Recent furniture make overs

I love to buy something old from the charity shop or carboot and give it a new lease of life, don't you?
Well those of you who have read my blog before may know that I LOVE vintage china and knick knacks. A while back I bought a   dresser and with the help of my hubs we made it over and its a fab place for my china. But alas my collection keeps growing and after months of trying to persuade the hubs I needed a china cabinet he relented and I found a lovely slim one that would fit perfectly into the living room.

The before

And after

And full of pretty things

Already very full! I think I may need another!

My next recent makeover was a set of drawers for the bedroom, I've been looking for ages for a nice set and I recently came across a set that had just been unloaded from a van and were sitting on the pavement waiting to go into a charity shop. So I ran in asked the price and they were mine!

After some TLC

And embellished with a little touch of decoupage

Thanks for taking a look 😀

Next time I'll show you some of my ever growing china collection, any one else out there who also collects feel free to share you blog with me I love seeing others finds xx

I've been away way too long :(

Time just seems to have flown by these last several months, I didn't realise quite how long it had been since I last put a post on here. Life has been so busy what with one thing or another. I've been trying to catch up on reading everyone else's blog and I think it's about time I started posting on mine again. I've had lots of lovely finds and made over a few pieces of furniture, so I'm afraid the next few posts may have a lot of pics of all my goodies.

Here's a couple of before pics of my recent upcycle projects to peek your interest ☺  

Fabric and pinnies

I seem to be acquiring quite a stash of fabric and a few curtains (because I like the fabric!). Every time I see some in a charity shop that I like at a good price I bring it home with me. I don't necessarily have something in mind to make from it, I just think that it could come in handy for a future project. I really should actually make a start on some of these future projects. Now I don't know if anyone else is a bit of a Pinterest addict like me, I LOVE Pinterest. I pin and pin and pin thinking 'ooo! I could make that!' but never get around to making anything I've pinned. Does anyone else do this? Or do you actually get around to the projects you pin?

Now I'm sure I've told you before that I'm not the greatest sewer in the world but when I do get around to sewing anything I really enjoy it. And the only way I'm ever going to get any better at it (hopefully) is if I practise more. And the way I hope to do this is by actually making some of these pinned projects.

Want to see some of my fabric stash? No, then look away now. For those that do here are a few, ok a lot of pics.

An odd curtain I picked up.

There's about 5-6 metres of this fabric and it only cost a few £. 

Another odd curtain, this is from The Country Diary (of an Edwardian Lady) range, it's quite a large curtain which I'm hoping to turn into a pair for my bedroom.

I picked this piece up for the grand sum of £1. I want to make a throw for my youngest sons bed but to be honest I'm not sure how to. Any advice would be greatly received.

A small embroidered table cloth. I love embroidered linens and see lots of beautiful ones on peoples blogs but when I usually come across them they're badly stained and have a hefty price tag on them. This one has a couple of marks but I'm hoping I can remove them.

A set of 4 napkins, I loved the cherry pattern on these.

One of the other items I seem drawn to recently is aprons, especially homemade ones. Here are a few I've picked up recently.

Sorry not the best picture. These are three half aprons I picked up for a pound each, they look like they were all made by the same person.

Hopefully soon I'll have some pictures of projects that I've made from some of these fabrics.

A tick on the wish list

Recently I've started to make a wish list of things I would love to find in the charity shops or at the car boot. The things on my wish list are things I've seen while browsing others blogs or when I've been researching items on the internet and I've completely fallen in love with the item.

The latest tick on my wish list is not one but six pieces of Hornsea Fauna (well I say tick but I think it'll actually turn into the latest collection). I originally saw a piece in a charity shop, it had no markings on it so I'm assuming it was a copy or something that looked similar to Hornsea Fauna. So I went home and researched it and completely fell in love with the range. I think it's very cute and whimsical looking.

Well last week when we took the boys to the cinema there was the weekly antiques market on outside so we went for a browse and found three pieces, two were from a stall where everything was £1. I couldn't believe my luck to find three pieces in one day.

