Desk and Chair Facelift by Jen
Hi, I’m Jen! I’m a mom, a wife, a housekeeper, a cook, a decorator, a crafter and a blogger. My blog is a collection of everything that I enjoy from DIY projects, home decor, crafts and recipes to fun activities for the kids and our own family experiences. Hence my blog name: Scissors & Spatulas: And Everything in Between! You never know what you’re gonna get!
I’m so excited to be here at Remodelaholic! Let me show you a peak at what I have in store for you today…
Would you believe me if I told you this desk and chair cost less than $20? Well, it’s the truth! One of my favorite projects is turning someone else’s trash into my own new treasure. Particularly furniture. It’s garage sale season and I am up and out early on Saturday mornings in hunt of some great bargains! I found this chair for just $5!
I gave it a good cleaning with the hose and let it dry out in the sun before taking my mouse sander to it. I roughed it up pretty well to make sure the varnish was taken off.
I used one coat of Kilz
{water-based} primer and then three coats of Olympic Irish Cream 
{just slightly off white} in a satin finish.
{water-based} primer and then three coats of Olympic Irish Cream {just slightly off white} in a satin finish.
Then, after all that hard work, I took my sandpaper and started distressing it! I use a very low grit to remove the paint but then use a very fine sand block to smooth it out.
Here is a preview of what it looked like after distressing. You’ll see the finished product in just sec. First let me show you the second part to this project.
My mother-in-law gave me an old sewing table a while back. Now I know I’m going to get some grief for saying this, but I removed the table top and sewing machine and replaced it with a large piece wood because I love the look of the legs, but the table top was not functional. It wasn’t one of the nice ones with the drawers, just a flat table that unfolded. I wanted to use it for a writing desk and once the sewing machine was removed the original table top had a big hole in it. So i decided to make a new top all together.
Here is the stained piece of wood after I took my mouse sander to it. It had a thick coat of varnish on it, so it took some elbow grease to rough this baby up.
Then I took a hammer to it and it was actually quite fun! I softened up the sharp edges a bit and put some dings and dents all over the edges, sides and top.
One coat of primer and three coats of the same paint used on the chair .
Then again, I took my low-grit {rough} sand paper and started scraping away at the paint. This knot above is a result of the hammer. Love it! I wasn’t quite getting the result that I wanted with the sandpaper, it was still too clean and white.
So out came my handy dandy mouse sander again and it worked like a charm. Sneak peak. . .
Okay, are you ready to see my new writing desk?
A huge thanks to Remodelaholic for having me today! I hope you all have enjoyed my trash to treasure transformation and I hope you’ll come by and visit me at Scissors and Spatulas.
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