Projects!

"We now have to have projects."  My husband says with slight distain.

"Hey, I haven't got to do much 'projects' in years, its time!"  I defend

I can now get back to enjoying projects of all kinds.  Sewing, photography (still learning), the decorating, and hopefully soon building things.  It has been about 4 years since I have been able to do anything like this.  Both with having small kids, going to school, then working full time, and just not having any room to do projects, it has been a long drought.  Sure I have done a few sewing projects; kids Halloween costumes, a duvet cover for Grace (which is now ruined), and a few other odds and ends things, but nothing big.  It was just too much to take on a project in that small trailer.  I had to drag everything out and if it was say, sewing, I had to use the dining room table, well more than likely, I would not finish in the first day, so by meal time, I had to pack everything up and put it away so that we could eat on our dining room table.  Just a pain!

But anyway, I can now have projects.  I debated on what to do with the girls room and their bed.  I was originally going to do two matching twin beds, in which I found two wrought iron WWII quartermaster hospital beds (or so I was told) for a good price, then I sent them to my husbands uncle to sand blast for me.  Well, I had only received one finished after 3 years, so I had to kinda figure something else out.  My concern turned to the lack of a guest room.  Where was I going to put my guest when they came to stay?  On the couch, on the floor, in separate beds?  Then I decided my best bet was to have the girls share a queen bed and then I have a guest bed!!  Now I know some of you think its not fair to have them share a bed, but so far they are loving it and they are so small its like they have their own bed.  If they decided in the future they don't want to share, I think there is enough room in there room that we can put a twin bed in there also, but till then they can share.


This was my first project and really my first furniture project.  I found this bed on Craigslist for $125.  (this is just the footboard, I forgot to take a picture of the headboard before).  I thought it was a pretty good price for a solid wood bed.  Then I went to Lowes and bought supplies- orbital sander pads, primer, paint, paint brushes and rollers and got working!  It took me two days to sand the booger!  I used the orbital for as much as I could, then did the rest by hand, in between the cracks and around the curves.

Foot board

Head board

Here it is after paint.  I decided to paint it white and then distress it to give it the cottage feel.  It took me two days to prime and paint and then a day to sand. (not full days, but a few hours a day).  And the final results...

I found a duvet cover at Target on clearance in their Shabby Chic section that I thought would look just perfect and since I already had the duvet, it was perfect!

Another view.  I really liked doing it.  The sanding part was the artistic part, I felt.  It was really fun.  I went through so many sander pads though.

After it was all said and done I probably spent more on the bed then I was hoping.  We already had the mattress but had to buy a box springs, plus the all the painting materials and the duvet cover, it was probably more than my original "This is a really good price!" thought.  Oh well, it was fun and now I just need to finish decorating the rest of their room.  I plan on doing it in a shabby chic kind of theme, but not over the top.  Antiques, feminine, and cute.  I have a few ideas, so stay tuned in the future.