Pimp My Crib

I am so glad it's Monday!  Why?  Because, when our furniture flipper Martin Hodgson of Pimp My Crib sent me today's flips, I was so excited about them I almost couldn't wait for today to show them to you!  I know you will love them just as much as I do!  

Martin is based in the United Kingdom and has been making children's themed beds for years.  Last year he decided to try his hand at cribs, too.  He took a second hand crib and decided to make a sample one.  (Martin stresses that when making one to sell he always uses a new crib.)

He worked his magic on it and turned it into a carriage, fit for a little princess.

Here it is all ready for paint.

And here it is finished...

Isn't that fantastic?  Can you imagine having that in your child's nursery?  Wow!  Amazing.  

Wait, there's more!

This next picture Martin sent shows a complete nursery full of furniture he created.  

What a lucky little baby Indianna is!  Speaking of Indianna, I have been trying to get somebody in my family to name their future daughter that!  I have been trying for what seems like FOREVER!  So far, nobody has.  I'm still hoping.  (They could call her Indy for short!)

Martin is a fulltime dad who pursues his craft on a part-time basis.  He keeps pretty busy with his orders.  Check out these other themed beds he created.

What lucky children to slumber in these beds.  

Look at the one with the slide.  You'd never get your kids out of their rooms!
 
Thank you so much Martin Hodgson for sharing your incredible talent!  

You can check out more of his work on his Pimp My Crib Facebook page. 

How's that for a start to the week?  Have you submitted your furniture flip yet?  I hope you do!  Email me before/after pics and plenty of details to furnitureflippin@gmail.com .

~ Stephanie  

Chalk It Up To Good Taste & A Valentine's Giveaway...

It's the Friday before Valentine's Day and boy, do I have a special Furniture Flip for you today!  Not only that, but there's a chance to win a Chalky Patina Paint Package from Bluestone House™ worth $150!  You can thank my flippin' friend Denise of Salvaged Inspirations for this wonderful opportunity.  

If you don't already subscribe to Salvaged Inspirations blog or follow her Facebook page, you are missing out.  Denise very generously shares the steps she takes in accomplishing her furniture makeovers on her blog.  Do you know how invaluable that alone is?  Not only will she teach you a thing or two, you'll have fun along the way because she is a riot.  
 
Let's take a look at her one of her latest pieces.  She began with this lovely dresser.  The dresser had spent some time in the past as a dog's chew toy.  It's legs bore the scars of that pup.  That didn't deter Denise.   She fell in love with it.

This is Denise

This is me

Denise did a "Wash & Dry" technique on it.  (I'm going to butt in here and say, that I adore Denise.  The only thing where she & I could have a parting of ways is in regards to a different "wash & dry" technique.  She has a dishwasher but doesn't use it.  She prefers to wash dishes by hand.  That almost could make me dump her as my friend.  I have a dishwasher and I can't live one day without it.  Opposites attract tho, so I won't break her heart two days before Valentine's Day.) 

Denise repaired the dog chewed area with Bondo.  She then sanded down the entire dresser and removed the dust.  After completing her "Wash & Dry" technique, she added new hardware along with the original.  Then she lined the drawers.  

Now without further ado, let's check out the entire piece completed...

Isn't that lovely?  Denise has excellent taste.  You can read all of the steps it took to accomplish this makeover at Salvaged Inspirations.  While there you can also find out how to enter for the Bluestone House™ Valentine's Day Giveaway.  The package includes: 

• French Country 473ml/16oz
• Bluestone 473ml/16oz
• Moulin Rouge 236 ml/8oz
• Emma 120ml/4oz
• Vintage Velvet 120ml/4oz
• 100% All Natural Bee's Wax 120ml/4oz
• Small Brush
• Sanding Block
• Buffing Rags
• Color Card 

You only have a couple of days left to enter.  So hurry! 
Be sure and check out Denise's past projects featured here. 
I showed you her "Fifty Shades of Grey-Green" China Cabinet.  I also featured her "Stenciled China Cabinet".   Gorgeous!

Thanks so much Denise for sharing your latest furniture flip and for letting the Furniture Flippin' readers in on this giveaway.

That wraps up another week of Furniture Flippin'.  I hope you've submitted your own Furniture Flips.  If you haven't you can email me at furnitureflippin@gmail.com .  Send before/after pics and all the details you'd like to share.

Have a great weekend and Valentine's Day!

~ Stephanie

Vanity Tables, Valentine's Day and A Lady Named Vonda...

Sesame Street called and they said today is brought to us by the letter V.  

