silver linings.

Published on by Quandie30 Comments

How about a mid-summer garden tour?  Everything is looking very green and lush right now, so it seems like a great time for an update.

You may remember that we had a horrendous hail storm back in May.

I was a tad upset by the damage done to my gardens, especially the hostas.

But let’s talk about silver linings!  As a result of the hail damage, Mr. Q and I are getting a new roof on both the house and the carriage house compliments of our insurance company.  What a blessing in disguise!

In addition, although the hostas were looking pretty rough after the storm, it was early enough in the season that most of them bounced back.

I trimmed away a lot of the really damaged leaves, and most of the hostas filled out with new ones.

There are a few that still look fairly sad, but for the most part we’re good.

Let me give you the technical details of my garden.  I garden in a suburb of the Twin Cities which is zone 4b.  I have a lot of shade, and in fact I don’t think any of my gardens qualify as ‘full sun’ since that means six to eight hours of sun per day.  There is a small portion of my yard that gets hot, full sun around noon, but really only for a few hours.  As a result, my flowering annuals do OK in that area, but they are never loaded with flowers like they would be with more sun.  So I mostly rely on foliage to provide interest in my gardens.

But playing around with different textures and colors of foliage has come a long way in the last 34 years (that’s how long we’ve been in this house, and that explains how well established my gardens are).  I can remember early days in my garden when all we had was one kind of variegated hosta, an Annabelle hydrangea, a couple of peonies that never bloomed, and lots of rocks!  Yep, originally the foundation gardens (garden beds installed along the house foundations) were all landscaping rock with a hosta popped in here and there.  We hauled all of those rocks out over time … well, OK, Mr. Q hauled all of those rocks out.

I’m really happy with how the front garden looks this year.  All of the hostas have filled in, the astilbe are looking fab and the dark purple huechera I added for contrast looks good too.  You may remember the rusty iron garden chair that I added earlier, it’s being swallowed up by plants now.

I forgot to give my sedum the chelsea chop this year and I’m kind of regretting that now.  If you aren’t familiar with the chelsea chop, you can read more about it in last year’s mid-season garden update.

We moved our fountain to this location in the front garden a few years back after trying it in a couple of other spots over the years.  So far, this spot is my favorite.  We can hear the water from our bedroom window which is lovely at night.

For the most part, I repeated last year’s plant selections in the front window box because they worked out so well  I’ve got several types of coleus, some lemon coral sedum, some dark purple oxalis, and a dark sweet potato vine.

And the fuchsia is doing especially well in there this year.

My favorite garden (although I suppose one shouldn’t play favorites) is the one that runs down the side between the house and the driveway.  This one is in full shade with the exception of some evening sun.  It’s filled with hostas, ferns, evening primrose, fairy candles, foam flower, heuchera, brunnera, lungwort and Cossetta, my statue.

I think it might be my favorite because it’s such a cool, shady spot to work in most of the time, so it tends to get the most attention from me.

You can just catch a glimpse of my Annabelle hydrandea in the background of that photo above.  This is the one that came with the house when we bought it, but it wasn’t in that spot.  It was originally in what is now my fern garden, we dug it up, divided it and planted half near the deck and half out behind the carriage house in the cutting garden.

Although it does look really lovely right now, I wouldn’t plant an Annabelle (Hydrangea arborescens) these days.  They tend to get floppy, so I much prefer the Hydrangea paniculata family of hydrangeas these days, although they aren’t blooming yet.  That’s the shrub that you can see behind my patio table and chairs in the photo above.

I’ve got 8 clematis, but not all of them bloom at the same time.  Currently the one on my arbor is in bloom …

and this one on an obelisk.

I planted an old galvanized sink with an herb garden and it sits up on the deck so we can easily grab some herbs when cooking.

