$10 ReStore Find to Fabulous Kid’s Bed

Our most recent project- renovating E’s room was kicked into full swing after I stumbled on a fantastic twin bed from Adourn.  I couldn’t leave it behind and couldn’t bear to see it sit in the basement until we redid the room thus beginning our current construction project.

A couple of weeks after purchasing the first bed (which will be F’s), I took the kids up to Winona, Mn and Lacrosse, Wi for some antique shopping hoping to score another twin bed that would complement the one I had.  For the first time in my entire life, I hit gold at the first store I stopped in (after the obligatory stop at Bloedow’s Donuts):  The Habitat for Humanity ReStore in Winona, Minnesota.  I have expressed my love for these stores in a past post when we purchased a bathroom vanity top at one so I won’t get too gushy again but let me just say if you haven’t ventured into one, you are missing out!  It’s truly amazing some of the things you will stumble on at seriously unbeatable prices.  

So there I was, 9 months pregnant with two trailing kids, hands in pockets when I found a WHOLE RACK of bed frames!  After a quick look through, I found the trifecta:  right size, right style and right price ($10!!!).  

The bed did not come with the rails, only a headboard and footboard but I was confident that Andy would be able to Macgyver something up.

I knew that I wanted to paint the bed and decided to try some chalk paint.  I stopped by a craft store in LaCrosse and they had a limited selection of American Decor Chalk Paints.  After conferring with E, we choose a light pink color, Promise.  

I wasn’t 100% sure it would work with the color of F’s bed but decided to give it a go.  I also purchased a jar of American Decor Creme Wax to use for a top coat on the painted bed.  With a coupon I had, the two paint jars plus a big can of stripper came to $20.

Still carrying a Peterson spawn, I passed the job of stripping the old, glossy polyurethane off the bed to Andy.  

The big things to know about using stripper is to do it in a well ventilated space, use drop cloths around the space and apply the stripper liberally.  It’s a messy job but much easier than trying to get polyurethane off with a heat gun.  Using an old brush, Andy put a heavy coat of stripper on the whole headboard.  Right away, the polyurethane starting to bubble up.  Andy then used a scrapper to scrap off the old finish.  It took four coats of stripper to get everything off.  It is important once you are done with the stripper to let the wood rest overnight to dry out any stripper that has seeped into the now bare wood.  

After letting the wood dry, I used 220 and 100 grit sandpaper to sand off any remaining poly and even out the finish.  

Before sanding

Before sanding you can see some remaining globs of poly

It took several passes with the sandpaper and numerous squares of sandpaper but once it was done, the wood was bare and very smooth.  After a wipe down to remove dust, the bed was ready to be painted.

I followed the instructions on the American Decor Chalk Paint and applied two light coats of paint.  

One coat of paint

My between coats trick of saving the brush without cleaning or drying out. I throw the bagged brush in the fridge.

A quick fast forward through dry time and I wasn’t happy with the color.  It wasn’t an offensive color or anything but just kind of a… blah, non color… somewhere between pink and grey.  

Back to the drawing board, I choose a rose pink:  Faded Courtly Rose from Walmart’s color line color matched in Glidden Satin paint. 

I still wanted to try a chalk finish but can’t get chalk paints in town so I decided to make my own.  I found a few “recipes” online but decided on one from lowes.com- mostly because I could get all the ingredients around town.  The supplies needed were:

Latex Paint (I got a quart of satin finish)
Stir Stick
Mixing bucket (I bought an empty quart paint can from the hardware store)
Plaster of Paris
Water

I mixed 1/3 cup of plaster of paris with 1/3 cup of cool water in the empty paint can and stirred until it was smooth.  

I then mixed in 1 cup of the latex paint and stirred it until it was completely mixed in.  

FYI- once I was done with it, I put the paint can lid on and stored it.  We used it again a couple of weeks later and all it needed was a quick stir and it worked great again!

Paint mixed, I applied two thin coats to the headboard and baseboard.  

one coat

two coats

When doing distressing, thin coats are best so the finish is smooth and it is easier to sand off paint to make a worn look.  Once the paint was completely dry, I used 220 grit sandpaper and sanded (with the wood grain) in areas that would naturally wear over time.  

My light pink paint snafu actually ended up being a good thing because the places that I sanded the rose pink paint then allowed the light pink paint to show through which really complemented the rose color.

After wiping away any dust, I applied the American Decor Creme Wax.  This is applied in thin coats with a clean, lint-free rag.  