I'm flippin' off the camera with the wrong finger.

Did you know my nickname used to be Sesame?  I probably told you once.  My first boyfriend when I was four years old couldn't say Stephanie and always called me Sesame.  That's okay because I couldn't say his name and instead of it coming out as Christopher, it came out as Kissifer.  My two older sisters and younger brother would call me Sesame because I loved Sesame Street.  They would sing a song "Sesame lives on Sesame Street, doo-dah, doo-dah" to torment me.  In return they were known as Baa-Baa Black Sheep (Becky), Lee Ann Pee Pan (Lee Ann) and Mikey Pikey Sat On A Trikey (Michael).  Later we would tease Michael even further by singing "Happy Tasting Apple Jacks" whenever we wanted to bug him.  He knew what we meant by singing that jingle.  We knew what we meant.  Our parents did NOT know that "Happy Tasting Apple Jacks" really meant "Hailey, Tiffany, Amber, and Jennifer" - the four little girls in the neighborhood we would tease him about.  Sneaky sisters we were!

On to a lady named Vonda.  Today we are going to visit Vonda of Antiqued With Love based in Gilbertown, Alabama.  When Vonda decided to purchase this vanity after seeing it advertised for sale she was too late.  Another person had offered to buy it.  As luck would have it, that sale fell through and Vonda had it in her possession.  

The vanity had it's issues but nothing that Vonda hadn't seen before.  She decided to do a paint/stain combo on it.  She sanded it down, primed it, and painted two coats of Valspar Signature Latex Satin in Lovely Bluff on the body.  Then she distressed it and dark glazed it to give it an antiqued look .  For the top she stained it Java gel stain and then sealed it with polyurethane.

This color combination really looks good on this piece.  See for yourself...

Beautiful.  Let's look at a couple of more pictures...

Alas, this vanity sold before she even finished it's transformation so if you were hoping your honey would buy it for you for Valentine's Day, you are out of luck.  

Speaking of Valentine's Day, it seems like just yesterday that my own honey and I traveled all over the countryside looking for a vanity table to redo for me as a Valentine's Day gift.  It was one of our first flips together.  When we were finished, my husband wanted to be sure I would always remember how much he loved me, if I ever felt like clobbering him with the chair.  (Would I do that? Hehehe...no.)  He wrote me this sweet message on the bottom of the chair.  We still laugh about it and I have yet to pick it up and swing it at him.  We completed that flip four years ago today!  It's a sweet memory and I'm grateful for the hard work that went into that.  
Even more recently, as our vanity table now has it's own little alcove to sit in.  Yes, we measured the vanity and planned the closets my husband built on either side of it.  (You gotta love living in an old home that literally only has (had) one closet in the entire house.)  Forgive the picture, it's a hard room to photograph with a cellphone.  
 
Let's talk about Vonda again.  You've seen her work here before.  (Get your flip in so we can see your work here, too!)  Three times previous to be exact!  (See readers, you can submit more than one flip and be featured more than one time!)  We saw her sweet Owl chest of drawers.  

And another vanity table...

and a beautiful china cabinet.  She takes a lot of pride in her work and it shows.

Thanks so much Vonda for sharing your gorgeous vanity!  You can find Vonda on her Antiqued With Love Facebook page.  Let her know you saw her on Furniture Flippin'!

Three flips down, two more to go this week  Will yours be one of them?

See you tomorrow!

~ Stephanie

Chairs To A Job Well Done!

It's Two-fer Tuesday!  That's right.  Today you are being treated to not just one, but two flips!  And are they ever good ones!  If you know me at all, you know I hate working on chairs.  Hate it.  Dislike it even more than I dislike French Provincial furniture.  (Though you Furniture Flippers have shown me some pretty spectacular FPF flips and I've softened a bit on the style because of you.)  Well, today we get to sit back and watch the outcome of another's hard work on a couple of "seen better days" chairs.

We're heading to Florida and checking in with Amanda of Reloved Home Designs.  Long time readers (those before my almost two year hiatus) might remember Amanda from her other appearances on the blog.  The first time we met her she had updated a cabinet she found for $20. The next time we stopped in she had made over a chair that still brings them into the blog.  (Seriously, it was a high traffic source just yesterday.) This time Amanda was on the lookout for a chair to complete her daughter's bedroom makeover when she found this chair on a local yard sale page.  She kept putting this one off because she felt a little intimidated by it.  She had upholstered dining room chairs many times, but never attempted an entire upholstery job like this chair would require.  After finishing up all of the other pieces for the room the time had come.  She couldn't put it off any longer.  