Then at the carboot this weekend I saw three pieces on a stall and she wanted £10 for all three but I didn't really want to pay that so after me acting all indecisive she finally offered them to me for a fiver.

Now I know they're not everyone's cup of tea (my mum's already told me she doesn't like them lol) but I love them. I just need to find somewhere to put them now as the dresser is pretty full, I think I need another one (and an extension on the house to put it in!)

A busy few weeks

Well it seems to have been a busy few weeks. The last three weeks of term seemed crazy busy and then the first week of the school hols the hubs booked off work so we've been doing lots with the boys.
So I've not done much on any of the projects from my last post in fact I've added to the queue a bookcase which I rescued from a skip (after asking the owner if I could have it). I tried painting it all in satinwood but I found it awkward to paint while it was in one piece and I changed my mind after giving it the first coat and decided to stain the shelves. The lovely hubs has now took it apart and sanded it for me, the shelves are stained and now I just have to paint the rest. Here it is in it's original state.

I've also picked up quite a bit of fabric from charity shops, not sure what I'm going to do with it all yet but I'll take some pics of it and put it in another post. Maybe you'll have some suggestions for it. xx

Lots of projects that need starting

I have a few projects sitting around at the moment that need finishing or actually starting! The last couple of weeks seem to have gone by in a blur, and with the typical British weather the hubs has not been able to go outside and sand anything for me. Here are the projects sitting around at the moment.

I've got two of these chairs waiting to be painted, one is destined for my eldest sons room to use with his desk and he's informed me he wants it painting red. They're a bit rickety and they need a good sand but for £2 for the pair I considered them a bargain.

I saw this sewing box in the local hospice shop originally priced at £10 and as much as I liked it I couldn't justify spending that much on something that I haven't really got space for. Later in the week it was still sitting in the shop and had been reduced to £2! Well for that price I snapped it up, no idea where I'm going to put it but I'm looking forward to painting it. (I'm sure I'll squeeze it in somewhere)

It was quite grubby inside but the fabric is quite pretty and I managed to salvage a few scraps(after a good soak in some vanish)  to use in other craft projects. It had a split in one of the legs but the hubs has glued it now it's just waiting to be sanded.

I showed these on an earlier post, well I've painted one so far and told the hubs where I want to put them in the living room (he's not too keen) but I have no idea what to display on them, any ideas?

I bought this cabinet quite a while ago, again it was a bargain at just a couple of pounds, but it has so many layers of gloss both inside and out. It's going to need a chemical stripper on it and that seems such a daunting task that it's been stashed away under the bed.

Again this is something that I have no idea where I'm going to put it when it's completed. Are you starting to see a theme here with things I buy? lol

One item that I have bought recently and have painted  (Yay!!) is this mantle clock.

I forgot to take a picture before the hubs pulled it apart for me to paint. I used a tester pot of emulsion to paint it then I was going to varnish it but that didn't go to plan. The emulsion went on awful, I think because there is so much detail in it. So I decided to sand it down and start again but as I was sanding it back I really liked the distressed look. Once I'd finished sanding it to reach the desired effect I waxed it and ta da!

I quite like the shabby chic look of it now, what do you think?

Well that's the round up of all my 'to paint' projects, there's a few sewing projects on top of this lot (I need more hours in the day!)

And just to say a hello and thank you to my new followers.

My finished dresser!!

Well in my last post I showed you a peek of the dresser I bought off ebay, well it's been completely made over, mainly by my wonderful hubs. He worked extremely hard, he took it apart, sanded it, stained, waxed and painted it and now it looks like a completely different dresser. Just a warning that this post is going to be full of pictures (some may think it's sad how excited I am over this dresser but I really do love it!)

Here's a reminder what it looked like before

And here is a pic (ok a few pics of it after)

And here's lots of pics showing the reasons why I'm so excited about having this dresser, it's a place to display all my knick-knacks!!

If you managed to make your way through all the pictures thanks for sharing in my excitement xx