♥ Painting Progress ♥

Remember me posting a picture of me painting the deck with a roller around Memorial Day?  Well, with the exception of one weekend, we have been working every weekend of June and some week nights when we could.  It's been a project that was attacked by Jason, my daddy, and me.  This was all done with a roller and sometimes a brush where needed......TWO COATS!

Here's a before glimpse, so you can see the transformation:  (And please excuse the clutter and plastic lying around...it's still in working mode.)

BEFORE:

And now!  AFTER:

We used the color we have on our outbuilding/shed.  It's the closest we could get to the cedar color we like in a stain, since this is a paint.  It is called Ginger Spice by Olympic.

We're still working on the rest of The Cedar Loft/Garage area.

And when we're done with this?  Well then it's time to do the house!  But this time, it will be with a sprayer where possible!  Do you hear me shouting "Praise the Lord"?  :)

Thanks for stopping by!  Hope you have a wonderful day!  :)

♥ Tammy ♥  

Paint, Antique Glaze, and Stain (My Friends)

Last week when I showed the wooden bowl makeover from Goodwill, I had a couple of people ask about paint and antiquing glaze. I know I'm always curious when I see others paint and distress. I wonder what color they used, what type it is, the method they used to distress, etc..so I thought there might be more people out there interested. If not, at least these two people can see it! :)

I actually tend to use whatever I have on hand when it comes to paint. We have used plenty of the custom mixed barn red/burgundy paint that we used on our back door and stepback cupboard. I have also used the color we painted our dining room (because we had it on hand). But usually when I sit down to work on a crafting project, I pull out the little bottles of craft paint that you can purchase in Hobby Lobby, Michaels, and even Walmart. Personally, I tend to find more colors I like in the Americana or Folk Art Brand, but I also use some of the Apple Barrel ones too. Most of these are about $1.00 a bottle (but this is a small bottle).



Someone asked about the color I used on this bowl. I used Americana brand called Heritage Brick.

I use a combination of two different brushes. I use a regular brush and then the sponge type brush. If I want to see brush strokes or go lightly over something, I use the bristle type brush. Most often, I use the sponge type. I find I can control how heavy or light I want with it fairly easily.



This bowl, after having about 3 coats of paint (because I was painting over that fruit, remember?), was distressed with antiquing glaze. I love this glaze. It tones down colors and makes them more muted, which I think makes them look even richer, yet prim.



We buy it at Lowes and if I remember correctly, it is only about $6 to $8 a bottle. And believe me, this stuff goes a long ways! We have done many projects that include many pieces of furniture, walls, and small crafts and this is only the second bottle (maybe third) that we've used. It is made by Valspar and called Antiquing Glaze:



To apply it, use the bristle type brush shown above. You may dilute it half and half water to glaze. If I'm working on a small craft project, I just get out a couple of Tbsp. and then add that same amount of water. However, if I am working with a dark color, I don't dilute it at all. I use it full strength, or if I want a really distressed look, I do the same.



The trick to this is to put it on the very tip of your brush and use light strokes of the wrist, back and forth.



This is a surprise project that I'll show you in a couple of days when I can bring it in. Jason was working on this one and I was photographing.




Here he even let Joy do it. See how simple it is? I hope this helps. If I didn't make something clear or you have more questions, email me or leave it on a comment and I'll try to make it clearer!

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Another project I tackled yesterday was this old window frame that hangs above my couch. Here's what it looked like. You may remember seeing it from a previous post. (Remember you can click on the picture to view it up closer...you can see just how white it seems when you look closer).



It was really "bugging" me that it was so white, even though it had a little dark distressing here and there. So....again, I used what I had on hand. I didn't want to use the antiquing glaze here because I didn't want it to still look white distressed. I really wanted to alter the color a little. So, I pulled out all of our stains and ended up deciding on the Mini Wax Red Oak. I rubbed it on with a rag over the entire frame...giving it two coats. This is how it looks now!



I just love it so much better! It doesn't look so stark against my walls. It seemed to instantly cozy up that spot behind the couch. It coordinates much better with my couch now, toning down the white and making the muted color that fits in much better! If I could just add some things that are in my mind's eye now and make some prim changes, it will look even better. But until then, this did help out. I love that stain!

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Just to show you a sneak peek at something else I'm working on.....here's what I found at Goodwill a couple of weeks ago. I forgot to take a picture then. It's a great pineapple cutting board. As I'm still working on it, I'll show you the outcome in another post real soon!



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And one more thing.......Patty over at Blessed Beyond, posted this wonderful Creamy Cheesey Potatoes recipe on her blog and I made it last night for supper. I have to tell you that we loved it! We had enough left over to go with our meal tonight! It is a crockpot recipe! Thanks for sharing, Patty!



And that is it for today! We're off to a field trip (during our Spring Break)! Thanks to you all for honoring me with your visits and comments! I appreciate them all! Have a great Thursday! :)

~ Tammy ~

A Kitchen Update

A few of you have asked how the kitchen was coming along, so I thought I would give you all an update today.

This past weekend, the only real visual accomplishment was the completion of the back door and pantry door and putting a little shine to the trimwork (hubby HAD to have this). We did come to some decision as far as countertops (I think anyway) and a kitchen sink and faucet.

Saturday, Jason took the pantry door down and "spruced it up". Now if you remember the before pictures, this door was a plain flat interior door. I knew I wanted it to have more character. We had talked about what to do to give more interest. Jason took it out to the garage and worked his magic on it. He planned to add trim to the door to make it a raised panel door. What I didn't know is that he used the old trim that used to be above the cabinets to make the panels (repurposed trim). Now that makes it even more special in that he used a part of my "old kitchen" on the door. And he purposely left me a 4 1/2" opening or space below the first raised panel for a "Pantry" sign (that I don't have yet but have always pictured there and plan to purchase).

Then came the paint. We had chosen Cabin Red, also Lowe's Eddie Bauer paint. Everyone that came around agreed that from the paint sample, it complimented the bittersweet paint very well. However, one stroke of it on my door, and I knew I didn't like it! I was trying to be positive and convince myself that it would dry differently and that it would be okay. Well two doors painted later and dried, I was SURE it wasn't going to work. It looked pink! Jason agreed. Here's what it looked like:



So off we went to Lowe's again late Saturday evening. I didn't expect to get my money back, but I hoped maybe we could tint it some. I put the paint on the counter and proceeded to tell the guy why I didn't like it...and before I could get it all out, he said, "And it was pink." He said that I was about the fourth person in a couple of months with that same shade/color that brought it back for the same reason. He said they all complained that it wasn't the color of the sample...it was more pinkish. That made me feel a little better because the sample swatch really coordinated. He was willing to trying tinting it for me. He started to add more red, but I told him to try brown first. After a couple of times of tinting with various amounts of brown drops, we had a shade I thought would work. Had it not worked, I was going to Sherwin Williams on Monday to buy what had been my second choice of all the paint samples against the kitchen color.....Sundried Tomatoes. But we brought it home and Jason put on the "new color" and it was SO MUCH better. Here's how it the doors turned out:





However, I still thought they would coordinate even better if the color wasn't so bright...muted some. I told him I thought we should try antique glaze over them. He wasn't fond of that idea. Remember he isn't real keen on the old, distressed, grungy look of too many things! I convinced him to do me a sample on a board lightly brushed on with antique glaze (I had not been feeling well during all this...sore throat, headache...etc..). He did it for me, but brought it in and said, "There's your glazed one....see which way you like it better, but I hope you don't like it this way!" lol! Well which way do you think I liked better? Yep, the glazed one! I knew immediately that I liked it alot better. It just seemed to compliment the wall tone! I told him so, and asked him to trust me. I told him I thought he would really like it better in the end. And whew, was I glad when it was finished and he DID like it better. He liked the way the glaze brought out the wood grain on the pantry door, and that fact that it toned down the color a tad bit and made it go better with everything.



I have no idea why that circle is on the wall...the flash I guess..it's not really there in person:


A little closer view..you can see the wood grain Jason likes:


And after all of the painting ordeal was over, late Saturday night, Jason brought in a piece of formica countertop that we had been considering at Lowe's. Remember I told you earlier that we came to some decisions? Well one of them was that we didn't like the tiles for the countertop. The more we looked at them all week and "lived with them", they just didn't make us happy. They seemed to compete with everything! The four color combination was too busy. The two color combination (the floor tile color and terra cotta color) just made me think of a checkerboard and the one color (terra cotta) was best but still just seemed to take over everything. Maybe it was because there was tile on my floor. I'm not really sure. We also decided against the three formica countertops that I showed samples of in an earlier post. I think because my cabinets are so light, the countertops needed a darker contrast, so we had pretty much decided on a black(ish) countertop from Lowe's. A couple of friends from the Country Sampler forum have this countertop, and I loved the way it looked. It's called Labrador Granite. Here's a piece of it lying on my counter. What do you think?



The plans are this weekend to put in countertops and hope that our ordered kitchen sink arrives from Home Depot. The original sink I wanted just didn't coordinate well with the countertop, so I researched and looked....and researched and looked some more. In the end, we ordered this one.



It had good reviews. We sat the laminate piece near a similiar black sink in Lowe's and it seems to work best. We're hoping we made the right decision and that it arrives this weekend in time. If not, Jason plans to just cut the place for it and drop it in when it does arrive. I'm nervous about it all coming together, but I feel fairly confident and excited about it.

Then the next decision will be curtains. Too many decisions to make! Any ideas on curtains? My dining room burgandy sturbridge valances look great in there against everything, but that's just it....I already have them in the dining room and I have the navy sturbridge valances in my living room.



So that's the kitchen update....oh and just last night, Jason painted the pantry door knob black. He was going to buy a new one. I suggested we at least try the $1 Walmart black spray paint and see how it looked. I think it's fine.





And Jason got a big hug and kiss for doing the majority of painting everything this weekend when I wasn't feeling well....I got to be supervisor pretty much this weekend..so I'm really thankful for all his work, and all without complaining at all! :)

And now you know what work is in store for us over the holiday weekend......