Beach Cottage Decor now at Stars

I rearranged my wall space at Stars and put out all the beach cottage decor.

I brought in my shabby white crates to create shelves for the booth.

A couple of shabby blue nightstands tucked in there, and a white wall shelf.

A sweet vintage shabby white child’s chair and a little three legged foot stool.

Shell topped jars, shell filled jars and shell candle jars.  A little round table with a shabby white trug on top.

Distressed turquoise frames with ‘floating’ white fingerling starfish.  Some BIG sugar starfish, painted white and glittered.

A shabby vintage spice rack filled with little jars of shells and sea glass.  Some small mermaid crowns and a sugar starfish mounted atop a shabby white candle holder.

I did some rearranging and stocking of my big booth too.

Lots of stacks of old books, as always.

This giant turquoise cubby shelf is filled with vintage milk glass and Ironstone pieces.

Some additional, and smaller, cubby shelves.

LOVE this vintage chicken tureen!

I’ve added lots of this style of vintage Ironstone with the scalloped edges.

Beautiful hand painted vintage milk glass vase with gold accents and ruffled edge.  Gold glitter Eiffel Tower tags.  Little vintage vanity jars.  Old bottles and upcycled bottles with repro labels.

Vintage metal chair with new gold paint and pretty soft blue and gold Toile covered seat.

Come on by and check it all out.  The construction on the next block continues; BUT, they have not been blocking off the side street parking as much lately.

 

 

 

 

 

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Outdated / Updated little end table

Poor little outdated and unloved end table!!  I’m not sure exactly WHEN this was ‘in style’, but I actually LIKE this style; with the drawer and open area.

It was pretty banged up, but I’d need to sand it to prep it for painting anyhow.  What’s a few more minutes of sanding to remove the scratches.

Sorry about all the shadows in the photos!  We’ve had some crazy sunny spring weather.  (Our spring weather typically consists of April showers with lead to May showers which lead to June showers.)   A couple of pretty deep gouges on the side there that required a bit of wood filler to repair.  Nice clean drawer innards.  Since I had to remove the drawer pulls to sand and repaint; I decided to fill the holes and add a single knob.  It just looks strange to me for the single drawer to have two knobs.  (Does that bug you too?!?)

I only had ONE of these fabulous cast iron lion’s head drawer pulls; so I’ve been saving it for the ‘perfect project’.  THIS seemed like the perfect piece to use it on.

With the lion’s head drawer pull creating a bit of a ‘Gothic theme’ to this make-over; I decided to add to enhance that theme with a cast iron sconce added to the top, at the back.

I resisted the urge to add and stenciled designs.

I kind of wish the sconce was longer and reached the sides, but it will look better once there is ‘stuff’ sitting on the top.

I’m really liking how this one turned out.

It’s at the bottom of a stack of three furniture pieces in my booth at Stars, so you can’t see the sconce in the pictures.

Visit my Stars web page to get a 50%0ff coupon valid on EVERYTHING in my booth through 5-31-2016.

Another night stand

There’s no such thing as having too many night stands in my booth at Stars.I snagged this little pink number at a recent estate sale.  Drawers are always a plus!

It’s difficult to tell from this picture, but I added a back to it.  But DON’T add your back first thing!!!  The insides of those shelves (and the backing!) are much easier to paint SEPARATELY.  So measure and cut your backing and paint it and your entire shelf BEFORE attaching the back.  I just run a thin strip of tacky glue along the edge of the back, then nail it down with finishing nails.

I love this vintage tarnished gold knob with back-splash.  I tried out several other knobs before settling on this one.  I tried a white ceramic knob, a crystal one, a wood one (that I would have painted aqua to match) and none of them were looking right.  I had NOT tried any gold ones because I really didn’t think they would look right.  Just goes to show you that sometimes you have to think outside the box.  This knob really set the ‘vintage tone’ for this piece.

I glued a piece of scrap book paper to the inside of the drawer to cover up a few crayon marks.

Did you notice that I didn’t distress this piece?!?!?  I didn’t want the original pink to show through, so it was either: A) Don’t distress it.  or B) Sand away all the pink paint before painting it.  With it being mostly flat surfaces and straight lines, sanding off all the original paint really would n;t have taken more than an hour or two.  But I would have never been able to PRICE it to recoup that amount of time spent on it.

You really have to always be thinking about your ‘bottom line’ if you are trying to make any profit on the items you make over.  You have to ‘choose your battles’ so to speak.  Don’t spend a lot of extra time working on a piece that won’t sell at a higher price point.

Last weekends painting marathon

Had me a little painting marathon this last sunny weekend.

I actually did almost ALL the painting on Saturday.  Then detailed, distressed and varnished on Sunday.  Rain was predicted for Monday night, so I loaded it all up in my PT Cruiser on  Monday afternoon.  (it ALL fit too; with room to spare!)  Took it all to Stars today.

This table from the Forest Heights neighborhood garage sale . . .

Now looks like this.

The pedestal base was in perfect condition, so no need to fuss with it.  The top just needed a little TLC.

This base would have been a real PAIN to sand and repaint.  I probably would not have even bought it if the base had needed refinishing.  Good profitability comes from knowing what projects to NOT take on too!

Love the detail on the apron.

$75.00 in my booth at Stars,

JUST picked up this solid maple coffee table on Saturday morning.  VERY damaged top, and good legs.

