On Tuesday, I had one last thing to do to finish my new treasure.  I simply needed to brush on a coat of polyurethane and let it dry.  I have gone down this road many, many times, so it should have been a breeze.

I set to work on the poly as soon as Emma went down for her nap.  Unfortunately, the fast-dry poly dried so quickly on the top of the piece that I had trouble keeping a wet edge.  When my brush drug across a spot that had just been painted 15 seconds earlier, it was already a gummy mess.

I thought that perhaps I was applying the coats too thinly.  So, I let it dry and added another coat with a loaded high density foam roller.  This time, I had a different problem in that the poly was super bubbly (and I’m not talking about it’s personality, y’all).

Instead of freaking out, which is quite often my reaction to something like this, I grabbed a sheet of 220-grit sandpaper and lightly sanded off the poly coats on the top.  I then went back to my paint can and repainted the top of the piece.  It’s not perfect, but it’s certainly good enough that only I will notice the flaws.  Today, I’ll reapply the poly in a thicker coat and hope that it will solve my problem.  Keep your fingers crossed!

I mention all of this because there is something I want you (and I) to remember:  It’s Just Paint.  Instead of worrying about messing up a finish or not liking a color, just remember that it can always be undone.  You may have to sand it.  You may have to strip it.  But there is nothing that you have painted that can’t be repainted.  And then repainted again and again.

The holds true for walls as well.  A few weeks ago, my Question of the Day on Facebook asked if any of you have patterns on your walls.  One sweet and loyal reader replied that she didn’t because she doesn’t want anything permanent.  I totally understand that line of thinking.  I change my mind with the seasons, too.

But the thing is, paint is one of the least permanent things you can do to your walls (or your furniture).  If you paint a stripe or try out a new stencil on a wall and you absolutely hate it, just paint over it!  You’ll only be out the time it took you to put it together and the cost of the paint.  That’s a pretty low risk for a giant payoff in my book.

Paint has amazing transformative qualities.  So much of what I do in my own home is driven by color, and that would be hard to do if I was paralyzed by paint.  The number of projects I’ve sanded down and repainted are too numerous to even remember.  I just keep washing my brushes, waiting on the coats to dry, and stocking up on fine grit sandpaper.

Do you feel nervous to tackle a painting project?  What is it that worries you?

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For much of our lives, we’ve heard the following about love:

If you love something, set it free;
If it comes back, it’s yours;
If it doesn’t, it never was.
- Author Disputed

But, when we are talking about something much less human, such as a great piece of thrifted furniture, I generally follow my own advice:

If you love something, snatch it up;
If you come back, it could be gone;
And you will spend months obsessing about what never was.
- Lindsay

Y’all can quote me on that, if you’d like.  I know it’s really deep.

Recently, a new furniture consignment store opened in my little town. We had a consignment store here previously, but it was more like 5% consignments and 95% new furniture that the owner bragged to me just came in from Thailand. Nothing against Thailand or new furniture, but that’s not really what I go into a consignment store looking to find.

I had my doubts about our newest shop, but stopped in a few weeks ago when my son had an appointment in the medical building next door.  I was initially disappointed because inside the front doors I basically saw nothing but new pieces.  But, the owner told me that he had two warehouses full of consignments in the back.  What looked like a small store was really about 8,000 square feet of space.

There was nothing that I particularly needed, but I was like a kid in a candy store.  I viewed each piece with the same amount of delight…until I saw two pieces that stopped me in my tracks.  One was a long, deep stereo cabinet and the other was a matching hutch and console.  I immediately recognized them as being pieces from the 1960s (too much Mad Men watching?), and my brain went into hyperdrive trying to find a place to put them.  I didn’t really have the space.  I then tried to figure out where to put them in friends’ homes.  It’s a bad sign when you try to mentally decorate your own friends’ homes without them asking you to do so!

Did I mention that each piece was only $80?  Yeah, you’d have been searching for a place, too.

