Painting Weekend

This weekend was BUSY.

On my way home from work on Friday, I swung by Home Depot to pick up my supplies and then grabbed my mom to head back home.  We tried to meet Brendan for dinner on Friday and walked over to Flat Top. Of course, Brendan over booked himself so it just ended up being my mom and I.

Saturday morning, we walked Samson and got breakfast at the diner down the street before making a trip down to the Crate & Barrel and the CB2.  I was desperate to use my C&B gift card to buy new wine glasses and get these side tables I had seen on the CB2 website.

Finally, we were home and ready to get painting by noon on Saturday.

First thing we did was move the dresser out on the back porch so we could sand.  My mom got started with that while I hand sanded the expedit shelf from Ikea.

 sanding, sanding, sanding

 Sanding seemed to take forever.  I'm sure my mom's arms were shaky for a good hour afterwards.

When the sanding was done, we brought the furniture back into the dining room where we prepped the area for painting.  Then, we primed and got to painting.  Due to the temperature in my house (and the thin coats of paint), we were able to do a lot of work that afternoon.  The primer dried after an hour.

Here were all the pieces when we stopped for the night.

Sunday morning we put the final coat on the expedit piece and the second and third coats on the dresser and drawers.

As a reminder, here is what the expedit piece looked like when I bought it from Ikea.  If you recall I added the legs to it.

 posted here

After 3 coats of paint and a piece of plywood nailed into the back, here is the finished piece.

The nighttime lighting doesn't do the colors justice.  Here is the piece taken yesterday with my stuff put back.

paint colors: Behr semi-gloss finish - Green: Japanese Fern; Turquoise - Winter Surf

All my new wine glasses made it onto this piece as well as the new appetizer plates I bought. I'm totally ready for my party this weekend!

My mom did majority of the work on the dresser.  After 3 coats of paint on the main sections of the piece, it was done.

Here's what it looked like originally.

posted here

And here's what it looks like now.

paint colors: Behr high-gloss finish: Cobalt Glaze

I still have to get new hardware (because these are way too ornate for this piece).  I am in love with it.

I'm so grateful that my mom could come and help me.  It definitely made the work more enjoyable and we were able to finish much faster than if I did it all myself.

Little by little my place is coming together.  I ordered two rugs online yesterday (one for the dining room and one for my bedroom).