Refinished MCM Cabinet

Well blow me down Im tired!  Mother's Day has taken it out of me.  And Im not even a mother..  I do have a cat, Ms Do-As-I-Please, but all she gave me for mother's day was a morning armpit sniff and a ferocious bath refusal.  No bacon, no eggs, just a sniff sniff and a whisker tickle.

 

 

 I did spend the afternoon with my mom, sisters, and their kiddies.  I took the two older ones down to the creek to try and catch fish.  And before that I was working on furniture all day (no complaints there!) but Im happy to be flopped on the couch now.



 

 

So I just finished this beauty.  And sometimes wood is just so great that you can't bring yourself to paint over it.  This piece spoke to me...it said...don't paint me. And I listened (for the most part, I did paint the hidden drawer).

 

 

It was in very good condition, but still needed a little spruce up.  I sanded the top and front panels back to the grain and re-stained.

 

 
I finished with 5 coats of satin sheen polyurethane.  The finish is fantastic.
 

 
It has one little drawer, and I did let myself paint that just to add a little bit of contrast when you slide the cupboard open.  I also lined it with vintage material.
 

 

I love the spidery legs. 

 

 
This shot shows how great the top came out.  I custom mixed up the stain using dark walnut and an orangey colour stain I have (can't remember what its called at the moment and Im too lazy to go check quite honestly!).
 

 

 

The shot below is the before, you can see how good the condition was, but up close there were some scratches and dings.  A little photobomber in the foreground there.

 

 



Very Whitewashed Grey Dresser

This dresser was a long and drawn out affair (think Victor and Nikky from Y&R)  I began by painting it a light blue, but the finished effect looked ill suited to anything but a nursery.  The plan was to have it in our bedroom, so nursery was definitely out of the question.

Phase two was to paint over the blue with grey.  It looked better.  A little.  But it still didn't have any pazzaz and it just didn't quite get me excited.

Phase three was to whitewash over the grey, ok I started to like it a little more, but it needed some extra contrast in my mind, bring on Phase four..

Phase four was to stain the top a very very dark chocolate (almost black) to amp up the contrast a bit.

It is a great addition to the muted tones of our bedroom and provides ample storage for Mr. Chuckles' unmentionables.

The cute vintage pictures are framed advertisements from old 1950s 'Life' magazines passed down to us from Mr. Chuckle's grandfather. I love the one of Santa holding a typewriter.

A close up of the whitewash technique.  I painted over the knobs as well, and then did some light distressing to show the brass through.  

I haven't decided if I will distress the dresser.  What do you think?