MY FIFTH "BUILDINGS OUT HOMES TOGETHER" FOR WEDNESDAY - JUNE 29TH

I'M PARTICIPATING IN THE WEDNESDAY "BUILDING OUR HOMES TOGETHER...WITH JESUS" OVER AT THE PRAIRIE FLOWER FARM BLOG. FEEL FREE TO PAY LINDA A VISIT.  SHE LOVE VISITORS. TELL HER I SAID HELLO :) :) :)

Hi everyone,

How are you this week? I know it's Thursday, but I still wanted to reflect Wednesday in my blog post today. No particular reason, other than to try and keep my self on task. Each new "Building Our Homes Together" series starts on Wednesday :) :) I am so LOVING this series. Every week, ladies are posting really cool things from Scripture, from their homes, DIY-projects, recipes etc :) :) It's a lot of fun.  Do you remember that curio cabinet that I wrote about awhile back. Well, it is now repainted. Here's the journey it went on or "Heather the Weather's Adventures in Painting".

IT STARTED WITH THIS SMALL WALL CURIO CABINET. I PURCHASED IT AT A YARD SALE A FEW WEEKS AGO.  THAT'S SOME OF MY CRAFT STUFF JUST STREWN EVERYWHERE. THAT'S TYPICAL TO FIND CRAFT STASHES LIKE THAT ALL OVER THE APARTMENT ;) :) 

            I saw this curio cabinet at a yard sale a few weeks ago. The lady selling it wanted $5 for it. However, I was able to talk her down to $3.50 since that was literally all I had in my wallet. Truth be told, I didn't do a lot of "talking down" in the bargain sense of the phrase.  All I said was literally "Would you take $3.50 for the cabinet. It's all I have in my wallet" It was the truth, too :) :) :) The lady said yes and home I went with a "new" treasure :) :) 
            When I first saw this, I knew it would look really cute repainted in softer colors that are romantic, shabby chic, cottage, country, Victorian, rustic etc..you get the idea... :) :) :) So that was my first step. Also since I'm working on becoming totally debt free I had to wait until more money was available to buy paint supplies.

IN THE FOREGROUND ARE THE PAINT SUPPLIES THAT I PURCHASED FOR THE PROJECT. I WENT TO MY LOCAL HOME IMPROVEMENT STORE. NOW THAT I THINK ABOUT IT, I PROBABLY GOT SUCKERED INTO BUYING SOME THINGS I DIDN'T REALLY NEED. HOWEVER, I WAS REALLY GLAD TO HAVE IT ALL.  THE SEWING BOX, THE STUFF ON THE SEWING BOX AND THE ROSE PITCHER AND BOWL WERE NOT PART OF THE PAINT SUPPLIES :) :) I ALREADY HAD THOSE ITEMS.

I had to wait until more money came in to buy paint supplies. Remember, I'm trying to redecorate and work my way out of debt all at the same time. Random, I know,  but it's a conviction and a commitment that I intend to keep. So when I got my new smartphone back in April, I filled out paperwork to get the rebate card. Once the rebate card arrived in the mail, it made my  smartphone totally FREE. The rebate card arrived earlier this month and off I went to the store.  Here's a list of what I bought:
- 400 SandWet sandpaper
- plastic dropcloth (don't want paint flying everywhere)
- roller brush/paint pan thingy
- paint brush with angle bristles
- primer (tried Zinser since it was the least expensive option)
- Behr interior semi-gloss paint in "Paris White" (more like pale pink)
- paint can opener (not necessary, but fits under the lid way better than just using a screwdriver. trust me on this one. It was absolute heaven to open)
- face masks

The  paint chip card and the paint stick were freebies. 

Originally, my plan was to go with a nice antique white paint. However, once I arrived at the store, the pale pink was calling my name. Well, not literally, but that is what I was automatically drawn towards. So I went with my gut and picked out a very pale, pale shade of pink called "Parish White". It's that very top  strip on the paint card. It's a  nice soft shade. 
            I LOVE vintage, shabby chic, cottage, romantic, Victorian, prim, country, feminine fru-fru, lots of frills and furbelows and simplicity or any combination of all of those. Does that make any sense? Oh, add farmgirl style to that too :) :) In any case, I had this vision in my head of what I wanted to do to this curio cabinet. The  cabinet was probably made in the 1970s.  Did I mention, that I have absolutely NO  EXPERIENCE with refinishing furniture of anykind? None. I just went ahead and did it anyway.

 My dad pointed out that the  door frame was seperate at the joint on the upper  left-hand corner along with a small crack in the frame in the lower right-hand corner. We used some wood glue, a clamp, and some tape. Now the tape is unconventional, but I'll get to that in a minute. It's all about using what you have to ge the job done.  
             I don't know much about "tools" as such. My dad had this clamp that can be fitted with different lengths of galvanized pipe, depending on what size clamp you need for the project.  This seems to me like it could be a real money saver, since you don't have to buy multiple clamps. Don't quote me on that, though. So we went to our local Ace Hubbard's hardware store to look for a 24-inch length of galvanized pipe.  Oh, I think the pipe diameter was about 3/4 inch? In any case, they didn't have the size we needed in the pre-cut pipes. The associate custom-cut some pipe for us. That was really cool. It only cost us $1.99 a foot and she threaded the pipe, too. That was nice :) :) 
           So we applied some wood glue in the joint at the upper left-hand corner of the frame and clamped it tight. Perfect. Only, there was that other crack in the lower right-hand corner to fix. No problem. It was a small crack.  We applied more wood glue. we tried to use a pile of really heavy books to weight it down/hold it together. Okay, we tried using my dad's John MacArthur Bible commentary and three Jon Courson commentaries. That didn't work really well, because the books just fell off. So we used package tape instead. That was totally unconventional, but PERFECT. It did the job perfectly and we didn't have to spend extra money.

