Wordless Wednesday: Charming Chair

Cute little yard sale chair I bought for $1 and painted.

Likey?

Makeover Monday: Pretty Dresser

I picked up this nice little dresser for a song from my local on-line yard sale group. $30.

Very nice shape.  Nothing wrong with it.  I almost hated to paint it.

Almost.

I love painted wooden things.

LOVE.

We'll see if I feel the same way after I'm done.

So here's my tutorial.



Like I said, there was nothing at all wrong with this sweet little dresser, so I was able to go right to painting.  Since I was using good quality chalk paints (Annie Sloan Old White and Paris Grey), there was no need to do any prep like sanding or priming.

And this would be why I am such a fan of chalk paints.

I took out all the drawers and removed the top piece.  I unscrewed all the pulls and taped off along the lines of where I wanted to paint white.

I did a coat of the white, and after a little while, did a second coat and removed all the tape.  So far, looking good!

Next day I painted they grey. I had run out of painter's tape and was too lazy to go out and buy more, so I just tried to cut in with the brush.  Sometimes my brush was flawless, and other times it decided to color outside the lines, but I didn't fret about it.  Just figured I'd fix it up once the paint dried.

(Here are some of the brush mistakes that I had to touch up.  No big deal.)    

So after two coats of the grey, and after it all dried, (and after I fixed all my oops-es), I took my orbital sander to the edges to distress it, then started rubbing in all the wax.

Finally, I decided to add a little something extra, so I painted this on the side, using the same Old White paint that I used on the drawer fronts.

I think I'll add a little bit of the design on the side of that top drawer.

And I'm not done waxing.

And one more thing I'm not done with.  Did you catch it in the pictures above?
I accidentally left her barefoot.  I forgot to paint her feet!

Oops (again)!

Back to work tomorrow!



Hope you enjoyed this.  What would you have done differently?

I'm linking this post up with some blog hops this week.  See the schedule in my side bar if you'd like to join any of the parties!

Wordless Wednesday: Sun on a Sill

Makeover Monday: This Old Door

Once in awhile you just get lucky.

Not long ago I dropped by a yard sale, and what to my wondering eyes did appear but a beautiful old, chippy, flaky, rusty door.

Hey, beauty is in the eyes of the beholder, don't judge!

Seriously, this was something I'd been hoping to find for awhile.

Originally I had wanted one like this to use as a headboard, from a great tutorial I saw on Pinterest.  But when the door of my dreams didn't appear, I finally moved on and made different kind of headboard.

So instead of hanging behind my bed, this door would find a home and a new life in my shop.  Standing there at the side of the road, I could picture it:  Painted, distressed, waxed.  Panels would be chalkboard to draw my logo and to write messages to customers.  As an added bonus, this old beauty even had a mail slot.  I would use that for a business card drawing!!!

OH HAPPY DAY!

I know.  I need a life.  Sigh....

Here's how she's shaping up so far.  Just playing around with the chalk, so this isn't a finished product yet.

The basket hung from the mail slot will hold my business cards, and a notepad of paper so shoppers can write their info and drop it in the slot for a monthly drawing.

What do you think?





Thanks for reading!  I have linked this post up with a few bloghops.  If you'd like to join the parties, I've listed all the links in my sidebar.  Hope to see you there!

Exciting Changes on the Horizon

I've slowly been getting back into my business over the last couple of weeks.
I've completed a number of projects.

I've also started the ball rolling on obtaining a little shop space in a business in town that is one of those each-room-is-different-vendor kind of shops. You know the kind.  Some rooms very artistic and antiquey, some more junky with lots of used clothes and stuff.

And truth be told, I wasn't exactly able to secure a "room".  More like an alcove.
A glorified hallway.
Where the restrooms are located.
Hey, we've all got to start somewhere, right?

And I've always been a silver-lining kind of gal, so I'm thinking, "More foot traffic!"
<Positive thoughts, positive thoughts, positive thoughts>

Anyway, I will post again when I have the space all set.  I have big plans for my tiny space.
Paint.
And shelving.
And a cool door and a shutter that I just picked up at a couple of yard sales.
Maybe a banner?
I think it will look cute and homey when all is said and done.

