q is for quandie

another quandie quickie.

Published on March 24, 2014March 23, 2014 by QuandieLeave a comment

Last summer I bought a sweet pair of child sized metal folding chairs at a garage sale. I knew they would make great canvases for a chalkboard sign. I also knew that they were an unfortunate shade of burgundy, one of my least favorite colors in the world. Still, I know there are some burgundy lovers out there and they had a fabulously junky patina, so I painted the seats with chalkboard paint and added a design to them with a chalkboard pen and ended up with this.

But, despite my best efforts, they didn’t sell at my summer Carriage House Sale. So, then I hung this one on the Carriage House. It stayed there most of the summer, exposed to the elements. As you can see, the chalkboard pen held up remarkably well.

I put them out for the October Carriage House Sale as well, and again they didn’t sell. Was it the spring message? Or was it the burgundy? You might be thinking ‘maybe it was the price!’, but I can’t imagine it was, these were priced somewhere in the $28 range. If someone had loved them, I don’t think the price would have been a factor.

So, as much as I love to retain an original junkalicious patina, I decided these would do better with a coat of paint. I thought perhaps the Annie Sloan paint would work well on the metal, and I have those samples to use up, so I decided to do one in the Florence …

And one in the Provence ….

I can tell you that the Annie Sloan paint adhered nicely to the metal. I did sand just slightly and wipe these down before painting, but that was it for prep. I gave each chair two coats of paint, then sanded, then finished with the MMS antique wax.

These will head to Junk Bonanza with me in April to see if they can find a home. Surely someone there will understand how fun it would be to hang one of these on the wall in the kitchen, or in a child’s room … or even outside on the garden shed door. How cute would that be?

it’s not easy being green.

Published on March 23, 2014March 22, 2014 by Quandie5 Comments

Kermit said it first, and the chair I painted last weekend seemed to agree. I started out thinking I would paint it with Miss Mustard Seed’s Luckett’s Green and call it good. I envisioned it being fabulously chippy and that awesome shabby chic green that we all know and love. Who doesn’t love a fabulous vintage green?

But, there was absolutely not even the slightest amount of chipping taking place. The wood on this chair just sucked up that paint like there was no tomorrow, and it looked like this.

Yawn.

I knew I had to break out the fancy techniques for this chair to truly shine. So, I used a hemp oil resist and added a couple coats of Miss Mustard Seed’s Ironstone over the green.

Ahhhh … much better. Now this chair looks like it has some age behind it. Just how I like it. As if it has been sitting in a lovely courtyard garden in the English countryside for years and years.

I can just hear my mother saying “I can’t understand why anyone would want their furniture to look like this.” She just doesn’t get it. I’m not even sure that I do, all I know is that I love this look.
I finished it off with a coat of clear wax, and touches of antique wax here and there.

Do you love the green as much as I do? It is currently my 2nd favorite color, falling just slightly behind aqua. This little garden chair has me dreaming of spring and getting out in the garden, maybe that is part of the appeal. Whatever it is, I think this little chair is the bomb.

a little landscape.

Published on March 22, 2014March 22, 2014 by Quandie19 Comments

I mentioned that the only thing I purchased while garage saling in Vegas was a little oil painting. It had to be small to fit into my suitcase. Here it is.

Before you recoil in horror, let me explain. There were a couple of things that drew me to this painting. First was the frame. Ugly as is, but I thought it would be a fun one to paint. Second, the painting itself, which I thought was rather sweet. Finally, the size, a mere 4.5″ by 6.5″. I like either things that are smaller than usual, or things that a bigger than usual. Why is that?

Anyway, I knew I could change up the look of this little painting by … well … painting it.

I also thought this would be a good way to try out the Annie Sloan chalk paint that I picked up at Bloom. I took everything apart, and painted a coat of Provence on both the mat and the frame. I have to say, the Annie Sloan paint went on smoothly. It didn’t dry as fast as the milk paint does though. Really, in the end, the main thing that I like about it is the color, and I can reproduce that in a much cheaper homemade version of chalk paint (latex paint mixed with plaster of paris). So, will I go out of my way to find more Annie Sloan paint? I doubt it. Will I pick it up once in a while for a special project? More testing required to answer that one.

Anyway, I knew that my final coat of paint on the frame would be Miss Mustard Seed’s Linen, so I decided to leave the mat in Provence. I originally planned to just use the MMS white wax over the Provence, and that is where I started, but I didn’t love it. I added some clear wax to tone it down, but still didn’t love it. So, I broke out the MMS antique wax and that did the trick. I think having all 3 waxes gives the mat an aged appearance that works for me.

As for the frame, I added two coats of MMS milk paint in Linen. I was hoping for a lot of chipping, but got very little. I added more distressing by sanding it lightly, and then finished with a combination of clear and antique wax.

Here is a close up of the end result.