Sanded away the damage and painted it turquoise.  I did half of this batch of stuff aqua and half turquoise.  I usually do it ALL the same color, but I really like how the various shades work together.

Left the legs as is.

$89.00 in my booth at Stars.

I could have almost left this vintage child size wicker chair ‘as is’; but decided to apply a coat of aqua paint.

Not a HUGE difference when you look at it by itself.

But definitely ‘coordinates’ better with the other stuff.  This chair sold MINUTES after I took the picture!

That partially prepped solid oak two tier stand.  Just had to sand the legs before I painted it.

Went with aqua on this one.

And after ‘sleeping on it’, decided it needed something more.

LOVE those curvy legs!

Really had to ‘cram things in’ to get it all to fit!  My booth was already plenty full; and I was entirely prepared to pull out and take home some of the old inventory to make room for all this new stuff.  But I got it ALL to fit!! $45.00.

Little black table from the Forest heights sale went from this:

To this!  Turquoise with some Paris chic fleurs in the corners.

When adding designs like this, I distress before and after painting on the design.

This one is ‘pretty well hidden’ under the round maple coffee table; only way I could get it to fit!  $45.00

But, the advantage to stacking furniture like this is that I don’t end up with a huge bare spot as soon as one or two things sell.  Which is extremely helpful for me, considering that it’s a 2+ hour round trip for me.

One of those little ‘kit’ tables.

Not so ordinary now!

Minimal distressing on this piece; just along the very edges.

More strategic stacking!  $29.00 for this little table.

HOW long had it been since this kind of white and gold paint has been in style?

It went from that, to this!

It is just me, or is that knob much too small for the space?

I traded out that small knob for this bigger pull that I had in my stash.  I’m sure I’ll need that small knob for another project someday!

Turquoise paint and minimal distressing; and a fun new drawer pull.

“You’re painting the BACK???” Michael said as he walked by.  Why not?  It literally took 30 seconds to roll paint on the back; and it looks SO much better when the backside shows in my booth display.

$65.00 in my booth at Stars.

Hot pink carrier; a nice extra looooooong one!

Initially I just painted it turquoise.

Then I decided it needed a ‘little something’, so I stenciled this PARIS design on ONE side.

*** HELPFUL HINT:  When painting decorative designs on items like this, that have TWO sides; I always only add the design to ONE side.  WHY?  The design might not suit everyone’s design preferences.  So this way, it can also be used with the PLAIN side showing.  Thereby appealing to a larger shopping audience.

I also added a little felt chandelier ornament; tied onto the handle, but easily removable.  $29.00.

Forgot to take these to Stars this trip.  Just a couple of shadow box shelves.  Had been very POORLY painted a medium brown.  I painted them aqua and distressed the edges a bit.  These are very handy to have on hand to use as ‘risers’ in your displays.  AND they usually sell well!

SO, that was MY weekend.  Glad I got a lot of painting done when I had the chance because ti’s RAINING again now!!  Ahhhhh . . . .summer in Oregon; people don’t tan, they RUST!

So, since it’s raining, you might as well go shopping!

The last of the summer finds . . .

Alas, the summer ‘stock up on furniture’ season is coming to an end.  As soon as the rains come it will limit my ability to paint furniture because I don’t have an indoor painting room for big things.  Here’s my last few findings of summer:

Small wood trunk.

Berry trug.  (thinking this will work great for displaying some of my smaller signs in!)

When I first saw this I thought it was a doll cradle, because one end is higher than the other.  But the wood dowels inside make it look like a magazine rack.  ???  Maybe someone else UPcycled an old doll cradle into a magazine rack???

Really CUTE little desk.

Another sign storage bin.

And the BEST score!!  An UNFINISHED round pedestal table..Gotta LOVE not having to do any prep work like sand or prime!!

I had already sanded this one when I remembered to take the picture.

These ought to keep me in painting projects for a while!

Sulking a bit

Along with the ‘anniversary weekend’ photos, the computer ate a bunch of my project pictures too; so I’ve been sulking over that instead of posting lately.  The past couple of nights it’s been getting quite chilly overnight and the cooler air is beginning to smell like FALL; making me realize that my ‘painting marathon days’ will soon be dwindling!  Time to get busy and get more of those bigger projects DONE, and soon!

I got this wrought iron etagere  painted turquoise and cleaned up the glass shelves.  Spray paint is your bet option for painting stuff like this.

It has gone to my booth in Curiosities, displaying a selection of my upcycled cake and cupcake stands.  It IS for sale too though; $119.00.

And whilst I was spray painting I went ahead and painted this little vintage wire newspaper rack.  Thought it would be cute filled with pillows.  It’s still in storage for now though.

Got this little night stand all spruced up too.  Took the handle off and sanded the whole thing with my trusty orbital sander.

Gave it two coats of my ‘beachy blue’ paint then a bit more sanding to distress.  For varnishing, I usually only do the TOP of chests, shelves and tables.

Sanding mostly along the edges and raised areas where it would ‘naturally wear down’; then on the flat surfaces for good measure.  You want your sanding to be very ‘haphazard’ so it looks more like it happened naturally, over time.  I don’t quite know how to describe it; but sometimes I see distressed pieces and the just look too PLANNED; too perfect!

Simple designs like this with just one (or two) drawers are perfect candidates for a big ‘statement knob’.  I just a thrifted porcelain rose knob on this one.

Isn’t she sweet?!?!  This cutie will be going to Stars sometime in the near future; hopefully along with the 2 drawer one I am working on today!