I have to confess that I keep forgetting about the chives, even though I love fresh chives on a baked potato.  I’ve been adding the mint sprigs to my lemonade which is pretty refreshing.  I added the word ‘herbs.’ to the planter after cutting them out of adhesive vinyl on my Cricut machine.

I still have my chicken feeder turned planter hanging above the herb garden.

I have to be honest, it doesn’t hold much dirt so it’s a bit of a challenge to keep plants happy in it.  They dry out really quickly on hot summer days.  But I still enjoy having it out there.

I hope you enjoyed this brief tour of my garden.  Gardens are always a work in progress, and mine is no exception.  I have a couple of projects still in the works for this year, and I’m already planning ahead on what I may do next year.  How about you?  Do you have a green thumb, or do you prefer to let others do the gardening?  Leave a comment and let me know.

unintentionally accumulating.

Published on by Quandie20 Comments

I’ve had a little pile of vintage laundry items unintentionally accumulating this summer.  Some of them are items my picker has found for me, and some are things I found … or already had on hand.  They were all pretty random finds, but in the end they have a laundry related theme.

Meanwhile, I was skimming through the April 2022 issue of Country Living and they had an article on exactly this sort of thing.

They featured vintage clothespins, washboards, and these cool retractable clothes line reels …

I kinda wish I had one of those for my basement in the winter.

Anyway, after seeing that article I decided I should figure out a good container for grouping all of these items together for sale.  I had a couple of baskets on hand, but I didn’t like the size and/or shape of them for this particular use.

Then while garage saling a while back I found this wooden box.

I thought it would be the perfect size for my accumulation of stuff, and it was priced right at only $3.  So I nabbed it.

After giving it a good scrub with soap and water and then letting it dry in the sun for a day, I painted it with just one coat of Dixie Belle’s Midnight Sky.  Once the paint was dry I sanded it heavily to give it a really worn appearance.  Then I added the Laundry & Co stencil from Maison de Stencils using Dixie Belle’s Putty.

Today’s q tip; I highly recommend doing any sanding before adding your stenciling when working with highly contrasting colors like black and white, or red and white … if you wait until after adding the stencil you will get a mess when the fine sanding dust from the black paint works its way into the white (or, in this case, Putty) stenciling.

So, I sanded first, wiped away the dust and then added the stencil.

FYI, I usually use a small paint brush to fill in the bridges on these kinds of stencils, and I did do that on this one except for the word “AND”.  I must have missed that one!

After the stenciled design was dry, I used DB’s Big Mama’s Butta to finish off the box.

Next up, I gathered up all of my vintage goodies to fill it up including the Watkins Household Hints book I picked up a while back …

the washboard …

some vintage wooden clothespins …

and hangers …

and finally this adorable vintage embroidered clothes pin bag.

I filled up the box, and I even threw in the magazine for good measure.

Sweet, right?

It would make a fantastic house warming or wedding shower gift for someone who appreciates vintage.  One could also just add all of these items to their laundry room for some instant vintage flair.

I’ll be taking this one in to the shop where I sell on consignment and we’ll see if it goes, unless of course one of my locals wants to snatch it up first.  If interested, be sure to check my ‘available for local sale‘ page for more details.

this beats working 9 to 5.

Published on by Quandie10 Comments

This mini dresser/jewelry box came from a garage sale earlier this summer.

These little pieces are so much fun to make over.

With this one, I initially thought about replacing the knobs with something else.  However, those knobs are glued in place and it would have been more trouble than it was worth to remove them.  However, I did use some Dixie Belle Mud to fill in those grooves on each drawer front.  I just didn’t like them and thought it would be preferable to have a flat surface.

Today’s q tip; once the Mud is dry and you have sanded your surface smooth, add a coat of sealer of some kind over it before painting.  That will ensure that you don’t see a difference in the way the filler absorbs the paint v. the wood finish.  I simply sprayed these drawer fronts with some Rustoleum matte clear spray paint, but you could also brush on a clear sealer as well.

