One of the most important pieces of this project was to spend as little money as possible. Sure, I like beautiful things, and I'd love to be able to purchase whatever I wanted because there are so many things that would be perfect for what I'm trying to create.
BUT, selfish space or not - this is a project that needs to be budget-wise. So big things - furniture things - need to cost a big fat ZERO.
I had a list of what I wanted to include as I searched through what I already owned:
1. A desk
2. A book shelf or cabinet
3. A comfy chair for reading/tea breaks
4. A side table
And guess what?! I found them all!
Where there's a will, there's a way!
1. A desk The first kitchen table we ever bought was a $25 steal from a liquidators warehouse in Barrie fourteen years ago. It had a good life, served many meals, saw many crafts and cracks, and ended up with it's legs detached, leaning against the back wall of the barn.
I rescued it. Pulled it back together again. Painted it with the same paint I put on the walls.
And all was perfect until I tried to use it and realized that everything I set down on it was sticking to the finish and marking it up. SO I pulled out the five gallon pail of white cabinet paint, gave it two more coats PLUS a hearty helping of a sealer and Voila! I have a desk!
2. A book shelf or cabinet When we moved here, many things were left behind. {I'm not complaining - I've made good use of almost everything!}
This cabinet was one of the abandoned:
It has lived in the laundry room, housing towels and toiletries, where it looked great against the 'New Penny' orange walls BUT I decided it would make a perfect bookshelf. After reorganizing the laundry room/bathroom situation, I brought the cabinet up the stairs {I'm a tank! - in case you forgot} and placed it in my white room.
Yawn!
Poor thing needed colour. Pronto!
I pulled out my leftover kitchen paint {Cranberry Whip by Behr Premium Plus} and got to work.
It always amazes me how such a simple thing can make such a huge transformation. I am loving my 'new' cabinet!
3. A comfy chair for reading/tea breaks The story of my comfy chair brings us back a year to the cleaning out of the church shed. Things accumulate there and things need to be cleared out from time to time. I selflessly volunteered to take this old piece off their hands. It hadn't sold in the annual garage sale and there was no way I was going to see it tossed in a dumpster - it was perfectly perfect! So {with the blessing of a pastor-in-charge, of course} I stuffed it in the back of the station wagon and happily brought it home.
{I'm going to share about that wall treatment in a later episode - stay tuned!}
4. A side table My brother-in-law found some old traveling crates in his work shed that he passed along to us, thinking the rock-n-roll hubby might be able to use them for lugging gear back and forth to gigs. He probably could use them for that - but I've re-purposed them as little tables and they seem to do the job just fine!
It's a small room. It doesn't need a lot and with what I've found I've managed to create a really cozy space that I love spending time in - away from the distractions of a messy kitchen or noisy television.
Come back on Monday for Part Three - Soft Things
{p.s. November is National Novel Writer's Month and I have joined a global community of crazies who have made a commitment to write every day with a goal of 50,000 words between November 1 and 30. Come on over here if you're interested in seeing how I'm doing...}
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ReplyDeleteI love it!!!
ReplyDeleteVery thrifty and perfect! You've done a great job. You are inspiring me to do some house projects.
ReplyDeleteGlad to hear it :) It's so fun to stand back and see what I created with very little money and a whole lot of creative thought
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