Amanda writes, "My daughter is an aspiring famous writer, which was the inspiration for the first piece of fabric.  Her color scheme for her room is a creamy white, burgundy and black.  I painted it in Annie Sloan Old White.  I clear waxed it and dark waxed the details to make them pop."

Amanda contracted with Loomcraft to sew the cushion piece and then she did the rest of the upholstering.  

Readers - be ready.  If you are standing then you might want to pull a chair close to catch you when you swoon at the sight of this completed chair.  It's beyond words beautiful.  Ready?

And now the back of it...

 

Don't you love it?  I do!  I want her daughter to tire of it and sell it to me!  Amanda jokes that this beautiful chair now resides in her daughter's room where it is spending it's days holding her clean laundry.  

Which reminds me, every time I see a used exercise bike or treadmill for sale, I wonder why the seller doesn't market it differently.  I mean, who are we fooling?  It's going to end up as a place to hang your clothes in a few weeks, so sell it that way!  Geesh...while we are at it, the Super Bowl 50 commercials were horrible and I'd fire the ad agencies that wrote them and hire me for next year!  I could do a better job. 

On to Flip #2!  Inspired by the gorgeous handiwork she achieved on the "Writer's Chair", she was eager to start another one.  Along came an old guy named Ethan Allen.  She found him on Craigslist where he had placed an ad looking for someone to take him home.  

Amanda's first stop after purchasing him was Loomcraft to find some inspiring fabric to set this makeover in motion.  This took hours.  I can totally understand that, looking at every last piece of fabric.  Yesterday I was heading out to the store.  My husband usually goes with me shopping.  He thought about staying home this time.  "Do you want me to go with you?", he asked.  "Well, let's put it this way.  I'll spend more money if you don't go with me.", I replied.  That sealed the deal.  He went with me.  Eh, it was only groceries and I had a categorized list with me organized by section that I was determined to stick to.  (What can I say?  I like his company.) 

Amanda chose a floral fabric first and then from there chose her complementing pieces of fabric.  Once home, she placed the fabric on her color chart to determine a chair color.  She wound up using a color mix that someone else created and had named Vintage Kitchen.  It's a mix of Annie Sloan Antibes Green, Old White and French Linen.  She paid Loomcraft to sew the cushion while she went to work on the chair.  

Okay, are you ready for the second reveal?  Here we go!

And the back...

I'm in love with that one, too!  I think Amanda has made me change my opinion about the possibility of working on more chairs.  If they were to turn out even half as good as hers have, I'd be happy.  Beautiful work Amanda!  

You can find Amanda in her Reloved Home Designs Etsy shop as well as on her Facebook page.  You are going to want to follow her page.  She does amazing work.  You will be inspired.  Or intimidated, which in that case, just buy what she has finished!  You know it'll be good and you won't have to be stressed out.  

Two days of flips down and three more to go this week!  Get your flip in!  Email me at furnitureflippin@gmail.com .  

See you tomorrow!

~ Stephanie

Here's The Story Behind The Coolest Chicago Cubs Dresser Of All Time...

It was October 25, 2013 and I was driving home from grocery shopping because that is what cool people do on a Friday night.  I was within three blocks of our home when I spotted this dresser on its back in a front yard.  It had yellow Post-It notes stuck to its parts indicating that all of the pieces were there.  I was so excited to find this that if I knew how to do a cartwheel I would have.  (Somebody needs to teach me to do a cartwheel.)  I made my son help me drag it into the back of the Durango and I drove it home.  You can only imagine the excitement I felt for this found piece of roadside rubbish.  Well, I will confess that my handsome handy husband did not share my enthusiasm.   

While I envisioned what could be, Mr. Level Headed saw the work it would take.  More precisely, the work it would take HIM to rebuild it before I even got my hands on it.  He was right.  I knew he was right.  However, I have a soft spot for discarded pieces and what they could become.  I also knew he would come around.  I was right.  He did.   

At the time I had no idea that this dresser would become THE centerpiece in our first grandchild's nursery.  We didn't even know that our first grandchild was on his way.  Yet.  When the good news was shared, we stepped up and offered to furnish his nursery.  On a budget.  We always tackle each project we take on very frugally.  Just like when we did the Park Ridge Project.  Baby's Mommy decided on a Chicago Cubs Baseball theme for his nursery.  
 
Triple H rebuilt the drawers.  After that, I started stripping the layers and layers of paint this dresser had accumulated over the years.  I think I counted five or six.  Thank goodness for Citristrip.  