Next up I painted the entire piece in Dixie Belle’s Putty.  I let that dry overnight as a base coat.  Then I continued to work on my paint blending skills by blending Putty and Drop Cloth.

Once again, I kept the color blending very subtle, trying to make it lighter in the middle and darker on the outer edges.  Maybe one of these days I’ll graduate to a more obvious look, but I’m definitely not ready for that yet.

Here, maybe you can see the color blending a little bit more on the top of the piece …

As you can also see, I used a section from IOD’s Label Ephemera transfer on the top.  I added pieces from their Floral Anthology transfer to the front and sides …

and then added some more Label Ephemera wording over that on the bottom drawer.

Once the transfers were in place, I sanded lightly with 220 grit paper and then added a topcoat of clear wax.

In an homage to my former day job as an accountant, I lined the drawers with some old October Afternoon scrapbook paper from their 9 to 5 line.

Ahhh … debits and credits, general ledger, account no … all things I no longer have to worry about 😉

Instead I get to spend my time working on fun little projects like this one.

Whether my pieces sell or not, this still definitely beats working 9 to 5!

And speaking of sales, this piece is for sale locally so be sure to check my ‘available for local sale‘ page for more details.

Thank you to Dixie Belle Paint Co for supplying the paint used on this project.

scandi end tables.

Published on by Quandie21 Comments

Moving forward on my plan to unstick myself, creatively speaking, I decided to work on this fabulous pair of end tables that came from my neighbor nnK’s parents.

She’d grown tired of them and replaced them with chrome and glass of some kind.

They look great from that angle, but nnk’s mom had kept houseplants on these tables resulting in water damage to both tops.

There was also a spot where the veneer was worn through, I’m not quite sure how that happened.  In addition, the pieces were discolored from years in bright and sunny living room overlooking the lake.

All of which meant that these tables were great candidates for some paint.

I decided to keep it super simple, just painting the damaged shells of the tables and leaving the drawer fronts and legs in their original finish.

Since the previous owners had often spruced up these tables with a coat of furniture oil of some kind, I gave them an extra thorough cleaning with Dixie Belle’s White Lightning which contains trisodium phosphate.  I usually use a TSP substitute, but in this case I thought I should go for the big guns.

Today’s q tip; always wear gloves when using TSP.  Also, be sure to rinse your piece with clean, plain water after cleaning it with White Lightning to remove any residue.

Once the tables were dry again, I sanded them with 220 grit paper to rough up the surface a bit and thus improve the adherence of the paint.

Finally, I painted the shell in Dixie Belle’s Silk paint in Anchor.  Just a reminder, Anchor is the black in the Silk line, Black Sands is a charcoal grey.  I was confused by that once and ordered the wrong color and I don’t want you guys to make the same mistake.

Once again, I chose the Silk line from Dixie Belle because of its built in primer and top coat.  It was super simple to add two coats of Anchor to each table.

The Silk paint has just a tad more shine to it than the very flat chalk paint, but I’d say it’s comparable to the sheen you get with a waxed chalk paint finish.

I then spruced up the existing finish on the areas that I didn’t paint using some of Dixie Belle’s Big Mama’s Butta.

By the way, the backs of the tables look like this …

And here is the completed pair.

I like the clean, modern lines of this Scandi looking pair.

Although this isn’t my usual style, it was still fun to breath new life into these tables with just a little paint and some butta’.  The next step will be to find out whether or not they will sell!  I’ll keep you posted.  Of course, if any of you locals are interested in purchasing this pair, be sure to check my ‘available for local sale‘ page for the details.

As always, thanks to Dixie Belle Paint Co for providing the White Lightning, Silk paint and Big Mama’s Butta used for this makeover.

getting unstuck.

Published on by Quandie43 Comments

As I’ve mentioned recently, my furniture is not selling very quickly (or at all) for me these days.

