I made it to the other side...

After being hit with Hurricane Irene last week, and torrential downpours for the past week, everyone has been affected by flooding.  We seen to be living in a small pocket, protected by the harshest weather.  Not to say that 4 feet of snow 2 winters ago was protected, but that doesn't happen all the time.  This year has been horrible for weather in Pennsylvania.  In the Spring we had rain constantly, and too many tornadoes.  I thought I was living in Kansas.  The summer was pretty dry, my new garden was pitiful to say the least.  My carrots were only about an inch long.  My broccoli and cauliflower grew to only about 2 inches tall from seed. I could go on and on, but now entering the fall the East Coast has had its share of Tropical Storms.  So today was the first time the kids and I got out of the house in a week.  So we drove to the other side of town, thru traffic (hate it), and made my way to the Salvation Army.  I was on the hunt for a desk for my son. The one that I have is just too big, so he needs a place to play in his room.  So we had a choice of 5 and Zachary got to pick what he wanted.  I think he made a nice choice.  It's going to take a little work to make it pretty, but he's happy with it, and so am I. Oh, and it's heavy! So when he gets mad and doesn't want to do his homeschooling, it will hold up...LOL.

My NEW old table

I love vintage and antiques!  The quality is awesome!  Real wood...that's what I'm talking about.  This new wood (MDF), once it gets wet, forget about it.  My husband picked up a table and chair set a few months that he found out for trash.  I was thinking about taking off the old fabric from the chairs and putting something bold on them.  The table top itself was peeling.  They put a wood laminated top on, and thru the years it was chipping.  Everytime I brushed against it (my kitchen is small), I would catch the snags.  Well one boring, raining day I decided to peel, strip, whatever it took to get that laminate off.  A razor blade did a pretty good job.  But once I got all that junk off, and sanded, I realized it was more mdf underneath.  And some parts I sanded too long, so there was no way I was going to stain the top.  So I was on the hunt for a new table top.  Well, on craigslist I found an old set, table, 5 chairs and 2 leaves for $50.  Yep $50 bucks!  Posted my old set for free and sent hubby out for my new to me set.

That is my sad old part.  Here is my new set just fresh from the rain.

I love it.  The chairs need to be tightened.  Now I'm thinking of painting the chairs and the base of the table, and just sanding the top and poly it. Here's my dilemma, the guys had a difficult time getting it in our narrow door, so I think I have to refinish it in my kitchen.  But for now, I love it, finally real wood in my kitchen.

I have to get back to the other side of town

Went to the Salvation army a few months ago and picked up this little side table for $4.  So far I have sanded it and primed it white.  My problem is, I have no decorating sense in my home.  I need an interior designer to come in and move all my furniture so it has a nice flow.  My living room walls are a deep red, and I love the color.  I don't care if red is out and blue and green are in.  My son has a blue room and it gives me a headache just walking in there.  I have to take a picture of the rooms later, maybe someone out there can help me.  here's the table that needs some color.

I love yard sale season

At the beginning of yard sale season, the kids and I went hunting.  I found this sad dresser in someones yard.  The had a sign for $20 on it, I got it for $15 since they didn't want to carry it back in the house.  I love old, real wood furniture.  Someone had painted or stained this black, and it could have been perfect for that primative look.  but I really wanted to see what was under there.  So I stripped it.  And stripped it again.  Boy in the hot sun, the stripper kept drying on me, so I had to apply another layer. But then I was seeing the beautiful wood underneath.  So all I did was sand it, let it dry and applied wipe on poly in satin.  The details on this dresser are awesome.  i still haven't found the perfect place for it, so right now it's in my living room holding all our dvd's.

My husband now knows to pick up things along the road.

Thank goodness he has a pick up truck.  I have a mini van and have packed it full.  But I always have the kids with me so I have to be careful with items I get, so they don't get bonked on the head.  So this summer we picked up a pile of wood bi-fold doors ans old wood shutters.  I tried my hand at a plant stand with the shutters.

This summer I have been busy

At least with home projects.  One of the first things i wanted to tackle was turning a twin headboard and foot board into a bench for my porch.  Pretty easy, got hubby to cut the foot board in half, well close enough. He can't cut very straight, but it takes me a while to warm up to power tools.

Day 3

Ok, generally in my restorations, or furniture project it doesn't take me 3 days.  But this sectional is driving me crazy. I have never reulpholstered anything in my life, and now I know why I haven't tried to tackle this before.  After removing hundreds of tacks and staples, I now have to use hundreds of staples to hold this new fabric on.  After several cuts and scraps on my fingers and hands, it's almost completely covered.  Today I had to pull the sewing machine out of the closet and dust it off.  See, hubby thought it would be a really nice Christmas present a few years back. I had mentioned wanting a sewing machine once, but not using one since I was in 7th grade, I was "pleasantly" surprised to receive one. Every gals Christmas dream!  So I attempted my hand at stitching the back with piping. Here's my attempt, not quite finished.  I have to figure out how to attach the fabric to the one side since my staple gun won't fit. Now I have to sew the bottom cushion and add some trim to cover my staples.  UGH!