That day, I couldn’t justify buying either of the pieces since I couldn’t find a place for them, so I had to walk away.  It was hard.  I obsessed about where I could put them or how I could refinish them.  I told Tom about them.  I told my best friend about them.  I told all of the mothers in the waiting room at Zack’s appointment about them.  I was a woman possessed by the thought of owning one of those pieces.

As the week went on, I decided that I did in fact have the perfect place for the stereo cabinet.  I had a piece I was already planning on refinishing for that space, but I loved this one so much more.  I told myself that if it was still there 7 days later, it was destined to be mine.  I had dreams (literally) about what color I would paint it.  I was all prepared to store my kids’ wooden puzzles in its wooden slats that originally held records.  I didn’t follow my “if you love it, snatch it up immediately” advice, and I knew that I was taking a risk.

Those seven days crawled by, but eventually the day arrived.  Emma and I went into the store and made a beeline back to the warehouse where it originally was.  Would it still be there?  Would it have a ‘sold’ tag on it just to taunt me?  If I ran (even though no one else was in the store), would that help my chances of finding it?

Yes.  No.  And probably not, but it didn’t hurt to try.

She was there.  The owner told me that the consignor’s dad had purchased it new in 1964.  The daughter-in-law hated it and wanted it out of her house.  Obviously, she didn’t see it for all of it’s awesome potential.  Do you?

This piece is currently in my dining room, drawers out and doors off.  She underwent a major transformation this weekend, and I have a few finishing touches to put on her before I can show her off.  Any guesses as to what color her faded, green-tinted self is now?  She’s now a little Don Draper meets Living With Lindsay.

Which of the thrift store love tenets do you follow – Set It Free or Snatch it Up Immediately?

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Getting a new, glossy decorating catalog in the mail is such fun.  I love looking through the pages, but I admit that I rarely buy what they are selling.  Why?  Firstly, it seems like everything is always way too expensive for my cheap taste.  Secondly, I know they are trying to trick us into thinking whatever we buy is going to look just as good as it does in the catalog.

Trick us?  Yep, that’s right.  The catalog photographers use lighting, extra props, and backdrops to set the scene.  Just as fashion magazines airbrush their models to give you the illusion of perfection, home decor catalogs do whatever they can to suck you into buying their goods.

Don’t believe me?  Well, let’s deconstruct a photo from a recent Crate and Barrel catalog that arrived in my mailbox.  I was really drawn to this photo of their Regatta Lounge Set.

What they are selling here is $4800 worth of patio furniture (and I’m not even exaggerating the price).  I love this photo, but it’s not the furniture I love.  I am drawn to this because of the feeling it conveys.

So, let’s start taking away some things and see when we stop loving it.  The first thing I’m going to remove via my super awesome photoshop skills (ha!) is the gorgeous background that overlooks the ocean.  Obviously, the vast majority of us don’t have this view from our back patio.

Okay, that’s not really that large of a change.  Now, let’s take away the lanterns that are placed in the foreground of the shot.  You may have one or two lanterns on your patio, but you certainly don’t have them spread all over the floor.

And I’ll take away the backgammon board, because I’d assume you don’t have one of those just laying around on your patio, either.

Let’s now take away the tray of decorations and the beautiful cocktails from the coffee table.  Maybe I should have left the glasses since you would probably have those on the table if you were throwing a party, but they wouldn’t be there every day so I took them out.

Now, let’s take away the rug.  You might have a rug under you set, but I would guess it wouldn’t be the nearly $400 rug that’s pictured here.

Okay, now it’s getting really interesting!  What if we removed the other table top accessories and bucket of iced beverages?

A ha!  Now it’s looking more like something I’d actually have in my backyard.  And honestly, I really am not loving it all that much anymore.  Let’s remove the pillows, though, since just those four would cost about $130.

And just because I thought it would be more realistic, I went ahead and removed the beautiful wooden decking.  If you are lucky enough to have a deck in your backyard, it’s probably stained closer to the color of the above chairs.  If you are like me, you just have a slab of boring concrete.

Woah.  Here’s what they are really trying to sell you – the $4800 patio set.  It looks a lot different without all of the extras and the beautiful scenery, doesn’t it?

