December means Christmas

     Yes, that time of the year has arrived and with it, the urge to decorate for Christmas, I don't go too big with decorations, just the Christmas tree and one or two poinsettias but  this year however I decided to make some arrangements for the front of the house.

     I didn't buy anything though, taking advantage that we live almost in the country, we went for a drive and I collected five different kinds of pine, some branches and red dogwood sticks, my poor daughter was very scared of me going into the woods, I had enough greenery to make three urns, added some Christmas ornaments to the arrangements and I must say I'm very happy with the end result.

    

     These wreaths I made a few years ago, again I collected the pine cones in a park, attached them to a wire ring with floral wire and  added some fake berries and greenery.

After I finished the urns we went to our local home depot to get the tree, I have a fake tree but for three years now I've been using a real tree, I don't think I'll ever go back to the fake tree, it doesn't matter if I have to sweep every day around the tree or if it has imperfections like bare spots, some branches are too long or too short, or the trunk isn't straight, nothing beats the look of a real tree.

I had to add a piece of furniture that I finished last month. The painting was very easy but to get the top right was a long process, probably ten coats of stain and another ten coats of polyurethane, but I think the end result was well worth it, it went to a nice young couple, it's a big and heavy dresser, they had to rent a cargo van to take it home I hope they had some strong friends to help bring it to the second floor.

My new bedroom set

     I finally got the pictures of our bedroom set, the two dressers are a set from 1955 from a well known Canadian maker. The reason I decided to keep them is the quality of the craftsmanship and the quality of the woods, all made of wood, the tops of the dressers are solid planks of wood and they look like walnut. The original color was  light brown and I had to strip the paint to the bare wood.

     I was going to stain them in a dark espresso color, but when I applied the first coat of stain on the tall dresser  it looked terrible, the color of the stain was very uneven so I took the stain off, sanded the whole dresser again and ended up painting  them with  WHITE (my favorite color).

     The dressers with the original color look very dated, once I painted them and added new hardware they look very modern.

     I don't know if you can see that the knobs and the pulls are different colors, I got them from Lee Valley, I saw them in the catalog and order them online, I assumed that because they were both  silver and shiny they were the same color but I found out after I picked them up that  they really were silver and shiny but the knobs had a chrome finish and the pulls nickel finish, because I love the chunky pulls I think the knobs are going to be changed.

     The night tables are actually dressers, the height is perfect for our bed, their original color used to be a peachy color and are made of maple.
     I have a few leftover mirrors, my plan is to have them cut to the size of the tops of the dressers and the night tables so they will add protection to the tops. That is if I don't sell them first, the truth is that I like them and I know it's very good furniture, but I'm not feeling the love, I like modern looking furniture but my heart loves a more  traditional style.
     I'm going to live with them for a while, I'll keep you posted.

 

By the way I think those two french chairs are screaming "Paint me white and change my fabric with a more bold and colorful pattern"!!!

 

French bedroom set

I had this french provincial bedroom set in my bedroom for almost two years, I loved the curved shape at the front of the dressers, the legs, the hardware and the fact that was made of solid wood. I didn't like the fake wood grain and the color of the stain, but I got used to live with it until I found another set, very different, more modern looking, I'll post the pictures next time.

The original plan was to stain the tops dark and the rest of the dressers and night tables antique white, but when I applied the stain, dark circles started to appear, for me the easiest thing to do was to paint the whole piece white.

These are the before pictures

These are the water marks or should I say red wine marks from my husband's glass and maybe some marks from my daughter's glass of milk.

These are the night tables, the original set came with just one table, I found another table not identical but I liked the proportions and it is french style as well.

These are the after pictures, I regret that I didn't paint them sooner and enjoyed them in our bedroom. I think they look very nice.

The long dresser was missing a pull, I had a hard time finding one to match the other pulls, it's not easy to find hardware that is around 60 years old. I had to borrow the pull from another dresser, so I'm still looking.

Black dresser

I would say that ninety percent of the times I paint the furniture white, but this time the color I've chosen for this dresser is black, I love how it turns out.

Dining sets

 It's hard to find chairs that are in good condition, it's very common to find chairs that are wobbly and the foam on the seats very dirty so it has to be replaced, and that alone can be expensive. So far I found three dining sets I liked well enough to refinish them, all  the same style.

The first set, came with four chairs, but I found another two, once you paint and recover the seats they look perfect together. Can you spot miss barbie?

I didn't bring the table inside the house so I took pictures in the garage, sorry for the messy background, the bad lighting and the bad photographer, but unfortunately that happens a lot.

The second dining set, went to a young woman, I gave her the leftover fabric I had from the chairs, she was going to make a balance for the kitchen's window and some pillows to match her new dining set,

And this it's my last dining set so far, this is how the chairs looked before I worked on them, again the set had just four chairs but I was lucky to find another two, different but they look well together once I put the same uniform.

White buffet

   Buffet before: good condition but looking a little sad.

Buffet after: dark stained top, bottom part painted antique white, same hardware, very heavy piece I couldn't bring it inside, had to take pictures in the garage.