Box store furniture CAN be aged loveliness, Whitewashed Apothecary Jars TUTORIAL, and 25% off coupon code

I am currently in the process of decorating "middle boy" and "baby boy" s bedroom into a vintage/nautical/sailing room.

It has been quite fun

to come up with random ideas

 and hunt the thrift stores

 for bits and pieces to make it all come together.

-So I thought I should share a few

random little ideas

on how to get that look without

breaking the bank ;)

I started out with a basic box store book shelf that had two shelves

and a basic 4 drawer desk.

Both had a cheap dark finish on them.

The bookshelf was $5 at the thrift store and the desk was $3 at a garage sale.

(It was toward the end of the day at that sale and the couple told me that they were just going to tear it up and use it for firewood if no one bought it! -You can just imagine my mouth dropping open when I heard that! The desk was completely sturdy and had TONS of use left in it)

So anyway,

blue was the lucky color for this desk and bookshelf.

I had found a fabulous blue color

(Marine Magic by Behr)

in a magazine and then promptly lost the name of it.

So I chose a blue from the chips at the store,

came home,

primed and painted both pieces and OH NO!

That blue was way too bright and bold with a teal tone to it.

So there they sat in my garage for months.

And then one day the name of the color I had been trying to find popped into my head from out of the BLUE, ;)

Needless to say, I rushed to the store,

bought a gallon,

painted both pieces,

and there they sat for a month, cuz that's how I work :)

The other day I happened across an extra hour so I flew out to the garage and started sanding both pieces to give it that worn, vintage look.

As I was sanding I noticed the bright blue from the beginning was starting to show through here and there.

Oh my word was it ever lovely!

So I guess mistakes can lead to great new ideas!

-But wait, I'm not done with my longwinded post here ;)

As I was sanding the edges, the sander was taking of the dark finish and leaving the cheap light wood or whatever fake wood it is and making the piece look terrible.

What a bunch of ups and downs!

I racked my brain and the only thing I could come up with was

the same thing I always use:

a dark paste wax.

I was sitting there thinking, hmmm...

what if just rubbed a heavy coat of it everywhere that raw wood is showing through the paint?

So, I tried it,

and
I could not be happier!

This is the exact look and feel that I was aiming for in their room.

Oh, and the jars?

Well, that could be a whole other long winded post so I will try to quickly give the basics.

They are being used in a holiday vendor sale/ flea market/whatever you want to call it sale, coming up this weekend.
(I needed a fun way to display my knobs that I make so this is what I came up with)

-By the way all the knobs and other items in my etsy shop are 25% until Tuesday November 8th

with coupon code:

NOV11

So feel free to hop on over and check out the latest styles I have added.

-I have almost hit 900 sales so let's celebrate and thank you all!

Anyhow, 

for the jars,

you just go to your local thrift store 

and grab up random jars 

and

those lovely-wooden-candlesticks-that-are-so-plentiful-at-thrift-shops-and-no-one-seems-to-wantanymore.

Throw a light whitewash on the candlesticks and if the jars have wooden lids, do those also.

Grab your handy dandy tube of E-6000

(I don't get paid to say that, the stuff is just like gold to me though!)

put glue on the top of the candlestick and center you jar on it.

Voila!

You have some out of this world apothecary jars:)

-A teeny tiny tidbit........ Look for wide bases on the candlesticks,

otherwise your jars are gonna be tippin' over on you

and breaking!

Enjoy!

I would love to see what you all come up with!

Anthro Mirror

One of my previous posts had promised an Anthropologie Knock Off Distressed Mirror.

Weelll......

Here it is!

I had so much fun with this!

-AFTER the mirror finish was distressed!

I just used paint stripper and a scraper (outside of course)

to distress the back of the mirror.

The frame was a plasticky gold thingy that I primed and painted gray and finished with a whitewash that I wiped off of the raised edges.

Then came the fun part,

spray the back of the mirror with spray glue,

lay a pretty piece of floral fabric on it and smooth out bubbles,

Snap the mirror and the backing back onto the frame and

VOILA!!

This Was A Thrift Store Find, No, Really, I'm Not Kidding!

I found this pitcher for 50 cents at the thrift store.

It works, it's fine-

but it doesn't go with my stuff.

The lines are just classic and it has this lovely little carving of some sprigs on each side.

It jumped right off the shelf and into my cart because it knew that it would be much loved at my house:)

That above, turned into this below, sigh,

So let me attempt to tell you my very unprofessional process.

First off, spray it with my bestie,

Zinsser Bulls Eye 1-2-3 Primer

(and no I don't get paid to say that, I just really, really love this stuff, -like, almost as much as my family, JK!)

Anyway, it sticks to anything, glass included.

(Do not use for food or drink after this process, this primer and these paints and sealers are NOT food safe)

For decor only!

I then brushed on a coat of darker brown craft paint just like a 2 year old would.

(I really should let my kiddos help me out with this step, they would be thrilled!)

Then 2 coats of gray craft paint,

there will still be some brown showing through.

Now you will whitewash it with a 2 parts water and 1 part white craft paint mixture.

(Brush it on in little sections and wipe it off gently as you go to get the amount of whitewash you prefer)

After it all dried I took a slightly damp scrubby and scrubbed random spots all over so that just the primer shows in those spots.

(You might want to add a little more whitewash after this step, I did, because the brown shows through a little stronger than I liked after the scrubbing.)

I did put a coat of clear acrylic spray over it all to protect it but it left a bit  of a shine.

I'm thinking a VERY light rub with sandpaper might be just enough to take any shine off.

The very last step was the best of all!

Me, my camera, (I use a Canon EOS Rebel XT which I HEART!!)

the lovely reborn pitcher, some vintage book pages and my lovely button collection.

What a date!

I heart doing photo shoots!

Although I am NOT a professional,

I hope you pros will just humor me and let me pretend that I am, pretty please?

My #1 gives me odd looks when he sees me taking pics of what he considers junk that I haul home.

But he loves me so he lets me do it without too many comments :)

I won't even mention the looks I get when I start ripping out book pages and spreading buttons all over the counter to take more pictures of the finished project.

You see, he doesn't realize the value of editing and tweaking a picture until it looks like it came out of this perfect, lovely made up home.

He sees the reality of the book pages and buttons on the counter of the island beside our lovely little sink.

And he sees my kiddos holding up a white posterboard for the background so that our lovely stainless steel fridge doesn't show up in the pics.

He also sees the jars of paint and random paintbrushes and sealers sitting a foot away from the object being photographed.

But, I am thankful for the imperfectness because I know that it is what gives us our best memories and laughs!

Let's see that again,

The before:

and the LOVELY after: