Painting & Refinishing Archives | Page 2 of 16

Painting & Refinishing

Antiques

painting a vintage splint basket

Rewind, if you will, back to the day I went to innocently pick up the pond yacht from a local consignment store. I ended up buying the pond yacht, an antique post office register, an antique quilt (I’ll share that soon), and this vintage splint basket. It was all just too good! This vintage split basket/bassinet was a particularly good buy at just $13. It had a very faint stencil on it as well as some aggressive spray-painting marks, so I decided this vintage splint basket was in need of painting. Here is how I gave it a fresh coat without taking away from the aged, chippy appeal. I first tried lightly sanding the stencil off before painting the vintage splint basket, but sanding revealed a yellowy-white color that was not really what I wanted. It was worth trying, though, before breaking out the paint. I thought that MMS Milk

October 21, 2021 6 Comments

All Things Home

painting light switches

For those who have asked about painting the light switches, outlets, and trim in the same color as the wall in the basement family room, this post is for you! Before I ever put a roller on the wall, I envisioned the walls and trim painted the same color. The rest of my house has white trim as a frame to blue/gray walls or wallpaper/starched fabric, but I want this room to have a Gentleman’s Library sort of vibe. I’m sure that many gentleman’s libraries have white trim, but I imagined this room with moody blue walls and trim. There are a lot of different finishes and colors happening in the space right now and painting it all one color (but different sheens) will remove those visual distractions. As an aside, if I thought we were going to live in this house “forever”, I would want to clad the walls

September 9, 2021 42 Comments

Decorating

painting a vintage dough bowl

I’ve had this vintage wooden dough bowl for a few years. My mother-in-law gave it to me when they were cleaning out Jeff’s grandfather’s house. She thought I would like it and she was right. It is a practical size and shape and has a pretty patina. I’ve always thought it would look pretty with some blue paint on the bottom and, so I finally pulled it out and painted it a couple of weeks ago. I was in a mood to work on a project and this was one that’s been on the to-do list for far too long. Here’s how the vintage dough bowl started… I love how wooden pieces wear over time. Can’t you see some color on the bottom? I adore primitive wooden bowls and trenchers wearing their original milk paint, but they are always so expensive. This is a nice way to get that look

August 18, 2021 18 Comments

Art Supplies

refinishing a vintage paint palette

I spent much of last week working on some freelance writing projects, so I didn’t have a chance to make more progress on the basement family room makeover. I am planning to install the chair rail this week, though, and get some more painting done. This is a slow and steady project, but I do want to keep some forward momentum going! Since I don’t have an update on the basement, I thought I would share a little project I worked on a couple of weeks ago – refinishing a vintage paint palette. I realize this is sort of a niche thing and not everyone has a vintage paint palette sitting around that they want to refinish and use, but refinishing wood is refinishing wood. This would work for a cutting board, a tabletop, a dresser… anything that is wood. I purchased this palette off of Etsy because I loved

August 17, 2021 8 Comments

All Things Home

furniture makeover | painting an old stool

We had an uncommonly warm weekend, so I decided to finally work on painting this stool that’s been hanging out in my garage, waiting for some attention, for almost a year! I picked it up on one of my first antique outings when the stay-at-home orders were lifted. I had no idea what I was going to do with this stool, but I think it was $12 or $15, so it was hard to pass up. It’s sturdy, has a great shape, and pretty turned legs, and I almost always find a good use for an old stool. They are a great size and height to use as a small side table or a plant stand, so I have them all over the house! I liked the shape but I did not like the beige paint color. It wasn’t the worst beige ever, but I wanted to change the color.

May 4, 2021 21 Comments

All Things Home

milk painted dresser makeover

I know that my followers love a good furniture makeover and I have a good old fashioned painted dresser makeover today! This is a dresser I bought in the spring of 2019 when my mom and I were working on the guest room makeover. We went out to a few local antique and consignment shops to see if we could find dressers to use as storage/nightstands and we ended up finding one for each side. This is one of those dressers that was now replaced by an almost identical dresser we found when they were visiting a few weeks ago. Are you tracking with me? We ended up swapping out the one we bought last March with the recent find because the drawers work just a little bit better. Since Jeff will be using it daily as a nightstand, it made sense to use the slightly sturdier one. Be also

September 9, 2020 67 Comments

All Things Home

how to paint a granite fireplace surround

One of the downsides to buying a house that is new-ish and in nice condition is that it’s hard to rip out and replace things that are perfectly nice. In the other homes we’ve owned, I’ve been able to take the approach of “we can’t make it any worse, so let’s just go for it!” In this house, we can make things worse and also make them look cheap and shoddy in comparison to the quality of the home. So, I was hesitant to do any sort of DIY treatment to the granite fireplace surround in the living room. There was nothing wrong with it, but it just wasn’t my taste. I can’t tell you how much research I’ve done over the past three years on how to paint a granite fireplace surround before I finally took the plunge! I wasn’t even sure I wanted to paint it, so I

August 17, 2020 33 Comments

All Things Home

Edging & Painting the Concrete Patio

Last Thursday, the weather was lovely. It was sunny, wasn’t too hot, and there was a light breeze. It was the perfect day to get the patio under our deck painted. Oh, this patio was so sad and neglected. It felt so good to finally give it some attention! Before we could paint, we had to get it all cleaned up. We did the majority of that during one of our family workdays. We burned the sticks, bagged the trash, put things in the garage that we wanted to keep (like the cinderblocks) and power washed the dirt and debris off. It looked so much better after a good cleaning, but the power washer (we have ) did not remove the paint splatters from when the previous owners painted the deck. The best option was to prime and paint to achieve a nice, clean surface. I started by edging around

June 16, 2020 16 Comments

I’m Marian, a painter, writer, and lover of all things creative. From art and antiques to home projects and everyday life, I share my journey in hopes of inspiring you to embrace your own creativity and make beauty in the spaces you live.

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