I had a really strong start to 2022.  I sold a number of pieces in January and February including the nightstands made by separating the two sides of a vanity …

this gorgeous armoire …

the barrister bookcase …

a primitive chippy dresser …

and the botanical cupboard …

But since then the only piece of furniture I’ve sold is the dry sink.

Well, and also the rusty garden furniture, which I suppose does count as the sale of furniture.

I’ve been selling refurbished furniture for a long time, and if there is one thing I can say for sure, it’s that it is very difficult to predict what will sell and what won’t.  Mainly because it changes all the time.

For a while there, dressers were a sure fire seller for me while more unique pieces like dry sinks, armoires, book shelves or restyled radio cabinets were likely to be more difficult to sell.  Now the opposite seems to be true.

One of the problems I have when unsold pieces start backing up is that I have nowhere to store them safely.  Sure, I could put them out in the carriage house, but it is damp and dirty out there (not to mention the bugs and critters).  Definitely not a great environment for storing my finished pieces.  They really need to be inside the house, so I line them up in the dining room.  And currently I’m out of space out there.

But really, the bigger problem I have when pieces aren’t selling is that I get stuck creatively.  I totally lose my motivation for working on more furniture.  I just can’t continue to add to the pile.  It starts to weigh me down.

So I took some time this past holiday weekend to try and brainstorm some potential solutions to this problem and I came up with a few ideas.

First up, I have this washstand that hasn’t sold.

I decided that I really liked this piece myself, and it could possibly work in my front hallway.  So I put it out there just to see how it would look.

It turned out to be a good fit.  So at least it’s out of my dining room and freeing up some space in there for now.  I’ll continue to list it for sale, but in the meantime I’ll enjoy it in my hallway.

Next up is the bench.

As you may remember, this is look number 3 for this bench.

If it still doesn’t sell in the next month or so, I may possibly take it into the shop where I sell on consignment.  I don’t usually take big pieces of furniture to them, and I have to wait until they have space for it, but maybe I can reach a wider audience … or at least a new audience … there.

I’ve also decided to try something a little more trendy on this piece …

I’m going to strip the drawer fronts and then either leave them as raw wood or add a white wax.  Then I’ll repaint the rest of the shell in a closely matching chalk paint, maybe Dixie Belle’s Putty or maybe the Burlap that I used on those nightstands.  Or maybe I’ll just strip the whole thing.  I’m not sure yet.  But it will be getting a new, raw wood sort of look.

If that ends up helping it sell, I may have to rework the other two dressers that aren’t selling.  This one …

and this one …

Another idea I had is to try going in a little different direction with the style of pieces I work on, starting with this set of modern end tables.

I’ll be sharing their makeover with you tomorrow.  And then we’ll see if these sell quickly or not.  If so, maybe I need to change up my inventory and focus more on mid mod pieces?

And finally, I’m also going to spend some time working on a couple of projects for myself.  I have a cabinet that I’ve been meaning to get to that will be part of a makeover of my shed/photo cottage, and I also have a headboard that I’m making into a sign to hang on the carriage house.

So hopefully in the end some/or all of these options will help me get unstuck.

I’d love to hear from any of you that are furniture refurbishers.  What is selling for you these days?  And when you get stuck, how do you get unstuck?  Leave a comment and let me know.

nothing earth shattering.

Published on by Quandie6 Comments

I went to the Longfellow (Minneapolis) neighborhood sale the weekend before last and it was pretty much a bust.  I brought home a couple of jigsaw puzzles, another glass canister, a shovel with a beautiful wooden handle, and this E. Swasey & Co crock.

The crock has some pretty good chips and dings in it.  I ended up giving it a quick refresh by filling the chips in the upper dark brown area with some paint to make them less noticeable.

Dixie Belle’s Coffee Bean was a pretty good match.  I added a top coat of DB’s Gator Hide over the Coffee Bean to try and match the sheen on the pottery as well.  It’s definitely not a professional looking repair or anything, but it improved the appearance of the crock.  This one wouldn’t be collector quality, but it would be great for holding utensils on the kitchen counter or as a plant pot.

