Drawers & Bedside Table - Makeover Time!!

If you visit my house at the moment make sure you don't stand still too long as I am liable to give you a coat of paint!! 


On Saturday I gave a chest of drawers and a bedside table a little makeover.


This was the chest of drawers before:

It was a cast off from my sister and I had painted it cream. This time I mixed my own colour using 2 x parts Annie Sloan Old White; 1/2 part AS Duck Egg and 3/4 part AS Provence. I love. love, love how it has turned out:

Please excuse the ratty carpet, we're hopefully having white boards next month....

I really love this paint, so much so I feel bad about telling you all I was a bit disappointed after painting the little shelves!! It's lovely to work with, goes on in one coat and distresses like a dream with the help of a foam sanding pad.

I redid the knobs by decoupaging them with Cath Kidston flowers. I had done them before when the drawers were cream but the cat (yep, the cat!!) had chewed the decoupaging off!!

The bedside table I am not loving quite so much, I should have painted it white first I think so when I sanded it back some of that showed as well as the pine:

I have a computer hideaway cupboard to paint today. Much of our furniture is painted so I am busy re-doing it all in Annie Sloan!!

In other news, W called this morning to say the campsite they are at is fabulous and he is having a good time - I thought he sounded a tad subdued but maybe that's just me being a neurotic Mummy?

Do you know I told my Mum I was expecting for the first time and she said "You'll never have peace of mind again" and blimey, she was right - I have worried about these boys since the second I found out I was expecting them!! 

Hope you've all had good weekends....

hugs,

S x

Tea Trolley Ta Dah!!

Hello all!!


I have spray painted the tea trolley that I got last week - it was a nightmare job, the spray paint was HOPELESS, and refused to spray for more than 20 seconds at a time and I had to keep taking the nozzle on and off until I was cursing it!!


I've also used some wallpaper samples leftover from the patchwork wall and Mod Podged them onto the trays - I'm not entirely happy with it as it has wrinkled a bit in places so I'll look out for some oil cloth I think to replace it in due course:

Apologies for pic quality, light is not good in our lounge

I've also been doing lots of painting with my Annie Sloan paint, I bought another shade on Friday - Provence and will reveal all tomorrow!!


In other news our youngest W (on the right, H is on the left):

....has gone on his holidays today with his friend R - he only left a couple of hours ago and I miss him already!! 


We really agonised over whether to let him go (they have gone camping in Dorset with R's whole family) because I knew I would worry the whole time he is away; will he be OK? Will he talk to strangers? Will he get swept away to sea?(!!) Will the parents drive carefully?


In the end I decided that I mustn't let my anxieties hold my boys back but I don't think I'll settle until he his back home in a whole weeks time!!


Things are not helped by the fact I got lost on a school camping holiday when I was his age (11yrs), my friend and I got separated from the group and we were lost all afternoon - I've since discovered that the beach we were lost on for much of it trying to find a way back was the one in Norfolk that is notorious for people being washed away!!


I must confess, I am struggling with the whole boys-growing-up thing, they seem to change before our very eyes now and I so miss them being tiny - I am feeling super broody much to Mr G's disgust!!


Anyway, enough "whittling" (as my Mum would say!!) for now!!


Hope you're all having a lovely weekend....


hugs,


S x

I'm Convinced!!

You may remember my post last week when I told you I was a wee bit disappointed with the Annie Sloan chalk paint after using it for the first time to paint the dinky shelves my Stepdad made me?


I did say that I would reserve judgement until after I had painted a larger piece - yesterday I tackled our sideboard and I can now tell you I am a fully fledged member of the Annie Sloan Appreciation Society - I love it!!


I think the fact I wasn't blown away by it after painting the shelves was partly due to not having the right tools - I have since got some better brushes and sanding blocks - and also the shelves are a made a little rustically and so were perhaps not a good piece to form an opinion on.


The sideboard was originally (several years ago) from a charity shop for £10. All the veneer was peeling off the top so I removed it and painted it with regular emulsion.


