Natalie's Cabinet Makeover

Hi!  Today's post is a cabinet upcycle done by one of my very best besties, Natalie.  Isn't she adorable?  We served missions for our church together ten years ago and she's just one of those people that you can talk to after months of no communication and it's like nothing has changed.  Love her!  And just to show you how good of friends we are... notice the dress?  Yeah, how many people's wedding dress can you borrow?  

I borrowed hers, by the way.  And that said... Here's Natalie.

One thing I need to tell you, I practically suffocate at our house on toys. We have too many toys. Any of you out there in blogger land have that problem? Ha ha . . . if you even have one child, you have this problem. So, I needed another place to put toys. Something in the family room that the toys can be invisible in. I knew I wanted a cabinet to stick in the corner. Enter KSL.com :)

I found this little beauty on KSL. They were asking seventy bucks. I offered forty. We settled on fifty. I could see the massive potential!!

Okay, so I brought the thing home, took off all the hardware (doors, hinges, drawer) and began sanding. Here's something I didn't know. When people say 'sand' something, they could mean that very loosely. They (whoever 'they' are) could probably mean something more like 'rough up' so the primer or paint will stick. Sanding sucks. It's horrible and time consuming. This is how far I got after an hour. I called Kelli bummed and ready to be done. I had ONE day to finish this so it could sit and get paint fumes off before I took it in the house and set up before Tyler's arrival home. I did NOT have a week to sand this whole thing off. She set me straight. You rough it up, which would take maybe one and a half sheets of sand paper, not the FIVE I went through for half of the top and maybe 20 minutes. So I roughed up the rest (notice, I didn't NOT say sanded) and called it good.

This color looks black, but it's actually dark walnut. Just thought you'd like to know. And I actually painted this whole thing with spray paint (seriously, all five layers). Not something I would do again. 'Why not' you ask? Because my forearm is still sore. And, the worst part for me, it's really really hard to control drips when the can is almost empty because of it's spraying inconsistency. So there's that.

Also, if you were doing this, I would take off your wedding ring or wear gloves. I now get to make a trip to the jeweler to have my ring cleaned. I've been assured over and over that they can remove this paint from my ring. I have high hopes.

So you LOVE this color?!?! This awesome color is called Paprika and it's by Rustoleum. It really is the color of the spice! Awesome! I kind of love love it (yep, I said love twice!! That's just how I feel).

And I left the inside, the back of the cabinet door, and the inside of the drawer the dark walnut color. I just like it like that! After that I slightly distressed it. I forgot to take a picture, but on the drawer and a couple of spots of the doors the paint fish-eyed. I didn't care because I knew that I was going to distress it, but that would have made me completely furious if I was going for a more modern look. Fish-eyeing is when a contaminant gets on a substance that repels paint. I happened to be talking to my brother who works with paint all the time. A garage isn't exactly a clean space :) Whatever. Then I went ahead and stained it with, what else?, a dark walnut stain!! I instantly liked what I saw.


SO . . . . drum roll please . . .

TAH DAH!!!!!!

I am completely amazed with how much I love it. Seriously. Oh, and just so we're clear, I bought new knobs. The other ones were hideous. But I adore the little hinges, so they totally stayed and I didn't do anything to those other than wipe off the dust :)


Honestly, not to toot my own horn, but BEEP BA BEEP BEEP BEEP!!! I'm so excited about this that I just may do something else. Who doesn't need a reddish orange cabinet in the corner of their living room?!?! If you need help . . . well, I suppose you can call me, but I would recommend calling someone that knows what they are doing. I just guessed and pretended to be confident about it :)

WOO HOO!!!


(Kelli again)
I asked Natalie if I could post this on my blog because I am absolutely in love with it and with the fact that she didn't know what she was doing, she just went for it.  Isn't that how it is for most of us?  At least that's how it is for me.  


So, what do you guys use?  Spray paint?  Roll on?  Brush on?  I made a poll so use that to tell me!

What paint method do you like best?