Fridge Redo

I'm going to preface this post by saying, this is not a project I made myself. This is something my Mom did for her store, Country Road Treasures (info at bottom of post). That being said, I don't have any in progress pictures, but I know how she completed the process.

Mom needed a fridge for storing things at the store (pop, lunches, etc). They had a old Frigidaire from the 60's era. It was originally white, but the door had started rusting and was very stained. Mom also wanted a place to display the different fonts and things she could cut with her Cricut for custom orders. The fridge door was already divided into panels, so Mom just used those to make this:

She taped first spray painted the green color (not sure which colors she used.). When that was dry, she taped off the green part to spray the blue borders. Finally, she cut different words and silhouettes out of vinyl using her Cricut and applied them to the panels. Pretty simple!

I'm not sure if you would want to do this to a newer fridge in your house, particularly one that gets a lot of use. But who says that garage fridge has to stay ugly? I would be interested to see if anyone could transform a golden harvest colored fridge!

If you are interested in mom's store and live in South Dakota or Minnesota near the border (Big Stone City, SD) sent me an email (ehinders[at]gmail.com) and I can give you directions.

Don't settle for dull, live a refinished life!

What I've Been Working On Lately

It's been awhile since I've posted anything. I've been quite busy at work and with some community obligations, but I have managed to get a few projects done lately. I just completed a swap for Craftster (go check this out if you haven't yet. It's a great site where you can view lots of crafts by medium. Okay, short commercial break over! :) )

 I sewed two applique pillow covers. I haven't done much applique, but these turned out pretty good (minus the crooked sewing lines!).

These were based off of some Pins on one of my partner's boards. I think they turned out pretty good. Here's a closer look at the bunting one:

I also crocheted some fingerless mitts (a mini tutorial coming soon on this) using cotton yarn.

Here's one on:

That's mainly what I've been up to lately. This next couple of weeks, I am planning on a full tutorial post, a couple of mini tutorials, sewing my daughter a Halloween costume and hopefully a continuing series of organizing all my craft supplies in my basement.

Don't settle for dull, live a refinished life!

Chevron Side Table

I've been in love with chevron patterns on furniture for awhile now, but too nervous to try. I got a set of side tables at an auction recently and decided to try it out. I'll do my best to lay down how I did it step by step in case any of you out there are brave enough to try it as well! :)

I'll start by saying this project probably would've turned out better by rolling on latex paint and not using spray paint, but I had the spray laying around in the colors I want.

Here's a before shot: (well, not technically as this is the other table which you will shortly see is a hexagon shape and not square like the other one, but you get the idea)

I really like the rope detailing on these. I wanted to do the rope detail white and alternate with the blue. (Of course I would pick colors to make for a lot of tape work!) The first thing I did is tape over all the sides I wanted to be blue (which I forgot to take a picture of) and painted the white base on the top.

Then I tried to cut out a chevron pattern with my cricut on freezer paper to use as a stencil. Total fail. But I did get a small chunk of it to work and just traced it on my top:

Until I had this:

Then I started taping the pattern:

After I had everything taped, I sprayed over it with my blue (Krylon Oxford Blue). I let it dry a minute and peeled the tape to reveal this:

Not too bad. Way better than I hoped for sure! If you go around and measure the lines, they are crooked, uneven and not at all the same size. But, I'm not worried about perfection.

I was going to paint the base white, but I decided I liked the blue better. (I mean is it just me, or should this blue really be called Tardis blue?) So I painted the bottom, distressed it and rubbed a super light coat of poly + stain (Minwax Polyshades in American Oak) over it to seal everything.

Here's the final results:

Some details:

A tip to note on this one: I just barely sanded the bottom before spray painting. Just a quick rub with a sanding block to make it a little rough. The result of this is when I used the sanding pad to distress the paint, the original finish showed through quite nicely. If you were not distressing the piece, more sanding before painting would be required to make sure the paint adheres without flaking or peeling down the road.

What do you think? I love the chevron and I think I need to do more pieces that way (but not the sister table to this one. I think chevron on a hexagon is my limit!).

Don't settle for dull, live a refinished life!

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Knot Too Shabby Wow Us Weekends

Chenille Pumpkins

I had an old white chenille bedspread I decided to make fabric pumpkins with. I dyed a chunk of the bedspread orange and away I went. They are really quick and easy to cut, sew, and stuff. They only take about a half hour start to finish.

What a great trio of pumpkins! I decided to leave the white one inside out because I like how shabby it looked with the raw seam edges.

A little stick and some hot glue, and I have stems!

Don't you just love fall?

Don't settle for dull, live a refinished life!

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