I show you this not to discourage you from falling in love with a catalog and magazine photo.  I love taking that sort of inspiration and tweaking it to fit my reality.  If I had the above set, I’d add a few accessories, but it would still look nothing like the original photo.  I show you this to help you see through the styling tricks and encourage you to see what they are really selling.

Just for giggles, I put together an animation of all the layers being stripped from the original photo.  I found it really interesting!

What do you think about all of this?  Have you ever been drawn to a feeling conveyed in a catalog photograph and then been let down when you saw the actual item that was being sold?

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For years, I stored all of my leftover paint in the garage.  We had several shelves full of half-empty gallon and quart size cans.  About this time last year, I decided that needed to change.  Not only were they taking up valuable garage space, but it turns out that paint goes bad after being stored outside for just a short while.  I felt silly for not realizing that.

So instead of storing the new cans I have more recently acquired in the garage, they now take up residence on top of the cabinets in my laundry room. It’s a great solution for the new paint, but I was left with a conundrum of how to dispose of the old paint.  You shouldn’t simply throw it out with the weekly trash, as it presents a hazard to the sensitive environment.

In many areas, you can take your half-full cans of paint to be disposed of in hazardous waste collection facilities or recycling centers.  You can find a place in your area by visiting Earth911.com.

It’s also quite easy to harden leftover paint to make it okay for curbside pick up.  Now, I’m certainly no expert, but I understand that most municipal trash pickups will collect dried latex paint.  I have heard that you can use mulch or cat litter to harden the paint, but I just picked up a package of Homax Paint Harder for a few dollars at Home Depot.

To use the paint hardner, you simply dump the powder into up to 2/3 gallon of paint.  I had about a quart of paint in a plastic box that I needed to harden, so I just poured the powder into it.

With a stir stick, I stirred the powder into the paint until it started to thicken up.

After about 15 minutes, it had hardened to the consistency of thick oatmeal.  The wonders of chemistry!

At this point, you can simply scoop the hardened latex paint into something like newspaper and throw it away on trash pickup day.  Your cans can then be recycled.

Oil-based paint cannot be disposed in the same way.  Instead, it does need to be taken to a local hazardous waste facility.

Now I just need to buy about 30 more packets of paint hardner to finish up the rest of the paint left in the garage!  What do you do with your leftover paint?  Have you ever used a paint hardener?

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Custom, hand-painted rugs are all the rage these days.  Why settle for an ordinary rug that you can buy in the stores when you can easily customize one with paint in the colors and style of your choice?  Blogland is hopping with tutorials on the subject – my friends Mandi and Shelley offer great tips on their blogs – and I’ve even tried my hand at a few.

But, if the thought of coming up with your own pattern and creating your own stencil makes you nervous, or if you worried you may ruin a perfectly good rug, there’s a new company that is going to help take all of that worry away – Vecco.  They sell DIY rug supplies and kits that contain everything you need – the rug, stencils, colorant sprays (think powdered spray), and a sealant to bind the paint to the fibers of the rug.  If you make a mistake, all you have to do is vacuum away the paint before you apply the sealant.  Folks, it really don’t get better than that!

Just a head’s up – TODAY ONLY (5/3/12), you can use the code RUG50 at checkout and save 50% off your purchase of a new rug at Vecco.  Grab your rug for 50% off and then add in the stencil, colorants of your choice, and the sealer.  Or maybe you just need a plain, new rug to ground a space in one of your rooms.  This is a great coupon code for that, too.

Sorry to post this last minute, but I just found out about the coupon code.  I’ve had my eye on this company for a while, because I thought it was a great concept. I’ll be sure to let you know if I come across further discounts.

Happy rug making!

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I live in a little suburb of Austin, which is the capitol of everything awesome.  Okay, maybe LA and NYC take the titles of the Capitols of Awesome, but Austin is easily the runner up.  I’m probably a bit biased, but we really do have the best of everything.

