A DIY DRESSER

HOW TO DIY

Step 1:

Remove all the hardware.
With an electric sander, sand down your dresser.
Make sure to wipe the dresser down after sanding.

Step 2:

Using a white primer, paint the dresser with a full coat. 

Step 3: 

After the Primer has dried, apply the paint of your new color choice. You will probably need to do several coats of paint for this process.

*A tip, it's fun to match the lines that the dresser had originally.  

I decided to choose a grey and white color pallet and follow the horizontal lines that the dresser already had grooves for.

Step 4: 

After all's dry - and I mean DRY, put hardware back on. 

You might want to spray paint your hardware which is what I did with mine.  Quick, Easy, and makes a big difference! If you're not a fan of the hardware on it, then Anthropologie has a great selection knobs to choose from.  I scour the sales bins because you can almost always score cool knobs for $2.95 each.

Step 5:

Viola you've got a cute new piece for cheap!

DIY Framed Vintage Wall Paper

Today I decided this beautiful gold wallpaper has been sitting in my closet for too long! I scored it at an estate sale a few weeks back and immediately wanted to put it on display.  But how do you put wallpaper on the walls when you live in an apartment?  You frame it!  This project was quite simple really, just required the right supplies.  With the most essential supply found it was just a matter of gathering the remaining frame, spray paint, scissors, and ruler.  


I have quite a soft spot for vintage wall paper.  There's a slew of projects I have in mind for the remaining roles I have. One of the priority ones is lining the inside of my dresser.  I find that contact paper offered at most stores are boring and/or ugly.  Scour a few estate sales and find a stash of wallpaper roles to jazz up the insides of your dresser!

If you're interested in this simple project you can read the 'how to' below. 


First you have to gut the frame, and God knows the terrible 80's photos they held need to join him in heaven.  I peeled back the staples and took out the glass.  The frames were taken outside to my balcony.  Or I guess I should say to my buildings community balcony.  I realized halfway through spray painting that I was standing out there in my way too short pj's.  Watching a neighbor walk by out of the corner of my eye I tried to stay focused on the frames so not to cause any awkward conversation.  That's step two!  

Once the frames are sprayed let them dry for a bit.  Once they dry flip them over and spray the opposite side.  While you're waiting for the frames to dry spend your time measuring out your wallpaper for the frame.  Start by measuring the glass that goes inside.  With a pencil mark the backside of the wallpaper with the same measurement. Then cut away.  

When the spray paint is completely dry bring them inside, place the glass back inside, and pop in that fancy paper!  Bend the staples back. Flip the frame over. And Oh and Ah!  Then Enjoy! :) 

A late night rambling of creative confusion...

A terrible cough has plagued me for the last 5 days, and so sleep is hard to come by.  For this reason, a 1 am blog post sounds like a good investment of my time. This will probably be a bunch of random ramblings but there's a lot of creative things I feel the need to sift through. Maybe typing them out for no one else to actually read but myself will be a like a quick cheap therapy session.


I'm trying to figure out what direction to take all the styling, sales, vintage finds, and such. My brain feels like a big cheese board half the time.  There's all these slices with all completely different tastes and textures, much like my ideas. The challenge before me is utilizing all of them, and at the same time moving somewhere other than just my head!


Stuart says that the best way I can approach all this is to let it grow organically.  For the most part that is what it has done up to this point, and I assume that's the best advice I can continue taking.  God's given me some fantastic creativity when it is needed, and squelched it when it's not.  So I assume that if I follow that vision when he gives it then I will ultimately land in a good place, right?  


Back in April the pressure of moving from my giant home to a tiny apartment posed a big problem.  Where does all my stuff go?  This lit the flame for an ongoing dream of mine, Sell My Finds! I utilized my blog, facebook, and twitter to sell my items. I was blown away that in about 48 hrs time nearly everything had sold. 


Now that I've settled into my new place, with alot less stuff I'm trying to figure out the next step. Maybe my blog sales are the way to go...  I just can't help but think that my friends will get tired of shopping my sales each month.  However, I will say that the last sale I did it was fun to meet a slew of random people I don't know, whose friend passed it to them, whose friend had passed it to them.  


This past month I decided to dabble in the ETSY.com world, you can check out my etsy store by clicking here. The name is temporary while I decide and work on the branding of my shop.  The latest idea is to call my shop Tess&Tom after my late grandparents.  They were fantastic people who always believed in me and supported regardless of the dream. It's still not set in stone, but that's what I'm leaning towards.  Regarding the current store, I've scavenged garage and estate sales and had a blast listing all my fun treasures.  I think for a first time shop owner $300 of sales in less than a month's time is pretty good.  I do enjoy the ease of having a listing where a buyer can simply click a purchase button and paypal sends me cash, and all I have to do is pack up the stuff and ship it.  But I find that my friends and close people don't have much interest in buying on Etsy, they much prefer the organic fun nature of an online garage sale.  
All that to say I'm still trying to figure out what to do with it all.  I'm considering doing a monthly blog sale to my dallas friends and whatever is left over I put on my etsy site.  What do you think?
On another creative tangent, I'm trying to figure out what direction to take my styling.  I absolutely LOVE to style and production design film sets and photo shoots.  Luckily I have a unique group of photographer friends that offer good projects for my passion.  However, I feel like I need to dive into more than I am currently.  It's one of those things on my list of many to accomplish with my life.   


A friend of mine (who is the coolest friend) and I are looking for a space to rent and house our collections and create a workspace.  It would be nice to have a storage unit and space to collect all my dumpster finds. We have a lot of random dreams at this point and hopefully God will continue to pull us in the direction that he has for it and us!


And then there's the website I want to create for my stuff.... and the film projects... and blah blah blah...


Ok all this rambling to say that I'm trying to follow through with everything on my list by doing it organically like Stuart says.  Much more than half the time, I feel like my brain is spinning in circles anad I'm just sitting here being unproductive!  I've got a list a mile long of work projects that need to be taken care of and I can't get my brain to stop spinning long enough for me to accomplish anything.  Sorry to all those who are effected by my ADD! Ah!


Ok, with that, goodnight, I am off to cough myself to sleep! 


Rachael