Normally I wouldn’t even bother sharing this with you guys, but I wanted to point out that I don’t always come home from neighborhood sales with a carload of amazing finds.

I was with my sister and my niece that morning, and by 11 a.m. we’d had enough so we gave up on the garage sales and went for brunch at the Longfellow Grill.  They have a lovely patio, and the food and mimosas were delicious.

But all is not lost.  I also popped over to a sale near me recently and came home with a few goodies.

The sled will go into my stash for Christmas, as will the metal ‘Christmas trees’.  The metal lockbox will be added to my growing pile of metal boxes so that I’ll have plenty to work on when the weather isn’t quite as nice.  True, it’s not a toolbox, but I’ve done a couple of these lock boxes and they turn out pretty cool too …

The doorstop will head to the shop …

As will the urn …

I found a spot for that funky wire thingie in my garden …

It was the perfect fit for this little concrete urn filled with pale pink double impatiens.

And that leaves the galvanized tote.

I cleaned it up and added an Everyday Farmhouse transfer to the side.

Then I had some fun staging it up with my faux flowers.

It will also make its way to the shop to be sold.

So, nothing earth shattering, but I did find a few goodies to share with you guys after all!  Hope you enjoyed seeing my finds, and what I’ve done with them.  Let me know if you have a favorite.

steep and hilly.

Published on by Quandie8 Comments

We had some absolutely perfect weather this past Sunday, so my sister, niece and I decided to take advantage of it and do some hiking.  My niece purchased an annual state park pass, and we are getting lots of use out of it.

We started out in Whitewater State Park, which is near Winona, MN.  The list of trails in this park all seem to have one thing in common, the guide describes them as steep and hilly.  Personally I’m more of a ‘flat and wooded’ sort of hiker, but I was game to try ‘steep and hilly’ if it meant getting an amazing view.  So we headed for the Chimney Rock Trail.

Hmmm, a ‘moderate’ 1 hour hike, that seems easily doable, right?

It starts out pleasantly enough with a stone bridge over the Whitewater River.

As soon as you’re across, you see some steps in front of you.

But that, my friends, is only the beginning.  There are over 100 steps leading up to Chimney Rock, interspersed with some narrow, rocky trails.

It was fun to check out Chimney Rock, but I have to admit I wasn’t brave enough to crawl inside (although plenty of others were).

Although going up is physically challenging, for me it’s coming back down that totally freaks me out.  I was so focused on not slipping and falling that I didn’t even take any photos on the way down.

But we made it down safely, and then decided maybe the Trout Run Creek Trail, which was described as flat with packed dirt was more our speed.

It was really lovely.  We were surrounded by leafy forest that was filled with bird song.

However, we’d only gone a little way down this trail when we saw a turn off for Inspiration Point.  There were a couple of hikers coming down from that trail and they told us we really shouldn’t miss it.  Sure, it’s steep and there are over 100 more stairs, but it’s so worth it.

And I thought the first trail was scary.  Yikes!

If you like narrow, rocky trails with a steep drop off beside you, or lots and lots of rickety wooden stairs, you’ll love this trail.

But I have to agree that it was worth it to get to Inspiration Point.

That being said, none of the three of us were actually brave enough to go stand at the very end of the point.  Luckily that other lone hiker went out there so I could include her in my photo to try and capture the scale of the place.

The view was pretty spectacular, even from where we stood (in safety).

Unfortunately my photos definitely don’t do it justice.

I have to confess that my fear of heights kept me from really admiring the beauty up there.  And on the way down I was too concerned with not falling to my death to get any photos.  But I found this great post on daytripper28.com with good photos of these trails, including a picture of the rather frightening stairs coming down from Inspiration Point, so go check it out if you want to see what I’m talking about.

