Tuesday, September 8, 2009

Labor of Love

This Labor Day weekend was really wonderful. I accomplished so much AND did a fair share of relaxing and having fun. I spent Friday working on repainting my dresser and went to the Herk to hang out with some Oles. Saturday I finished the dresser, rearranged the living room wall, went to the beach, rode my bike around the lakes and ended the day "rolling" with friends at Bryant Lake. We had a Westby family reunion on Sunday, and Monday included some much needed cleaning, an amazing picnic, ice cream and more bicycling adventures. Whew! So satisfying :)

Since I have recently become a manic project fiend, I have lots of creative work to share. I have a before and after of my dresser makeover and just the after of my living room wall with it's new arrangement of mismatched frames.



Before Dresser: Old dresser from my parent's basement. It used to contain costumes. Yes, that's right - we had that many costumes.

After: The new lighter color makes my room seem bigger. I sanded the edges and rubbed a brown glaze over the off-white paint to make it look old and distressed. It turned out really well. The knobs are all mismatched and from Anthropologie. I call it my "gypsy" dresser, although, a friend of mine told me that the word gypsy is very un-p.c. Whatever.

Close up of the knobs. I love the bee. I could have done all bees, but I liked the idea of having them all be different.


Q. What do you do with a bunch of mismatched frames?
A. Buy a few more at the thrift store, paint them, and clutter them all on one wall!


This is an image of both sides of the wall close up and mashed together. Kinda looks like the corner of a wall, but it's not.
That's a mirror in the middle... not a picture of a window...


5 comments:

  1. Totally cute dresser. Love the knobs. And your necklace/belt storage system...I wish I didn't live with a boy. Wait, you live with a boy. How do you get away with that?

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  2. Well, he has a "man-cave" and the garage. I also frequently credit all potentially unwelcome creative expression to the fact that "I am an art major," and therefore, I cannot help myself ;)

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  3. where did u find the half mannequin? im dyeing for one!!

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  4. A friend of mine worked for a clothing store and they were getting rid of them! I lucked out big time.

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  5. I love this dresser! I'm trying to do a similar project with an old Target table and turning it into an 'antiqued' makeup table; the mismatched Anthropologie knobs you used were such a great idea!

    http://gildedlilypad.blogspot.com/2011/07/diy-dressing-table-makeover-part-1.html

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