Before:

After:

I painted it with Duck Egg, did the top in Old White and then dry brushed some Old White on before waxing with clear wax and then distressing using foam sanding blocks - these were much, much better than the sandpaper I had previously and the distressing was much easier.

I love the colour but it's not exactly what I would call "duck egg" - not enough blue

One of my concerns over the AS paint was the price (currently around £16.95 for 1L) but when you consider I painted the above with one coat, whereas normal emulsion would probably have needed three then I think it doesn't actually work out as expensive as it may seem.

The chalk paint dries so quickly that the whole thing was done and dusted in around 3 hours too.

So, after initially feeling a tad disappointed I would now wholeheartedly recommend this paint and I shall be buying more colours for sure!!

hugs,

S x

Linking up with: The Shabby Nest

Fabulous Freegle!!

Hello, my lovelies!! Did you all have a lovely weekend? 

We had our best man & usher and their wives over for dinner on Saturday, we take it in turns every 2-3 months and we did a Mexican themed meal - nachos; quesadillas; fajitas and margaritas!! Yum!!

Yesterday my sciatica was settled enough for me to re-upholster the top of my vintage dressing table with the new fabric and make the skirts. I calculated how much fabric I needed three times and still have ended up with almost half left!! How on earth did that happen? Maybe me failing maths 3 times has something to do with it - I knew I should have got my Sis to check it.

Hope to have the reveal for you soon, just trying to source a braid to trim it that I like.

I've had a couple of fab things from Freegle lately, I have been hankering after a vintage tea trolley ever since I saw one of the lovely bloggers I follow re-do one beautifully (my memory is rubbish and I can't remember who it was so do shout if it was you) and was kicking myself for not buying one I saw in Barnado's for £12.50 because the starting prices for the ones on eBay were in the region of £40!!

Imagine my delight when I saw one listed on Freegle, I emailed the owner and she picked me to have it - yay!!:

Mr G thinks I have taken leave of my senses and has banned it from the position above (under the lounge window) but so far I haven't moved it so am hoping he'll get used to it. 

The plan is to spray paint it cream and decoupage the trays in something floral before artfully arranging some knick knacks on it. Mr G doesn't see the point. I told him not everything has to have a point. So there.

I also got these today off Freegle:

I wanted to dry some hydrangea flowers but our plants are teeny and only have two flowers - so I put a wanted ad on Freegle and a lovely lady offered me some of hers. Aren't they beautiful? You can find out how to dry hydrangeas here. 

Finally, I got my swap parcel from the magic ball swap that was kindly arranged by Hookin' with Laalaa - I was partnered with Pink Poppy and she sent me some lovely things. 

A magic ball is a ball of yarn that has treats and gifts wrapped up in it - the idea being as you knit/crochet the little gifts fall out along the way:

However, I was rather naughty as I couldn't wait so I unravelled my yarn in excitement!! Look at my fab haul!!:

Thanks so much Pink Poppy!! I love all of it!!

Anyway, I must be off as I am going to paint the sideboard with my fancy Annie Sloan paint, I shall report back henceforth....

hugs,

S x

ETA: It was over at Teawagon Tales I saw the beautiful madeover tea trolley!! Thanks G4C for reminding me!!

On This Day 23 Years Ago Our Story Began....

On the 5th August 1988 Mr G and I met for the first time - this picture above was taken on my 16th birthday 7 weeks later. Sigh, look how thin I was!! And how Mr G looked as though he belonged in a boy band!!

How times change:

Mr G and I got together using the time honoured method of "My friend fancies you" - my best friend Dawn and I used to frequent the local fairground (we lived in a seaside town that had a fair from Easter-Sept). 

Dawn and I would spend a lot of the time flirting with the boys and either getting them to take us on the beach road on their 50cc motorbikes or actually riding their bikes on our own.