After making it back to the car in one piece, we decided to head over to Carley State Park.  This is a much smaller, and less spectacular, park.  But my sister and niece want to get to as many of the Minnesota state parks as possible, and it was just a short distance from Whitewater.  We did a quick hike through the woods there just so that they could check it off their list.

We decided to take the scenic route home from there and stop off in Lake City.

If you aren’t familiar, Lake City is located on the Minnesota side of Lake Pepin.

Lake Pepin is a naturally occurring lake on the Mississippi River (ie. it was not created by a man made damn).  It’s known as the birthplace of water skiing which was invented here in 1922 (you can read more about that here).

We didn’t realize it beforehand, but Lake City was celebrating Water Ski Days last weekend.  We arrived just in time to have roads blocked by the parade, but too early to see the water ski show.

That’s OK, we found a great ice cream place and enjoyed some waffle cones while wandering around lakeside.

As I enjoyed my white chocolate raspberry ice cream I was reminded of what a beautiful state Minnesota is.  So tell me, where do you live and what are some of the prettiest spots near you?  And are you a fan of steep and hilly, or is flat and wooded more your style as well?

 

 

annie’s dresser.

Published on by Quandie15 Comments

Back when my friend Annie gave me the toolbox that I shared back in May, she also had two dressers that she wanted to part with.  I really thought I would get to these sooner, but here it is the end of June!

I have to say, I thought time would slow down a bit once I was retired from the full time job.  But if anything, it just goes even faster!  I also thought I’d have plenty of time to get EVERYTHING done.  Ha!  Jokes on me.

But I finally have the first dresser finished.  Here’s how it looked when I brought it home way back in April, before there were leaves on the trees or plants coming up in the garden.

If you predicted that I would remove those carved details from the drawer fronts, you were right.  It’s funny, there was a time when I was adding details like that to plain pieces.  Now I’m taking them off.  Just goes to show how trends change.

They were easy to remove using a chisel to pry them away from the drawer.  They had been both nailed and glued, so once I had them off I sanded any remaining glue off the drawers.

I wanted to break out of my Drop Cloth/Midnight Sky (ie. warm white/black) comfort zone and try a new color, so I pulled out Dixie Belle’s Dried Sage.  They describe this color as a soft gray with green undertones, which is pretty darn accurate.

So, OK, maybe I didn’t take a really huge leap out of my comfort zone.  More like a baby step.

After my usual prep process of lightly sanding and cleaning this piece, I gave it two coats of Dried Sage.  Once it was fully dry, I added I.O.D.’s Petit Rosier transfer to the drawer fronts.

Once I had the transfer applied, I top coated the piece with Dixie Belle’s flat clear coat.

After the clear coat was on, I got busy with other things and the dresser sat for a few days.  That was when disaster struck.

Well, OK, ‘disaster’ might be a bit of an overstatement, but basically the water based topcoat drew the stain through the paint.

I’ve had this happen before, and quite honestly I should have known better with this piece.  Looking back at the reddish orange stain on the piece in the ‘before’ photo, I don’t know why I didn’t just head this problem off at the pass with a coat of Dixie Belle’s B.O.S.S. to block stain bleed through.  Often times you’ll see bleed through right away with the first coat of paint, but every once in a while the stain won’t bleed through the paint until you add that topcoat.  And even then, it can take a couple of days to show up.

Normally at this point I would just start over with a coat of B.O.S.S. followed by another coat of paint.  But in this case I’d already applied a slightly pricey transfer to those drawer fronts.

Fortunately, the drawer fronts didn’t look that bad.  So I added a coat of B.O.S.S. to the top and sides of the dresser and then headed off on my trip to my mom’s house.  When I returned a week later, I added another coat of Dried Sage to the shell of the dresser.

As I expected, the areas with the B.O.S.S. were a slightly lighter color than the drawer fronts.  So I decided to see what I could do with different top coats to darken them up.  I dug out a practice board, painted it in the Dried Sage and then tried four different top coats.

