee at Target, but it was always sold out, even online. Seriously, they were eternally out of joy. As of right now, they are on sale for $16.00 according to their website (if you can find it in a store). I bought the LOVE yesterday in-store and it was also on sale, although it was a little bit more than JOY.

 I didn't take any before pictures because I wasn't planning on blogging about it, but I just love how it turned out! All I did was twist off the bulb fronts, and pull out the bulb and wire from the back. The metal comes with a faux wood grain, but it looks a little too faux in my opinion. I knew I wanted to mount it on wood, and I didn't want a wood-on-wood look. I debated between red or turquoise spray paint, but this was the first one I found in my stash, so turquoise won out! ;)

 Note to self, don't spray paint on a patio full of debris...in the wind. Booooo. A gust blew a bunch of crap all over my wet paint and I had to wait for it to dry, flake off the junk, then repaint and immediately take them inside to dry safely. Then it was just a matter of screwing the bulbs back in and nailing it to the wood. Luckily I found the perfect piece in one of the junk piles around the ranch.

The plug begins at the top of the L, so I had to run a small extension cord behind it. Target also has other words, a heart, and a star. I wanted a word that I could leave up all year long. If you want one, you should nab it now though, because these are only around during Christmas.

Antique Hutch Re-do

Yesterday I worked ALL day on fixing up my new hutch/cabinet thingy, whatever you wanna call it! Here is a quick side by side before and after! Click here for the before post.Crazy! What a difference a day can make! The picture below is a shot of the inside of the top section, after I painted the interior walls. I decided to use the roll of beadboard wallpaper that I already had to line the shelves.

Super easy fix! Just measure, cut, wet, and smooth it out!
The below picture is the interior of the bottom section. I love that there is a top shelf. I have SO much kitchen crap, you don't even know!

Here is what it looks like after I started filling it and decorating the top. I took a drawer from my top shelf decorating (and it looks fine without it). I just love the look of the natural wood with some areas of white washing, and the beautiful drawer pull I added. Mixing old with pretty just totally does it for me! I flipped it over, so that the stuff on top wouldn't lose a few inches of visibility by being IN the drawer. There was a wooden track on the bottom of the drawer, keeping the stuff from sitting flat, but that was nothing a hammer couldn't remove. ;)
Here is a close up of the inside of one of the doors. It's the easiest way to see that the paint is not solid. The lighting in my dining room make it hard to see in pictures. In case you're wondering, it's called Kiwi Kissed by Olympic, from Lowe's. It looks totally different on the swatch, than on the furniture, if you ask me, but it was the perfect match.
Ok, before and afters...


This is the closure for the top half.


As for the drawers, they were really ugly inside, so I wiped them down and also lined them with the beadboard wallpaper.
One last shot, you can see the tops of chairs because I'm standing on the opposite side of the dining room table. I'd take a room shot, but my table is quite the mess from all of yesterday's work and I haven't taken care of cleaning it off yet. ;)
It is my favorite piece in my house now! It cost $90 (it IS from an antique dealer after all), and less than $3 for the paint sample size (since I only lightly dry brushed over it). I already had the drawer pulls from Restore, and the knobs were probably less than a buck. I also already had the wallpaper and white paint for the interior of the bottom section.

Linking up to Beneath My Heart's "Best DIY projects of January

Aqua Chair

I bought a couple of chairs at an estate sale on Saturday. The one in the background of my messy garage pic was $5, and the one I'm painting aqua was $10. I have plans that I hope to have completed within the next two weeks. I'd like take out the big fancy table and chairs that I've never really liked. It's pretty but there is detailed carving along the edges and with kids all the syrup drips and crumbs get stuck in there and it's REALLY hard to clean. It's also too fancy for the decor I'm going for. SO, I have plans to build my own farmhouse table using Ana White's plans and paint mis-matched chairs. I have four so far and I'm aiming for six. I'm sure they'll be easy to find at Rescued Treasures. I used my free quart of Glidden paint that I got when they had their giveaway online. I ordered it in "deepest aqua". I gave it two thick coats of paint and then sanded it to distress it.

I am still undecided as to if I'll do all different colored chairs or stick with one color and white. I've seen some cute ones with different colors. Check out all of these pictures from Pinterest and see what you think....

(Photo: hgtv.com)(Photo: justinetaylor.tmblr.com)(Photo: Absolutelybeautifulthings.blogspot.com)(Photo: Remodelista.com)This last pic is the farmhouse table I want to build. I don't want the bench though, just all chairs.