Joe has started school and i'm working again.
It feels good to be settled for a while. We love our new apartment and having so much space is wonderful! With more space we of course need things to fill it right? Ha ha. Our extra bedroom is now half a study area for Joe and half sewing area for me. It's so nice! So we've been on the hunt looking for more furniture for around the house. We went Craigstlist crazy! (also freecycle, which is an amazing site) We got a coffee table, a chair, two bar stools, a desk (free at a freecycle sale, awesome!) a bookshelf and an end table. The end table we got at a yard sale for $5 but it was kind beat up. This inspired our DIY fever. We sanded it down and stained it and put a nice coat of polyurethane on it. It turned out beautiful! I wish i had taken a before picture but here's the after.
(looks new right? yes!)
We also got some paint and turned this ugly dirty books shelf
Into this great new shelf. It has a new life!
(sorry pictures are sideways)
We learned a lot in these projects. First, latex paint stays sticky for a LONG time. We let it dry over a week and it's dry, but still sticky. After doing some quick research online i learned about a phenomenon called 'blocking'. It is that latex paint is dry to the touch but will stay sticky for months. booooo. If we had painted a wall this wouldn't be so bad, but since the purpose of a bookshelf is to put books on we had to find a solution. You'll notice in the picture we had to put talcum powder on the shelves so they books wouldn't stick. Living and learning.
Also we learned in staining our end table you should sand the whole thing at the beginning. When we started we cleaned and sanded the top and stained it. Then realized the legs weren't going to be the same color. we had to wait for the stain to dry then sand the legs. Then clean the whole thing again. Then stain the top with the second coat and the legs with the first coat. Then wait for it to dry. Then stain the second coat on the legs, and let it dry. Then add the polyurethane and wait for that to dry a few days before setting anything on it. wow. What we thought could be done in a day took over a week. Lesson learned, don't underestimate small projects.
It was a lot of fun doing these projects together. More apartment pictures to come! Now everything is settled and ready for another year. Let the good times roll!