Oh, I almost forgot my other news!  I have come up with a logo that the design team at Staples is going to put together for me.  It will hopefully be ready for my stamp of approval in a couple of days, so it should be making an appearance right here on my blog sometime next week.  So keep your eyes open!

 
Yes, this picture was taken in 2016.
We have a very large Amish community in my town.
The sound of horse hooves clip-clopping down the road?  Very grounding.
Don't knock it till you've tried it....

Rest in Peace

I lost my mother last week.  She will live on in the memories of all that ever met her, for she was an interesting soul.    My sister and I wrote a memorial that I am sharing here, so that hopefully you may get a glimpse of who she was, if you never had the pleasure of meeting her.

Kid, Hon, Bird, 

Mrs. Birdsong, Mother Bridsnog

Sugar Britches.

Kathy, Katharine,

Kath,

Miss Kimball,

Ma, Mom, Mommy, Grammy, 

and (long story) “Susan.”

Katharine Evans Kimball Birdsong went by many names, but the one name that best captures her spirit is…

POET.

She was a gentle soul with a poet’s heart, and on June 2nd, 2016, Katharine Birdsong took her last breath. Most people would equate the last breath with death, but when Katharine learned of her terminal condition, she felt like she was just going on a long trip- quite literally at first.  

Shortly after her prognosis of having three to five months to live, she had the impulse to start packing and began looking for her well-worn Agatha Christie novel , and her even more worn pair of favorite slippers, only to realize with a disappointed laugh that it was true what they say—

“You can’t take it with you.” 

And she was more of a giver than a taker anyway.  One of the greatest things she gave us was a colorful childhood.

Words like “colorful,” “unconventional,” “eccentric”… these are polite substitutions for words less kind -- words that sometimes come with unwarranted shame. They are a gentlemen’s code used to describe people whose brilliance, creativity and compassion come with some heavy crosses to bear.  And though our mother’s “peace of mind” was often tested by personal demons, great tragedies and deep loss, she always strove to find some kernel of happiness amidst the struggle.  

It’s hard to explain our unconventional household, but if you’ve ever come home from school and found a wounded (but very much alive) goose staring back at you from the bathtub or a large (but very much dead) deer in the back seat of your mom’s broken down Oldsmobile, you'll have an idea of the colorful childhood our mom painted on a Jersey Shore canvas. 

Her unorthodox life was matched by her eclectic resume, with jobs including, but not limited to:

• waitress
• journalist
• clammer
• convent cook
• monastery maid

These jobs may been humble, but they were not without their perks.  While working as a live-in cook and housekeeper for a Catholic bishop (in a beautiful oceanfront home) she'd occasionally “borrow” his house when he was off doing bishop-y things.  Her daughter Mary’s eighth birthday party was held in his living room.  It beat the one bedroom efficiency apartment over his garage where she and her four children actually lived.

Besides being a heck of a party-planner, the girl could cook.  She nurtured the food she was cooking just as she nurtured the folks fed by it, working a pot of soup like a sculpture.  Many sat at her table: friends, neighbors, folks down on their luck or without family.  Even from time to time the creepy neighbor who claimed to be an orthodox Ukrainian priest (“He wasn’t no priest!”). 
The mouths she could feed with a can of tuna and a loaf of generic white bread would put Jesus’ loaves and fishes to shame.

Born in Upper Montclair NJ in 1944, Katharine wouldn’t remain a Yankee for long- her parents relocated to the Deep South (where they’d both grown up) and chose to raise their children in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.  

Married at 17, our mother had her first child at 18 after having to relocate quite unexpectedly with her new husband to Germany, where they lived an almost medieval lifestyle complete with chamber pots and cauldrons of boiled water for bathing.

After returning to the states and her Louisiana life, she eventually wound up in a South Jersey Shangri La called Long Beach Island.  Choosing a remote island for her home where she knew not a blessed soul had its own unique challenges, but she was nothing if not resourceful.  