I like how the aqua of the Provence shows through the Linen.

In the end, I can’t decide about this guy. Is he kind of fabulous? Or just kind of not fabulous.

So, you tell me. What do you think? Go ahead, be honest. I really want to know. Love it? Hate it? Indifferent?

antiquing in Boulder City.

Published on March 21, 2014March 22, 2014 by Quandie1 Comment

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I was in search of a fabulous vintage shop to visit in Las Vegas. I tried a google search and ended up finding a handful of vintage clothing stores, but that was about it. I also tried fleaquest and they had nothing listed in the Vegas area. I then looked for a Miss Mustard Seed retailer in the area. No dice (Vegas pun, get it?). Finally I resorted to searching for an Annie Sloan chalk paint stockist. And Bingo! (another Vegas pun, I crack myself up)

I found Bloom.

This is their location in Boulder City. If you are heading out to the Hoover Dam (as many tourists are inclined to do), I strongly suggest that you build in a little extra time and stop off in Boulder City. Not only will you find Bloom, but you will also find Goat Feathers Emporium, which is a really fun antique mall with a little bit of everything. Not every booth met my exacting standards, ;-), but there were some fun ones, like the Rusty Bucket’s booth.

Boulder City is very charming. They are obviously working to market the town as an antiquing destination. The are some very hip, retro drive in motels along the main drag, and quite a few more traditional antique shops in addition to Bloom and Goat Feathers.

I have to confess that the only thing I purchased in the antique shops was a handful of furniture keys. I try to grab a few of these whenever I see them. Oftentimes they will work on a piece of vintage furniture with locks on the drawers. Aside from the keys, I found the prices to be much higher than what I am used to in the Midwest. For instance, I saw several large vintage blue canning jars priced over $20! Yikes!

I did buy a few things at Bloom, some fab stencils to use on future furniture projects, some samples of Annie Sloan paint so I can see first hand what all the fuss is about, some fun Cavallini paper and a vintage alarm clock because I couldn’t resist the color. I bought the clock despite its cracked face. I was feeling a bit silly about buying a clock with a broken face, and then, ironically, that same evening I read a recent Miss Mustard Seed post where she did the same thing! So there. Not silly at all. If Miss Mustard Seed can do it, so can I, right?

It was fun to bop around the town on a gorgeous sunny afternoon with my sister.

Now that I know about Boulder City, you can be sure I will make it a point to spend an afternoon there the next time I visit mom.

One last little sidebar story. I’ve mentioned before that I come from a long line of scrapbooking women. My grandmother was an avid maker of scrapbooks. Way back in 1953 my mom, her parents and an aunt & uncle took the quintessential road trip. They were gone 21 days and they drove across the country from Minnesota to California. They hit all the highlights, the Grand Canyon, Yellowstone, Yosemite and so on. They even went to Tijuana, Mexico for a day. My grandmother chronicled the entire trip in a scrapbook, including information on how much money they spent. $123 in gas, $38 in hotels (yep, no kidding, for the entire trip, although they did stay with relatives some of the time). My mom was 12 at the time. I asked her if she enjoyed the trip, and she admitted that it wasn’t exactly fun sitting between her aunt and uncle in the back seat of a car with no a/c for 21 days! Imagine driving through the desert in the middle of summer this way! While reading the scrapbook at mom’s house, I found a blurb about their visit to Boulder City! Of course they visited the dam, which was built in the 1930’s. My grandmother had included a brochure from their visit that talked about the “modern” city of Boulder and how all of the buildings were “artificially cooled”. I had to laugh at seeing the city being promoted as modern in 1953, and now it is clearly being promoted as vintage in 2014. How times change.

garage sales, vegas style.

Published on March 19, 2014March 18, 2014 by QuandieLeave a comment

As much as I enjoy visiting with my mom and sister and the warmth and sunshine in Vegas this time of year, there just is no way I could ever live there. The garage sale scene is just entirely too dismal.

It’s not that there aren’t any around, there seem to be plenty, but the selection of items for sale is pretty pathetic. I have a theory about this, I believe that probably 80% (unscientific guesstimate) of the people living in Vegas moved there in the last 20 years. They moved into a brand new houses and I’m also guessing that many of them bought all new furniture when they did so. In other words, there is a lot of bad 90’s furniture in Vegas garage sales.

I am a die hard garage saler. I’ve been to a LOT of garage sales, so I know to expect some junk. But usually you find at least one or two cool vintage items, even if they aren’t something that you want. My sister and I went to probably about a dozen sales, and out of those there was only one that was even slightly decent.

All of that floral china is no longer my cup of tea, but at least it wasn’t cast off free coffee mugs from the casino. This gentleman also had some very lovely paintings. And in fact, I did buy a small one that would fit into my suitcase (more on that in another post).

Other than that, the only thing I purchased was a John Sanford book to read on the plane for 75 cents.

