Garden Stool End Table

One of the things I love the most is when a project is easy, it takes very little time, and it requires very little moo-la. This past weekend I worked on a bunch of small projects that didn't take too much of my time and by the end of the weekend I felt like I had accomplished so much! Don't you love it when that happens?! I know I sure do.

 

Let's talk couches for a second, shall we?

 

 Did you know that the average couch measures anywhere from 6-8 feet long? Our couch measures just over 11 feet! That means our ginormous couch far surpasses the average by a third! When we moved into our previous apartment, the main wall was a whopping 16 feet long!!! Both the couches we had previously owned prior were worn, dated, and just looked disproportionate up against the massive wall. So...we went couch shopping, found a great no-interest for 16 months deal, and purchased this 11 foot beast. We paid it off in 12 months thanks to my financially smart guy and it really is the most comfortable couch in all the land. What we didn't anticipate or take into consideration (our bad) was if/when we ever moved (which we eventually did) and how this massive couch would dictate which apartments we could/could not live in.  Our apartment search was brutal. All because of a stupid couch. We looked at and had to turn down so many other apartment communities all because the main living area didn't have a space large enough to accommodate our couch. #lessonlearned

 

All in all everything worked out, as most things do, and we decided (settled?) on the apartment we're in now. Our couch barely fits along the main wall, but hey...it fits. Which brings me to the project I'm blogging about today.

 

The main wall in our current apartment is approx. 13 feet long. Our couch clocks in at a tad over 11 feet. Which means that on either end of the couch I have about a foot of space to work with, if that. Immediately after moving in and placing the couch, I realized that end tables just weren't going to work. Bummer dude. I tried shoving the couch to one side and having an end table on the other but then my OCD kicked in and I just wasn't having it. Out went the tables.

 

Last summer I was in HomeGoods and found myself in the garden section when I spotted the solution to all my problems. Garden stools. The new end table for small spaces. They're small, compact, they offer a flat surface albeit a small surface, but hey, beggars cant be choosers so into my cart it went and decided to give it a whirl. The only problem? It was green. Mean green.

 

See?

 

 

Didn't exactly go with my black, white, grey, navy color scheme I have going on. But nothing a couple new pillows with some green couldn't fix, right? Right!

 

Well...not so fast.

 

I searched. I scoured. I came up empty handed. There are a ton of pillow options out there but none that I absolutely loved that would help make this green little stool apart of the family. So it's sat here in the living room just waiting. Until now.

 

I'm working on the lamp situation too...in case you're wondering. No side tables, no table lamps = it's a hard life.

 

I found the perfect pillows but the green would have to go. Nothing a little spray paint cant fix! I tell ya, pillows and spray paint can solve just about any decorating dilemma! This mean green garden stool not only got a fresh coat of paint, it also got a tabletop! Wanna see?

I ordered a plain pine wood table top online because I couldn't find one the perfect size at any local hardware or hobby store. It cost me less than $10. I followed the same steps to stain the tabletop as I discussed in this previous blog post and it turned out great!

 

Once the top was stained in my favorite Walnut stain, the garden stool got a few coats of Rustoleum's Candy Pink in Gloss.

Originally my initial thought was to permanently adhere the table top to the garden stool but then I decided against it. If ever down the line I want to repaint the stool or actually use it in a garden some day, I'd be wishing for an easy way to remove the top and restore the stool to it's natural state. That's when I had my little light bulb moment and decided to attach the top using my forever favorite command adhesive strips.

Worked like a charm!



 

 

The pink may seem odd now, but it will when I show you the recent changes to the living room, it'll all make sense. My uber supportive boyfriend didn't even flinch a muscle at the pink. What a keeper!

 

 

The table is a lot more functional now than it ever was and can now hold drinks without the fear of them toppling over from sitting on an uneven surface. For a little over $10, this quick little DIY project solved our space issue just perfectly.

 

I always love finding ways to use things in unexpected ways or to use them in ways in which they weren't originally intended. This project personifies that to a "T"!

 

Did any of you purchase a giant couch and had to forgo end tables because of it? What did you do to solve that dilemma? Do tell!

Light It Up

 I didn't necessarily need any new lamps when I found these ugly duckling ones at the Goodwill for $7 each and even though they didn't have shades and were pretty beat up, I figured with just a small upfront investment, they could be turned into swans. I loved the shape and how heavy they were so for $14, I couldn't pass them up considering similar style lamps go for quite a bit more.

 

 

The first thing I did was remove the price stickers and gave them a good cleaning with a little bit of Bar Keeper's Friend and a mixture of water. It really did the trick to get all the years of grime and in some spots, rust, off with very little effort.