 






Once we had it down to bare wood, Triple H went to work rebuilding the interior of the dresser.  

We decided to paint the dresser using Clark & Kensington's Chocolate Covered Cherry.  We had previously used that color in our RV's bathroom and fell in love with it.  Seriously, I could sit in that bathroom all day if it wasn't the size of a phone booth.  I love the color THAT MUCH.  

I knew we wanted to do the Cubs logo on the dresser and had originally entertained the idea of having the image on the FRONT of the dresser.  (That would have been cool looking!) Once it was stripped though and the wood was revealed, I knew that wouldn't work.  There were too many variations in the type of wood used.  So, that plan was scrapped and we decided to have it on the wood top.  I found the logo online (it was a coloring page) and printed out the size that I wanted. Then I traced it on lightly with a pencil.  I darkened this photo so you can see it, but trust me, it was lightly drawn on there.

Then I gathered my stains and paintbrushes.  Yes, I stained the logo on.  I used Dark Walnut, Red Chestnut and Light Oak.  I didn't tape off the area.  Knowing how stain likes to bleed, I was very careful, took my time and stayed within the lines.  After that was dry, I stained the rest of the top with the Light Oak.  Then it was polyurethaned a couple of times. 

I found some awesome baseball knobs online at Hobby Lobby.  I needed 16 of them and waited until they were 50% off.  

Meanwhile, we were simultaneously working on the rest of the furniture for the room.  

We took an old rocking chair we owned, repaired the rush seat on it, and painted it to match the dresser.  We gave a spruce up to a baseball themed table we found at a local secondhand store.  The lamp was bought new online.

I made some artwork in the form of a baseball and glove print that I manipulated on the computer to look like a painting, uploaded it to Walgreens, had it printed and I framed it.  

I bought some paper lanterns at the store and with the help of red & black craft paint, I turned them into hanging baseballs to suspend from the corner of his room.  If I ever make these again, I think I'll use red & black Sharpies instead of paint.

 

I made a giant ruler to hang on his wall so his growth could be recorded.  I created the numbers on the computer and printed them out the size I wanted.  Then I traced them on and filled them in with a black Sharpie.


One of my favorite pieces in the room is this fantastic artwork

showcasing his name.  I made that, too. I created it on the computer and had to have it printed professionally online due to it's size.  It measures 6" x 41".  Triple H made the frame for it. 

It was featured in my daughter's pregnancy photo shoot by my awesome photographer friend Flo.  It now hangs above Presley's crib.

Speaking of his crib, it needed some baseball themed bedding and there was not anything available online that we liked.  So, I tackled that, too.  I found the fabric online and made him his own custom bedding, including quilt, bedskirt and bumper pads.  That was the first time I had EVER made a quilt.  It was fun and most importantly, it didn't fall apart in the wash!  Hahaha...
 
We had leftover fabric and I made valances for his nursery windows.  (Don't lecture us on the bumper pads.  We've read all of the pros and cons on them.)

At long last, the dresser and everything for the nursery was finished and ready to be delivered to their house.  The baby's delivery was still a few weeks away.    

Triple H installed new flooring in the nursery.  It looks like wood but it's easy to care for vinyl flooring.  It's actually the same flooring we installed in our RV.  I highly recommend it!

Let's take a look at what we accomplished...

 

What is our FAVORITE part of the nursery?  That's a no-brainer.  It's the little guy who occupies it.  Even if he turns out NOT to like baseball, I think he'll still love his room. 

He doesn't look like this picture anymore.  

His Grandma Steffie took so long to write this blog post featuring his nursery that now he looks like this...

Next up on our flippin' horizon is this piece I got for FREE.  

There you have it.  The story behind the "Coolest Chicago Cubs Dresser Of All Time."  (Hehehehe...at least that's what I call it. )  If you have any questions about any of the projects in this post, please email or catch me on our Furniture Flippin' Facebook page.  I'll be happy to go over any of the steps I glossed over here.  (We would be here forever if I covered every step in this one post.) 

Here's an interesting little tidbit about this nursery:  this is the second time I have decorated this room in anticipation for a firstborn son's arrival.  The first time I was the Mommy to be and it was for my own firstborn son.  Back then this room was decorated in blue hearts and fuzzy brown teddy bears.  Other than the decor, the furniture (crib, dresser, rocker, table & lamp) was all placed in the same exact position it is this time around.  The house we used to live in is now my daughters.  Just a little bit of trivia for ya!

~ Stephanie