Wednesday, February 27, 2013

Nursery Stuff: Dresser

Danny and I finished up the last step of our dresser makeover tonight, so I thought I'd share the dresser story with you. As always, scroll to the end if you just want to see the dresser.

I know I've mentioned that we already own a mid-century dresser that I ruined with paint a few years ago (ugh). Here she is:



Back when I was feeling ambitious, I planned on refinishing that sucker—but as time wore on, the thought of all that stripping and sanding and priming and staining became overwhelming. Plus, if we used that huge dresser, we wouldn't be able to put anything else, like the Ikea Expedit, on that wall.

I searched Craigslist relentlessly for nearly 3 months—to no avail. The very same day I gave up and decided to just buy a changing table from Target (Seriously. Like, 3 hours after Danny told his mom she could buy us a changing table), I stumbled upon this stud (and his taller brother that'll go in our bedroom) on Craigslist:

Looks way better in this "before" photo I took than it did in real life.

I don't know why my gut told me to check Craigslist one more time, but it did. They're in very good condition, and we snagged them both for $200.

However, they looked very dull and dry, which this picture captures nicely:


I also wasn't a fan of this:

Freaking Formica!

...or this:

Disgusting drawer liners.

...but I knew we could remedy these situations.

We borrowed some supplies from my friend, Melanie, who happens to know and love all things furniture.


First we scrubbed the dresser down with Murphy's Oil Soap. Next, we applied Howard's Restor-A-Finish with fine-grit steel wool, then wiped it dry. Last, we polished the entire surface with Howard's Feed-N-Wax. This process really brought the piece to life, and it took less than 2 hours.

I removed the gross drawer liner and replaced it with some pretty gift wrap I found at T.J.Maxx.


I ordered a cut-to-order piece of laminated vinyl from Chic Shelf Paper to cover up the Formica and help tie the piece in with the crib. I have to be completely honest and admit that there are bubbles all over the surface of that thing, and try as we might, we can't get rid of them.

Anyway, this isn't the most fantastic picture in the world, but here's the final result:

All shiny and lovely.

Yay!

4 comments:

Colleen said...

Gorgeous! I love it :)

TheRavenousMommy said...

The dresser looks awesome!

jessica dukes said...

that looks so mod. love it! I feel like when we have a baby, his/her room will be prettier than the entire house. sooo fun!

Amanda said...

Jessica, it's true! I'm so jealous of my own baby's room. The rest of the house sucks. :P