The Remodeled Life: remodeling furniture

So a few weekends ago, my friend Erin and I went on a little thrift shop hunt to find some fun things. It was not the most successful shopping trip but she came away with an old chair she is going to redo and I came away with an old ugly luggage stand. It was pretty bad and needed some major tlc. Here's what I did....

First I had to take off all of the old fabric straps. It was fairly easy - they were just stapled on so it was just a matter of sitting down and slowly popping them off.

Next I decided on a color to paint the stand - I looove this glossy gray spray paint - Rustoleum Winter Gray. Gray is one of my favorite colors for the house, its just soothing and relaxing to me. So it received a couple of light coats of spray paint, and it was looking much, much better.

Then I debated on what I wanted to do with the straps. I thought about new ribbon or going to the fabric store to find something to replace it with...but then I was in Target (always the beginning of a good score story) and I found these.....

I fell in love with the colors and immediately thought of using these for the straps for my luggage stand. I'm all about using pops of coralish/pinky/orange in our house right now. Its just too happy, love it.

So I decided to just recover the old straps with my new"fabric". I simply used the old straps as a guide to cut my new covers and used a hot glue gun to secure the new fabric over the old - just making sure I kept everything tight.

Finally I just needed to break out the staple gun and staple my new straps on.

So much better right? I like the fact that the luggage rack can be used in different ways, like as a side table or a play table for Silas. Also, it can just fold up and store away when its not in use - so good for a small house - double bonus!

Something I have been thinking about this week is comparisons. Comparing an ugly luggage rack to its new redo is one thing...but we take comparisons to a dangerous level lots of times. We compare all sorts of things all of the time - we compare ourselves to others, and even worse- we compare our kids to other kids too. Yuck. I'm guilty of all of those things - as much as I wish I didn't have to admit. As a blogger its easy to start comparing your blog to other blogs, your projects to others, your stats to others...as a teacher you might compare your successes with other teachers or the behavior of your class to other classes, businesses will compare their clients, numbers, ratings to others...teenagers will compare their cars, their clothes, their hair, the way they look (and adults do this too, lets be honest). The list can go on. We have this desire to be better, be on top, be number one - its dangerous.
Comparing also leads to envy and jealousy - which I think are even worse.

A tranquil heart gives life to the flesh, but envy makes the bones rot. Proverbs 14:30

So put away all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander. 1 Peter 2:1

For where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there will be disorder and every vile practice. James 3:16

Jesus came and turned the world upside down - turned our thinking upside down. Instead of spending our time comparing ourselves, our acts and our deeds to others - which leads to envy and jealousy - we should be striving to live a life serving those people. We should be humbly emptying ourselves, shedding our pride and instead taking up our cross and living for the one and only thing that matters - Jesus. Not our own ambitions, not striving for ultimate worldly sucessess or temporary things - but focussing on things eternal and striving for our purpose - which is to love God and love others. We should live as a servant, longing to be like our Savior instead of the person next door. Even rejoicing in being a servant and counting it as a blessing to be last.

Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Philippians 2:3

For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps. 1 Peter 2:21

And calling the crowd to him with his disciples, he said to them, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. Mark 8:34

When you find Jesus, you find peace in life. You don't have to compare yourself to others anymore - Jesus is all you need. He took your place on the cross and covers over all of your sins (even all of the envy and jealousy) - making you white as snow and perfect in His sight. Our identity is now in Him - so no more comparing.

Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid. John 14:27

I need these verses and words often. My prayer for you today is that you can find true peace and life in Jesus and that the comparing would stop. All you need is Him.

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I shared yesterday that we had a lot of paint projects brewing over here in la casa. One of those projects happens to be a sweet little secretary desk that was given to me by Justin's Aunt right after we moved in. Justin's mom, sister and aunt are like the superior masters of finding hidden jewels at yard sales and thrift stores. So no surprise I was gifted a little jewel by them, this little desk. I knew I wanted to paint it but wasn't sure right at first what color exactly. I could go with a standard white - always chic and fresh. But, I just wasn't feeling it and I wanted to add a little spice to this little corner of my kitchen. Here's the little desk before anything has been done to it. This desk had definitely seen better days but it was still really sturdy and working properly so it really just needed a face lift.

First thing I did was to remove the drawer for easier painting and remove the knobs. I decided to replace them with something else I already had on hand. I also washed down the desk with a little warm soapy water and then this little baby was ready for some spice.

So spice it up I did. I hate priming things and will honestly skip that process whenever possible. And it was no different in this scenario. I decided that I would just go straight to paint and it worked out, I did however apply 3 coats of paint but it was really easy and quite quick. I used a little foam trim roller for most of the painting and It worked like a charm. I think I will always use a foam roller for furniture painting from now on. I also have another tip to share. If you buy paintbrushes at the dollar store in a pack of three - you get what you pay for. Awful. I'm sure most of you are thinking "duh" but I have always wanted to test those dollar paintbrushes. Luckily for this project I was just needing a paintbrush for a few corners I couldn't reach with the roller.

You can see the first coat wasn't that great and I started to fear it was going to take a lot more than 3 coats but thankfully after the second It was covering really well.

So here it is now, in all of it's coralish, rusty, pinky-orange glory. I have to say I absolutely love it. I wish I had a picture of the knobs before I spray painted them white, but take my word for it, they are way more cute now. I love the color contrast between the wall and the desk and we can't help but walk by it and smile a little. Everyone needs a little bright color in their home somewhere. It has definitely cheered this little corner right up.

(Ignore the random items sitting on top, I'm still working on that.)