It was while I was driving another boys bike that I caught sight of a motorcyclist coming along my side. He was wearing an open trials helmet and had the biggest, bluest, most beautiful eyes I have ever seen!! I thought "Oooh, I wonder if the rest of him is as gorgeous as those eyes".

It was. Swoon.

I sent Dawn (she knew him) to tell him I liked him and he took me along the beach on his bike, dropped me back at the fair and then left. 

He has since told me he was shy and terrified because I was gorgeous and a maneater (an unfounded accusation!!)!!

He had a summer job at the fair and Dawn and I went to see him the next day and arranged for him to come to my house whilst my parents were out with a bottle of cider!!

By the 10th August we were "going steady" (Dawn arranged that too!!) and the rest, as they say, is history....

Hugs

S x - who still fancies Mr G as much today as I did when I first set eyes on him....

I've Joined The Annie Sloan Club - But I Hardly Dare Admit Something....

....*whispers* I'm yet to be convinced :-0

I hardly dare admit that as I am yet to find anyone in blogland that doesn't just love this paint. In fact it was the rave reviews of everyone that urged me to take the plunge and order some.

I have just painted one small item so far, so I am going to reserve complete judgement but so far I am a wee bit disappointed - Mr G says I fell for all the hype and it was bigged up to such an extent it never stood a chance!!

I ordered Old White, Duck Egg and a tin of clear wax. My Stepdad made me some rustic looking shelves to hold my trinkets in the bathroom and so I set about painting them.

First of all upon opening the duck egg blue I was surprised as it was very green, hardly a hint of blue at all and not like the duck egg our kitchen & conservatory are painted.

I had read reports that the paint was thick but I found it to be a nice consistency, highly pigmented and it went on really well. You can tell it's expensive paint from how it covers so nicely.

I painted the edges of the shelves with the duck egg. It dried really, really quickly to an extremely flat, velvety finish.

I then went over the whole piece in the Old White. It covered well and dried quickly.

Then came the bit I found disappointing, I had read that it was really easy to sand and distress but I must confess I found it no easier than regular emulsion - you still needed to use plenty of elbow grease and work up a sweat!! One thing I found a definite downside was the mess - as you sand it creates clouds of chalk dust which is not ideal when (due to Mr G filling the garage with his RC paraphernalia) you only have the house to paint in.

Then came the wax. Annie Sloan recommends using a wax brush, but at £29 each I settle for one rag to wipe on and one to buff - the wax did bring the finish up from a very flat one to a slight sheen but again I was just not loving it like everyone seems to. I had read reports of how smooth and professional a piece would look with wax, but again I couldn't see a whole lot of difference from regular emulsion.

Don't get me wrong, it looks nice and I am pleased with the result, but after painting lots of furniture with regular emulsion I thought the chalk paint was going to be a revelation and it's just (so far) not.

I will report back when I have painted another piece, I have a bedside table and a mirror to do as well as a couple of pieces I'd like to redo that are already painted.

Here's the finished resulted (which I love, but I think I could have achieved similar with the cheaper paint I usually use):

The new fabric for the dressing table has arrived too:

The stripes are a bit further apart than I had thought but the colour is much better, more duck egg:

I still can't do anything with it yet as although my sciatica is much improved, it still hurts a bit to sit for any length and generally aches and I am afraid of "running before I can walk" and making it worse again, despite the fact I am B-O-R-E-D-!!

hugs,

S x

PS A couple of you have asked how I did my banner, it's a bit hard to answer as I did it in Photoshop - I don't really know how to use Photoshop, I just spent time playing with the photos I liked, resizing them and then copying and pasting onto a bigger "background" then added the text and border. It's a bit like saying I know how to drive to Gatwick but I couldn't direct you if you know what I mean?

July's Mosaics....

Projects:

Not very productive this month due to my back, I have knitted a bunny too but forget to get a pic of her (she's awaiting her clothes too, so not technically finished!!)

Misc:

Must make a point of getting more pics of Mr G this month....

S x

PS *dare I say it?* sciatica seems much better today, fingers-crossed....