 

Next...I taped off the socket, and cord with a little blue painters tape to ensure that no paint got into the parts it wasn't supposed to.

 

 

Then I sprayed both prepared lamps with my all-time favorite primer, Zinsser Bulls Eye 1-2-3 Primer. It's my go-to primer for full coverage on any surface with just one pass!

 

 

After priming the lamps I gave them a light sanding with a super fine sandpaper just to ensure that they were super-duper smooth for the next step.

 

I sprayed the lamps using Rust-Oleum spray paint in Navy Blue in a Gloss finish. I didn't realize at first that I had picked up the glossy finish but after seeing the end result, I'm so glad for the happy accident. Overall I applied 4 or 5 (I lost count) super thin coats. To obtain a super glossy, flawless finish, thin coats definitely the key!

 

 

I'm totally obsessed with this color and the high gloss finish. I literally want to stare at my reflection in them all day long and am hunting the house to find something else to paint this deep, bold color! It can be such a classic color but playful and bold all at the same time!

 

 

To finish the lamps, I purchased 2 inexpensive Threshold replacement shades and finials from Target because when I purchased the lamps they didn't have shades and I wasn't digging the existing finials. Small investments yield big rewards.

 

The lamps are currently living in our master bedroom on our long dresser that sits on the wall opposite our bed. I love them here for now, but can totally see myself rotating them throughout the house because I have design ADD like that and because I just love these oh-so-much!

 

 

And don't they look good with my Greek Key Curtains?! Swoon!

 

These ugly duckling lamps sure did come a long way! What do you think? For about $25 a piece, I invested about $50 for 2 for what would've cost me for one!! Can't beat that! Nothing like the power of spray paint! Maybe now you'll give some poor, ugly, outdated lamps a shot next time you stumble across them! If you do, please share!



Teacher's Pet

I'm so excited to be back to share with you all a project that I just love!

The dining room, or dining area is actually a better term, is a shared space with the living room. Truth be told...I hate, let me repeat, H-A-T-E, shared living / dining spaces. I don't know why I've come to have this aversion to spaces such as these but I guess this is just one of the sacrifices of living in a small apartment. Our dining room, or lack thereof, has gone through quite a few changes since we moved in almost a year ago. It's so hard to find a style or look for the dining room that flows well with the adjoined living room without the 2 spaces being #twinsies. Not fun. So because of this little dilemma, this small space had undergone a few makeovers in our short time here.

When we first moved in, we painted the dining room wall a deep, dusty blue. I've been digging the deep, rich, blues for a while now and couldn't wait to try out the color pallet in our new back then apartment. I was instantly in love but as the weeks wore on I quickly fell out of love...not because of the deep blue hue we had chosen, but because our apartment gets very bad natural light so the darker color made the whole space feel claustrophobic and small. So a few months ago, I decided to paint over it with something lighter and it's completely brightened things up in here, up in here, you know, like that one song...

When we decided to paint for the 2nd time, I went with big, bold white & grey stripes and I love, L-O-V-E them! Shout out to the best mom ever for helping me out (hope you're reading this! You better be!). Anyways, since painting the stripes a few months ago, the wall has sat empty and totally needed something. I've been searching for a big giant mirror to hang on the wall because mirrors are great to reflect light areas that don't get a lot of natural light but dang, giant mirrors are expensive. This chick ain't rich folks. So I set out to DIY a giant mirror but dang, I ran into quite a few issues and haven't got around to overcoming them so...onto Plan B!

While perusing Pinterest I ran across this baby that I totally fell for and ding...light bulb moment. I just had to have it.

So Plan B quickly became DIY-ing a giant-ish chalkboard to hang above my $4 Thomasville buffet that's still waiting to get refinished (we'll talk more later on how awesome a deal this buffet was).

I loved the look of this chalkboard coffee bar wall above the grey buffet but knew I didn't want an entire chalkboard wall because I felt we'd go right back to feeling like we lived in the batcave if we did that. So. I took this inspiration and put my own apartment-friendly-un-batcave-like twist on the idea.

To start I made a quick trip to my local home improvement store and picked up a sheet of 4'x2' MDF for around $6. I also picked up a 1"x3"x10' piece of trim board (used for baseboards) for another $6 smackaroos and a can of black chalkboard paint for $10. Then I got to work.

First step was painting the MDF board with the chalkboard paint. I brushed on the 1st coat but then rolled on all other coats with a high density foam roller. Using the roller gave it a smoother finish overall but if you decide to use a brush, be careful not to over brush as the paint seemed to dry quickly.