MY DADDY'S HANDS HELPING TO SAND THE CURIO CABINET.  HE STARTED THE SANDING. I FINISHED IT.

I bought a 400-grit SandWet sand paper. Again, it was what the store associate recommended. I did NOT wet the sandpaper, preferring to leave it dry . Why? No reason. I just didn't want to bother with that. The sand paper was so smooth. All I needed to do was take just enough varnish off  in order for the primer and paint to stick to the surface.  This was hard to do because there were so many nooks and crannies that were hard to reach. Not to mention those spindle thingies. Those were really persnickety to sand. As my 6th grade teacher once said "American ends with "I can"...and I did get the job done :) :) Now for the fun stuff :) :)

THIS IS THE CURIO CABINET AFTER I APPLIED THE PRIMER.

I got a little happy with the primer and applied TWO coats. The transformation was so amazing that I literally forgot what I was doing for awhile. I just kept applying more and more primer. However, I'm glad that I did, because I wanted the color to go on as smoothly as possible. 

THESE ARE THE PAINT BRUSHES THAT I USED ON THIS PROJECT. THE ANGLED-BRUSH AT THE BOTTOM HERE WAS THE ONE I PURCHASED MYSELF. THE OTHER TWO WERE BORROWED. NEXT TIME, I'M BUYING SMALLER BRUSHES.

 I was able to use the larger brush to get the larger surfaces painted. I also borrowed an angled foam brush to reach into the corners. Those were really hard to reach with the bigger brush.  It took patience and some agility with my arms. However, it was worth the effort.

HERE IS MY BEAUTIFUL CURIO CABINET ALL TRANSFORMED. DOESN'T IT LOOK REALLY DIFFERENT WITH A NEW COAT OF PAINT? IT HAS NEW LIFE BREATHED INTO IT.

Depending on your tastes, one coat of final paint may be enough. I decided to use two coats of paint. Remember, how enthralled I was with the primer? It was more so with the actual paint. When I saw the color go on so smooth and shiny, I was hooked. I applied one coat of "Paris White", let it dry over night, and then applied a  second  coat. This was right after I had applied the second coat of paint. Such a beautiful pale shade of pink :) :)

HERE IS THE FINISHED CURIO CABINET IN MY ROOM. THE BLUE MASON JAR IS  A YARD SALE FIND AS IS THE MASON GLASS DRINKING JAR.

This is the finished curio cabinet. It's sitting on top of my dresser drawer. Oh, the dresser drawer is narrow with five vertical drawers. It was also a yard sale find for $5.  OK, let me get back on track here.  I don't know what I'll put on it yet. It couldn't wait until it was all decorated to show you. I had to show it off today :) :)  I'm going to be really thoughtful about what I place here. It should be useful, but also cute at the same time.  For me, the everyday stuff of life needs to have an element of beauty attached to it. So it's worth it to wait a little bit and see what strikes my fancy. Once the shelves are full, I'll do another post. Let me know what you think :) :)  I might add painted roses at a later date. For now, it's going to look like this :) :)
             There are probably some mistakes that need to be fixed. In fact, I know there are...but I'm not going to tell :) :)  They're on the other side of the cabinet...where no one can see :) :) Oh, and "What happened to the glass door" you ask? Well, when I purchased it at the yardsale it was completely detached from the hinges on the door frame. So I removed it.  I decided NOT to reattach it to the cabinet, optioning to repurpose it as a display tray for my teacups, instead. See the photo below:

            This what I ended up doing to the door from the curio cabinet. I temporarily used it as a display tray for some teacups. Yes, also yardsale finds along with the doilies they're sitting on. I loved i t so much, I decided to leave it that way. Now I am tempted to repaint the frame. Although, it does have some vintage charm the way it is, too.

            I got a little behind in my daily Bible readings. So I've been spending some of today getting caught up on that. If you are looking for a  neat on-line Bible to read OR you want a cool  Bible app for your smart phone, I highly recommend the app from Lifechurch.tv.  You can click here to visit the site.  They have all versions of the Bible in English, plus multiple other languages. It's a handy tool if you want to read the Bible on-line or on your cell-phone. I'm currently reading through the Bible in a whole year.   It really helps keep me focused.  I'm also much less grouchy when I spend regular time reading.  What's really cool about doing my devotions online is that after each day's reading is done, I can check mark the box to say that it's finished. It keeps track of what I've read. It even tells me, in percentages, how close I am to finishing my goal.

Well, if you have any questions about repainting my curio cabinet or about the on-line Bible devotions, just leave me a comment :) :) This post would have been a lot LONGER if I had told you the backstory with my painting adventure :) :) Thanks for visiting me today. Oh, welcome to the new followers, too :) :) Please come to visit again and again and maybe leave some comments, too. I love to hear from you.

Oh, just on a random note, I'll have to reorganize the  "tags" for my posts. I have way too many and need to condense them. If you have any helpful ideas, leave them here, too :) :) That's the news from Oregon today. Love and hugs, Heather :)