As you can see, the flat clear coat just barely darkened up the color of the paint.  Clear wax darkened it just a teeny bit more.  The DIY Dark & Decrepit was too much.  But I decided that I could work with the Dixie Belle brown wax over an initial coat of clear wax.

Today’s q tip:  if you start with an initial coat of clear wax, the dark wax you add over it will be easier to manipulate and blend.  It will also make it easy to remove any excess dark wax if you put too much on your piece.  You can go back with clear wax on a rag and use it like an eraser to remove some of the dark wax.

So, I clear waxed the shell of the dresser first, then added some dark wax here and there, especially around the drawers to blend the color of the drawer fronts with the color of the shell.

I think it worked out fairly well.  Obviously this is a case of do as I say, not as I do.  I’m reminded to hedge my bets by starting with a coat of B.O.S.S. whenever I encounter a stain that even remotely looks like it might bleed.

The sides of the dresser are much improved.

You may have already noticed that I did not put the original hardware back on this piece.  I planned to initially, but after seeing how nicely the black transfer contrasted with the Dried Sage, I decided to go with a simple black knob from Hobby Lobby instead.

Finally, I lined the drawers with some pretty paper.

And with that, Annie’s dresser has been made over.

What do you think?

This dresser is for sale, be sure to check my ‘available for local sale’ page for details.

Thank you to Dixie Belle Paint Co for supplying their products used in this makeover.

the pie safe.

Published on by Quandie17 Comments

I found this vintage metal pie safe at a garage sale earlier this summer.

I liked the chippy original paint job, but it needed to be cleaned up, and the inside was in pretty rough shape.  It was also missing the shelves.

I wanted this piece to be functional for storage, so I asked Ken to cut a piece of wood to use as a shelf.  Then I cleaned the interior and followed that up with a couple of coats of Dixie Belle’s Kudzu.

I love that pop of vibrant green, don’t you?

As for the outside, I decided to retain that original chippy finish.  I gave it a good clean, then I sanded it lightly to remove any flaking paint and then I sprayed it with some Rustoleum matte clear spray sealer to reduce further chipping.

Finally, I added some bits from I.O.D.’s Label Ephemera transfer to the door, and then gave that another coat of the spray sealer.

I’m happy that I was able to keep the authentic look of this piece, while also giving it a little more pizzazz (and functionality) with some paint and transfers.

I suppose if you bake a lot of pies, you could actually use this as a pie safe, but I think it would be perfect in a potting shed.

It would also be awesome hung on the wall in a bathroom and used to store toiletries and such.  If only we didn’t have the world’s smallest bathroom at our house!

It has some holes at the back of the top that would make it easy to hang.

No matter where you use it, I think it would make a fabulously unique storage solution.

This piece is for sale, so if you’re local be sure to check out my ‘available for local sale‘ page for more details.

if it’s broken.

Published on by Quandie10 Comments

If it ain’t broken, don’t fix it.  But if it is broken, well … sometimes you still can’t quite fix it.

A few weeks back my handyman/neighbor Ken and his wife asked me whether or not I would like to have their cast iron garden furniture.  It’s your typical set that includes a bench (not pictured below), two chairs and a little round table, all in the classic grapevine pattern.

By the way, the giant pot is not from the neighbors, I only put it in the ‘before’ photo because I was working on it at the same time.  Kinda wish I hadn’t done that, but that’s water under the bridge now.

Ken and Arlene have had this set for decades.  I’m sure at least 40 years or more.  Every year they would haul it into their shed for the winter to save it from the elements.  But over the years, Ken has found that task more and more difficult because these pieces are pretty heavy.  For the last few years my other neighbor (the athletic trainer at a nearby high school) has gotten some football players to help with that task.  Still, Ken wanted to be rid of the furniture.  He’s tired of storing it in the shed every year (and I also suspect he’s tired of re-painting it bright white every few years), but his wife won’t have it any other way.