Also...be sure to mix your can of chalkboard paint THOROUGHLY before applying. When I first opened the can, the paint inside was blue. At first I thought I grabbed the wrong color (because chalkboard paint does come in many awesome colors) but once I began stirring I realized that a lot of gunk (not sure what else to call it) had settled on the bottom of the can and the more I mixed, the blacker the paint turned.

Chalkboard paint requires a 4 hour dry time so once I completely covered the MDF in chalkboard pain I waited 4 hours before applying my next coat. All in all I did 5 coats and I'd recommend at least 3 at the very minimum, more if you have the patience. The thicker the coat of chalkboard paint the easier it'll be to write on.

Fun little tip when you're painting something that requires multiple coats with long dry times in between - wrap your brush or roller in a plastic bag or Ziploc and stick it in the refrigerator. Totally abnormal to have a paint brush in the fridge, yes, but the paint doesn't harden and therefore you don't have to wash the brush/roller after each application while you're waiting to re coat.

While drying, I set out to make my frame. With the help of my handy boyfriend, we cut the frame pieces down to size. I have visions of chopping off my thumb so I haven't worked up the courage to do this on my own so I stand at a safe distance and snap pics while he operates the thumb slicer. 

We (I mean he) cut 2 pieces at and 2 pieces at for the frame.

If you don't have access to a saw at home, your local home improvement store can cut them down to size for you. Once all our frame pieces were cut I got to work distressing the wood. Because I like to buy perfectly good wood and then beat it up. To distress the wood I used a hammer, the can of chalkboard paint and even a fork. Don't worry, I washed the fork.

You really cant mess this up. It's totally random and to your liking. Just ding, dent, scrape wherever you want or not at all. You're the artist here!

Doesn't look like much here but once the stain takes hold, it'll bring out the grain and all those cool distressed imperfections you created.

Next up stain! I used my favorite of all time, Minwax Dark Walnut.

I went over each board with a generous amount of stain and let the stain soak in for 15 minutes before wiping off the excess. I always find that using old cut up t-shirts works well for the application and wiping off but the stain can be applied with a brush as well but it's kinda a pain to clean up afterwards. And don't forget to wear your rubber gloves unless you want stained hands and fingernails.

See what I mean about the stain bringing out the distress markings as if they had always been there?! Love!

Moving on...

At this point you can wait an hour, see how you like the color, re coat if necessary or just let the boards dry. Dry time is 4 hours. I chose not to re coat because I loved the look on the 1st pass so I waited the allotted dry time.

Next up, putting together the frame! For this part I used my new Kreg tool that I got for Christmas to drill me some pocket holes on both ends of my 2 side pieces of the frame to help screw this frame together. All in all I think it's a pretty nifty tool and cant wait to get better at using it. The possibilities are endless with this thing.

I wont go through all the nitty gritty of how to use this but you basically start like this:

and end up with this:

I then used a little wood glue on both ends, butted them up against the horizontal pieces of the frame and screwed everything together as shown on the diagram below:

If you don't happen to have one of these tools, you can still make your frame by nailing or screwing all the pieces together from the top and bottom. The exposed screws would give it a really cool industrial look!

Once your frame is all put together, now it's time to put the chalkboard backing on. I put a bead of wood glue down on the entire inner perimeter of the frame like so...

 Then I centered the chalkboard piece over the frame opening and nailed it down with 3/4" finishing nails.

This part was a little tedious but not too bad. It would've gone way faster had I had the right length nails for my nail gun but I didn't and didn't want to make another trip to the store so I did it the old fashioned way.

 Last step in fabrication of this bad boy is attaching the hanging hardware. I picked up some large d-ring hooks at the hardware store, measured down 6" from the top of my frame and screwed the hardware in using 3/4" wood screws.

And fabrication is complete! 3 cheers for a job well done and the newest addition to our dining room wall! Ain't she a beauty?!

 To prepare your chalkboard before using it, you'll need to season it. To do this simply take a piece of chalk and lay it on its side and rub the entire chalkboard with it.

 After wiping off the excess chalk dust, you're good to go!

I think the chalkboard is the perfect addition to this once empty wall and perfect to display the menu for special occasions or the use it to display the drink list for our makeshift "bar" that hangs out below.

 Now that we have something cool displayed on the wall, its time for a new light fixture that doesn't interfere with the line of sight! The chalkboard is just the start to some changes/additions I have in mind for this weird space but I think it's off to a great start. And now that I have a fancy new chalkboard, I better start brushing up on my chalkboard art skills! Check back soon for chalkboard art tutorials...till then, enjoy the weekend!

 Project Cost:

MDF board - $6

Chalkboard Paint - $10

Trim pieces - $5

Stain / Glue / Nails - already had on hand

Total Project Cost - $21.00

Not too bad!