To round out our thrifty morning, we also stopped at the local Goodwill and Salvation Army stores. Again, nada. Zip. Zilch. More bad 90’s furniture and tacky casino freebies. My sister did find a lovely blue carnival glass bowl (she collects it) that was tempting, but it was priced at $18.99. Not exactly an amazing bargain. Plus she was worried about getting it home in one piece.

None the less, it was lovely being out in the Vegas sunshine and scouting for garage sale signs. My sister was a good sport and played along. It just whetted my appetite for garage sale season in Minnesota, which is probably still more than a month away. Sigh.

the real McCoy.

Published on March 17, 2014March 11, 2014 by Quandie2 Comments

I collect vintage pottery. You may have already noticed that from the pictures of my living room. I used to collect any I could find, but now I have limited myself to white and aqua vases. But sometimes I can’t resist a planter too, if it’s the right color.

I like the ones that have a definite art deco feel to them.

And I love the ones that have a little texture to them.

McCoy, Haeger, doesn’t matter to me.

Most of mine have come from garage sales. Occasionally I find them at antique shops, but they are usually priced too high for me there. Sometimes I even get my friends to dig them out of the neighbor’s yard (right nnK?). My friend Sue has an eagle eye for these things. She collects white, but she’ll pass the aqua ones on to me.

The tall aqua vase here is a Haeger.

I don’t care about a few chips and dings. I’ll face that side to the back.

I’m looking forward to summer when I can actually put some flowers in these. Pink peonies look especially nice in them. Maybe I’ll have enough tulips this spring to fill a large vase. Spring will be here soon, right?

sweet little writing desk.

Published on March 14, 2014March 9, 2014 by Quandie12 Comments

I am still off enjoying Las Vegas, but don’t think I forgot about you guys! I scheduled a post so you would have something to see on Friday.

Two weekends ago, I sent Mr. Q off for a writing desk. It was a bargain, and even though it wasn’t special and it didn’t make my heart skip a beat or anything, I still thought it would be worth a quick trip to Minneapolis and a bit of paint. It was listed as a ‘beautiful antique writing desk’ which may have been stretching things just a tad.

When Mr. Q got it home, I was a bit bummed when I realized there were some major flaws that definitely weren’t apparent in the craigslist ad. Beware of this people! Some photos are very artfully arranged to hide the true nature of an item (how does this still happen to me, clearly I should know better).

To begin with, the top was leather. Oops. How did I miss that? Oh, now I remember. In the ad pics the top was totally covered with crap. Papers, books, etc. Uh huh. Don’t know if that was on purpose or not.

Even more disheartening, the bottom trim on one side was completely broken off leaving a jagged edge under the bottom drawer.

My heart sank as I contemplated these flaws. However, I should not have underestimated the power of the Ken; handyman neighbor extraordinaire! He came over for a consultation, came up with a plan, took measurements and headed back to his workshop.

Several days later, he appeared at my door with new trim pieces cut to match the center drawer for both sides of the desk. Like magic!

As for the leather top, I decided to just try painting it. I’ve had success painting suitcases, and books, so why not a leather topped desk? After all, my friend Lori painted her cowboy boots with MMS milk paint! I don’t know how well it will hold up to a lot of wear and tear, but my philosophy is that these things are meant to look distressed, so a little more here and there just adds to the look, right?

I debated painting it turquoise. It’s been a while since I used a true turquoise, and this would have been amazing in that color. But that leather had some red ink stains. That could have been a bleed through nightmare, so I went with MMS Typewriter, which seemed apropos for a writing desk.

I added a french address to the front of the desk to give it a little more personality. And look at those charming drawer pulls. Love them.

All in all, it turned out to be a sweet little writing desk. It’s sure to inspire anyone who sits at it to write their memoirs or perhaps just pay their bills.

Before I leave you, here are some handy tips I learned from this desk.

No. 1, if you are selling a desk on craigslist, be sure you pull the drawers out and check behind them for paperwork! These sellers left a lot of personal information behind including pay stubs and medical bills. Luckily I am not an unscrupulous identity thief.

No. 2, if you are painting with black paint, at night, in your living room that has wood floors … and you manage to splatter paint everywhere despite your numerous drop cloths … and you don’t see it until daylight hits it the next day, don’t despair. A magic eraser cleans it right up from both the wall and the wood floor. Good to know.

what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas.

Published on March 12, 2014March 11, 2014 by Quandie1 Comment

I am off to Vegas! Leaving Mr. Q at home to man the fort. This may lead you to conclude that I am a party girl who likes drinking and gambling and staying up all night without my husband. Au contraire. In reality, my mom lives in Vegas. Once a year or so, both my sister (from New Jersey) and I fly out there at the same time to visit with mom and hang out where the sun always shines and there is no snow on the ground.