Case in point: Her first day on the island she’d tucked her three small children into bed with kisses on their cheeks and thumb-swiped crosses on their foreheads, then returned to unpacking.  Much time and many boxes later, she still could not find the alarm clock.  

Desperate to make sure they’d all wake up in time for school, she called the police, and in her soft whisper of a southern voice, she asked the amused cop on the other end of the line for a wake-up call.  He was putty in her hands, and her children all got to school on time the next morning.

How a woman as beautiful as she could be so self-conscious of her looks is hard to fathom, yet she never saw the beauty that was so apparent to others. Despite her poor opinion of her looks, she stopped many a heart and turned many a head.

In fact, one Halloween while taking her children trick-or-treating, she was hit on by a bold 13 year old who mistook the dark-haired beauty for a gypsy. “Son,” she said, “I’m somebody’s Mama.” 

Her Mama’s depression-era mentality certainly rubbed off on her, and she was simply unable to throw things out.  Cupboards and countertops overflowed with cookie tins, plastic bottles, boxes and bags of all shapes and sizes.  Her refrigerator was crammed tight with little baggies containing half pieces of toast or a few crumbles of bacon, each labelled meticulously with a black marker on a piece of masking tape. Although she would use paper plates, she refused to throw them out until they were threadbare, wiping them off over and over because they were still “perfectly good.” Some say "Hoarder," others say "Green.” Tomato, tuhmahhhto.

Regardless, though she had to feed four children from a poverty-level pantry, she knew all there was to know about British Royal Family lineage, Shakespearean sonnets, biblical archaeology, and the latest installment of Masterpiece Theatre.  She was quite the anglophile.  Yorkshire Pudding was a regular item on the menu, but her children would eat it off of rickety TV trays while sitting on a three-legged curb-rescue sofa watching Laverne and Shirley.

Cooking and kindness will likely be what folks remember most about Katharine. A friend recently said of her, “She was always so kind to me. Every time she saw me she would compliment me, tell me I was a good father, and that God had a special place for me.”  That was just what she did.

She lost her only son Donald (her first-born child) to brain cancer when he was just 33 years old. And when his illness went from bad to worse she cared for him when he could no longer care for himself.  She was with him through all of it.

With her intelligence and her compassion, she could have excelled in any field, but due to so many struggles (both internal and external) she never found “success” in the traditional sense of the word.  She was, however, wildly successful in making those around her feel loved and cherished, and as unique as their fingerprints. There were many times she could not access her heart of gold, her generous and kind nature.  But when she could, you felt flooded by the light of the angels, and buoyed by the voice of a poet:

FINGERPRINTS

by Katharine Birdsong

To all who’ve touched my life, my soul,

Who’ve broken me or made me whole,

Or who’ve revealed a glimpse of you,

Stripped by all except what’s True—

You’ve left your mark no other’ll see,

Indelible, a part of me;

An imprint only you could make,

And from me none’ll ever take.

Light and dark, these works of Art—

Fingerprints upon my heart----

For good or not, I cannot tell,

But I’ve left my own as well. 

Interesting post note:  My sisters and I found this hand-written poem of my mother's when going through her things after she passed.  Although it was written many years earlier, it was dated June 2nd.  The day of her death.  

Facelift

I feel like I just stepped out of the spa.
Or had a major facelift.
I feel younger and prettier!

Well, my blog feels younger and prettier.

Isn't she beautiful?

With some of my earnings from the pieces I've created, I sprung for a little blog design by the amazing Stephanie of How Sweet Designs.  I think she managed to give me just exactly what I was looking for.

Plus now I've got this cool hovering Pinterest button.  Try it, just hover over an image from my blog post and a Pin button will pop up.  Cool right?  I feel so fancy.

Now hopefully I will stop neglecting my blog.
So easy to neglect the plain Janes.
So fun to pay attention to pretty shiny things.
Sad but true.

Here are a few pictures of some of the recent pieces I've worked on....