When they offered the set to me, I had to point out that I would leave it out in the winter.  Not only would I leave it out in the winter, but I would purposely make it rusty.  So if they couldn’t handle seeing that, they shouldn’t give it to me.

But they were still willing, so I took it!

There were a couple of issues though.  Both the bench and one of the chairs have broken legs that Ken wasn’t able to repair.  If you’ve followed me for long, you know that Ken is my fixer.  So if Ken can’t fix it, well, I’m not even going to try.  Apparently he even went so far as to have a welder attempt to weld the legs in place, and that didn’t work.

So basically, neither of those two pieces are suitable for actual sitting.

Well, that’s OK with me.  I planned to use the Dixie Belle Patina Paint to make them rusty, and unless you seal them, that makes them unsuitable for sitting on anyway.  Plus, let’s face it, it’s not like this furniture is comfortable, right?  Does anyone ever actually sit on it?  This is definitely one of those form over function sort of situations.

So I made them rusty.  The bright white just wasn’t ‘me’.  As per usual, I started off in the wrong direction.  I decided to give them a dark base color so there wouldn’t be any patches of white poking through the rust.  I also decided to use spray paint for this, simply because it would be way easier than painting them with a brush.  I had a couple of cans of gloss black on hand, so I thought it would be OK to use that.  So I sprayed them up … and boy was that gloss spray paint SHINY.  Like so. very. shiny.

I didn’t want to see super shiny black spots behind my rust, so I switched directions and gave the pieces a base coat of flat red spray primer.  Much better.

One caveat re: the primer, if I was concerned about these pieces rusting for real I could have used the Dixie Belle Prime Start.  It contains an acid blocker that prevents the activator (green spray) that you apply later from eating through the paint and degrading your metal item.  But I’m OK with these pieces rusting away for the next decade or two.

Next I followed the normal process with the Dixie Belle Patina Paint in Iron, followed by the green spray (you can get detailed info on that process by clicking on the image below).

For reference, it took most of the 8 oz. container of the Iron paint to do the two chairs and the round table (I haven’t gotten to the bench yet).  So if you’re planning a rusty project, maybe this gives you an idea of how far the paint goes.

I really loved the rusty look I achieved on these pieces.

Yep, rusty is much more to my taste than the bright white … or the glossy black for that matter.

As I’ve mentioned in the past, the rusty patina can take a while to fully develop.  I’ve also noticed that a little rain falling on the items will speed up that process.

Dixie Belle does make a sealer specifically for use over their patina paint called Patina Guard.

You may want to consider using this sealer to protect a rusty finish, or more importantly to protect yourself from sitting on a rusty finish.  But personally I don’t like the sheen it imparts, so I prefer to leave my rusty pieces unsealed.  You can read more about that in this post.

I’ll be splitting up all of these pieces rather than keeping them together as a set.

One of the chairs has found a home in my front garden next to the fountain.

I also have a spot picked out for the bench (once it’s done).

I did have a plan for the other chair and table, but ended up not liking them in the spot I picked out.  So now I’m going to attempt to sell those two unbroken pieces.  So if any of you locals are in need of a rusty table and chair for your garden, be sure to check out my ‘available for local sale‘ page for more details.

As for that pot, I made that rusty too, and here is how it turned out …

The pot also has a grape vine motif that looks great rusty.

It’s also available for local sale.

While I’m at it, I also have this pair of tall rusty planters and obelisks available.

These are quite tall and would look amazing flanking a door, or maybe a path in your garden.

Be sure to check out my ‘available for local sale‘ page for the details on all of these rusty items.

Have I gone overboard with the rusty look?  I don’t think so.  In fact I have another pair of planters that are going to go rusty next, and I still have to get to that bench!

As always, thank you to Dixie Belle for providing me with their Patina Paint products.