I probably have a very different Vegas experience than most. I like to visit favorite stores that we don’t have here in Minnesota. That would be Steinmart and Hobby Lobby (although now I do have my own Hobby Lobby). Plus there is an Anthropologie near mom’s house, and I never find time to get there at home. I’d love to find some fun vintage shops to visit, but have never had much success in finding any out there. Perhaps the locals are too busy gambling and they don’t care about vintage. Does anyone know of any? If so, leave a comment, I’ll be checking!

Aside from shopping, we’ll probably go to the movies, eat out a lot and in the mornings I’ll drink coffee and enjoy the sunshine because with the time change, I’m always awake 2 hours earlier than normal.

Usually I don’t even bother with the strip, but this time we are going to a show! Mom has connections and got some free tickets to the Bee Gee’s tribute show at the Excalibur.

Making their exciting debut in Las Vegas the talented tribute band brings the music of the famous Gibb brothers to the Las Vegas Strip. The Australian Bee Gees Show - A Tribute to the Bee Gees has become the world's leading Bee Gees show.

Most of all, I’m looking forward to 5 days away from the day job. Probably not long enough, but I’ll take it!

Don’t be surprised if I’m surfing craigslist from afar and sending Mr. Q off to pick stuff up even during my absence. It’s a sickness, I can’t help myself.

I will miss is my blog though (well, and of course I’ll miss Mr. Q). My mom doesn’t have a computer. I don’t own a laptop. Just my smartphone. I’ll be able to read comments and surf craigslist, but I won’t be posting long commentaries of any kind.

Try not to miss me!

another quandie quickie.

Published on March 10, 2014March 9, 2014 by Quandie4 Comments

After painting the petite buffet with MMS Ironstone milk paint, I had a little paint left in my jar. Waste not, want not. So, I decided to paint a few clay pots.

Here are the tools of the trade. Some MMS milkpaint in Ironstone, some 7 gypsies and Tim Holtz rub-ons, and let’s just pretend those pots aren’t painted yet 😉

I needed 3 coats of paint to get solid coverage, which is what I wanted. But this paint dries so fast you can do 3 coats in no time. I’d paint a coat, go fold a load of laundry, paint another coat, go surf pinterest, paint a 3rd coat, pour a glass of wine. You get the idea, just multi-task while your paint dries

I did not, however, take time to take photos during the process, so you’ll just have to use your imagination.

Once the paint was dried, I sanded the pots down a little, to give them a distressed look. Then I just added the rub-ons. Who doesn’t love a good rub-on? You can find the Tim Holtz brand at Michaels and Hobby Lobby.

After making sure the rub-on was adhered properly, I went over the entire pot with just a little MMS furniture wax.And voila. Some sweet little painted pots.

rue henri petite buffet.

Published on March 9, 2014March 8, 2014 by Quandie11 Comments

Sorry, there is no before picture of this little buffet. Honestly, that is mainly because it was just simply so completely boring that there was no point. Picture a typical oak finish, not a single embellishing feature and boring brass knobs. No real damage to be repaired or anything like that, just not even exciting enough to call ugly.

But, boring no longer!

I had a moment with this one where I didn’t think I could combat the blahness of it.

I started by painting it grey with MMS Trophy milkpaint. It’s a lovely shade, but it just didn’t do much for this one. No chipping at all. More blah. But I was texting with Lori, and she said “hey, why don’t you try the hemp oil resist?” Duh. Why didn’t I think of that? Well, truth be told, I had thought about layering color on this one, but it seemed like a lot of work and I was feeling lazy.

But, a hemp oil resist could be fantastic. I knew she was right and it had to be done. Clever girl. So, after the base coat of grey was dry, I swiped some hemp oil in strategic locations and painted Ironstone over it and crossed my fingers.

And it was so worth it. Just look at this chippy, crackled fabulousity (I made that word up, but yes, you can use it too)!

I added some knobs that I picked up during my Hobby Lobby knob nirvana buying frenzy. Aren’t these amazing? They look 50 years old.

I used what is becoming my favorite stencil on the doors.

You’ll notice that I staged this buffet with an amazing vintage hat box that I just picked up last week. I stopped in at a local antique mall, just killing some time on my lunch break. I wandered into a booth that was full of vintage hats, but way up high where you would hardly even notice them, were stacks of hat boxes. The color on this one just sucked me right in. A lovely pinky coral.

Kind of reminds me of Miss Mustard Seed’s new color Apron Strings. I’ll admit, I haven’t been tempted to try this color yet because I just can’t imagine it on an entire piece of furniture. But I’ve seen people using just touches of it, on the inside of a roll top desk, or just on the drawers. I’m definitely tempted now that I have the amazing hat box to match.

So. There she is. Isn’t she lovely. She will be making the trip to Junk Bonanza. Hope lots of people show up in the mood to buy furniture!