Last week, a new awesomeness came to Austin – the Country Living Fair.  For the past 9 years, Country Living (yes, the magazine) gathers some of the country’s best artisans, antique dealers, presenters and chefs and brings them all into one place.  It’s seriously like the magazine comes to life!  The CL Fair is normally held in Columbus, Ohio and Atlanta, Georgia, but we were lucky to have them add Austin in the mix this year.

Rustoleum (one of my favorite DIY brands out there) is a major sponsor of the CL Fair, and they sent me some passes so that a friend and I could check it out.  We had a blast taking the morning to shop for vintage and handmade goods, and I took my trusty ‘ole camera so I could capture the awesomeness for you.

I could spend days and days wandering through vintage shops, so the shopping was definitely my favorite part.  It’s been nearly a week later, and I’m still kicking myself for not picking up this concrete poodle statue.  I’ve noticed that I, quite on accident, have started adding a fun animal figurine to every room of my home, and this would have been a great addition.

Aren’t these chairs darling?  I wanted two of them (they came in red, too), but I didn’t take any home.  They were priced at around $150 a piece (for a reproduction!), and I thought that seemed a little crazy.  Maybe they were made with magic fairy dust or something and I just didn’t realize it.

I was absolutely enamored with these red lighted stars from an old carnival sign.  I really have a special place in my heart for old signs like this, and I have a special place in my home for these particular signs.  Too bad I couldn’t afford them.

I did end up bringing home a few other old carnival signs, but you’ll have to wait to see those…

I also thought this little house was adorable.  Couldn’t you see it on a little table on your front porch surrounded by little plants?  So cute!  I’m sure that the lady in the background doesn’t think it’s so cute that her rear is now on view for the whole world to see.  Sorry, Lady!

As you may have noticed from my remarks, the prices for the vintage items were a little steep.  But, I will have to say that I am becoming more and more willing to pay a bit more for vintage.  Now that I have my little nearly 2-year old (!) in tow most of the time, I don’t really have the time (or patience) to pick through things for the best deal.  I’m happy to pay a bit of a premium for someone to do the picking, hauling and cleaning for me.  Perhaps that will change once Miss Em starts preschool in the fall.  I’ve read some other reviews regarding the pricing of goods at the Austin CL Fair, so that’s just my 2 cents on the issue.

There were also a few gorgeous tablescapes set up by Country Living, and this one featuring faux butterfly specimens was my favorite.  I think it would be a cheap and easy DIY, and it would really set a great theme for a spring or summer party table.

Besides the vintage goods and antique dealers, there were tons of hand crafted goodies by independent artisans.  I met an artist named Shawna Robinson who has a business named Happy Chair.  I must have stopped by her booth 3 or 4 times.  I have never seen such artistry put into a piece of furniture, let alone dozens of pieces.  Unfortunately, the photos I took of her pieces at the CL Fair didn’t turn out because of the lighting situation, but I’m going to connect with Shawna so that I can get some better photos to share with you.  You are going to flip.  I’ve never seen anything like it.

There were other handmade items that I wanted to share with you, as well.  I thought this pair of dachshund pillows were just too darling.  Why didn’t I think of that?

I mentioned my friends at Rustoleum earlier, and they were there to show off some of their wonderful products.  If you follow me on Facebook, you saw my ridiculous delight last week about Rustoleum’s new Furniture Transformations product.  It’s very similar to their Cabinet Transformations product that I have tested and love, except the Furniture kit comes in array of bright, delicious colors – Bright red.  Apple Green.  Lagoon Blue.  Nom, nom, nom.

I’m going to be testing out this product in the coming weeks, so look for a review soon.  I can’t remember the last time I was so excited about a new DIY product.

If you live near Columbus or Atlanta, I definitely recommend checking out the Country Living Fair when it comes to your area.  Whether you are going to hear the great speakers (we sat in on talk by Cari Cucksey from HGTV’s Cash and Cari), eat some yummy Southern food, or search through the vintage or handmade goods, its worth a trip.  I walked away with exactly what I was looking for, and you might, too!

P.S. I have totally forgotten to announce the winner of the $50 Container Store gift card from Apartment Guide.  Congrats to Caryn!  Please email me so we can get the card to you.

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