If applied lightly, it dries in less than 30 minutes than can be buffed with another clean, lint-free rag to give it a little shine.  When I used this product on the kid’s dresser, I found that you could see rag strokes so it was better to rub with the wood grain and not in circles.  For furniture that will get a lot of use or might get wet/dirty, it is better to use a harder finish like a satin polyurethane.  

Andy installed casters to make the bed a bit higher so the footboard wouldn’t be sitting right on the ground.  Using salvaged metal bed rails and scrap wood, Andy built bed rails.  

When I bought the bed, I knew that I wanted to change the footboard a little to make it softer and to match the look of F’s bed.  Using this picture for inspiration, I drew a design on the bottom of the footboard so it would no longer be straight across.  To create a symmetrical design, I first marked the center of the footboard and used a ruler to create a straight line where the top of my design would be.

Starting at the center, I used my round quilting ruler to create the first round edge.  

If you don’t have a round ruler, do a scavenger hunt around the house for a circle object the size you want for the curve and trace it.  I then traced the curve and created a template to trace for the next curve section.

From here, I measured the space I had left- 10” and marked the middle (5”).  

I freehanded a curve from the edge to the top of my 5” mark and back down to the curve I had already created.  

I then traced this whole side on transparent paper, cut the curve then taped it to the other side of the bed and traced the curve.

Finished design

Unconfident in my jigsaw abilities, especially on a craved design I sent Andy out to the shop to cut the design out.  He used a jigsaw to trace my lines then buffed the edges.

Finally done, we put the entire bed together.

I love the sweet pink color and how delicate the bed looks with the decorated footboard.  Perfect for our girly 4 year old.  Together in the room, the two beds compliment each other beautifully in color and design.  The perfect mix of masculine and feminine in a shared bedroom.  I am in love and the kids are both thrilled with their grown-up beds.  

Dresser Designs

As Andy is feverishly trying to finish mudding, taping and sanding the drywall so we can get to painting the walls, I am working on some of the furnishing in the room.  Our hope is to get E and F moved back into the room before baby #3 makes his appearance… which could really happen any day at this point.

Just baby bumping it while I blog at the kitchen table

A little sneak peak- the room currently looks like this.  

Admittedly, kind of a disaster but really exciting considering we started with this 2 1/2 years ago.

And have been living with this for 2 years.

Which looks a hell of a lot better than what we started with but considering the paneled walls could be easily pulled at the seams and there was little to no insulation in the walls, the room still needed some serious work.

Our original plan for the room was to do a built-in dresser and bookcase on the same wall as the door.  Right now, time/budget concerns have put this off so I came up with a plan to use the existing dresser in the room and add some pizzaz to it plus a custom bookcase built on top.  I am not skilled at coming up with ideas completely on my own so I hit the internet- mostly Pinterest to bring my idea to fruition.  I found two perfect pictures that sparked the lightbulb.

From the blog Life Outside the Box

From the blog Howdy Honey

Step one of the dresser redo is adding some pizzaz with a custom paint job.  This dresser is a hand-me-down antique dresser.  

It is still in great shape- very study and well built but has several scratches and worn areas after living a long and fruitful life.  

I have been experimenting in furniture painting after discovering an amazing store in Chatfield, Mn, Adourn.  I am not a large-item impulse shopper in general but it seems that every time I walk into the shop, I leave with an unexpected furniture piece such as my recent buy of F’s bed.  I went to a basic painting class a year ago at the store and was bitten by the furniture painting bug.

The color scheme of the kid’s room is inspired by a piece of fabric that I will be using as the background of two twin quilts I’m making for the kid’s beds.  

Out of the fabric, I chose a great spring green to paint the dresser with.  The color really complements the dresser’s stain and is pretty gender neutral (which is good since the room will be shared by our 4 year old daughter and 2 year old son).  The green is “Ryegrass” by Behr which I got a quart of satin in color-match Glidden paint + primer.

I started by sanding the top of the dresser with 100 grit sandpaper, sanding by hand in the direction of the grain of the wood.  

After wiping all the dust off, I taped the edge of the top lip with FrogTape.  

Painting with the grain in long stokes, I used an angle brush to paint the top of the dresser.  

One coat of paint

I kept my paint pretty thin knowing I would be using a few coats to prevent any drips.  Waiting for dry time in between coats, I painted the top with three light coats of paint.

In between coats of the top of the dresser, I worked on the drawers.  I wanted to create a chevron design on the top and bottom drawers.  First step was taking off the original hardware which you wouldn’t think would be challenging but after slitting my finger open on a piece of metal that sheared off the screw, I called in my expert to give me a tip.  Put the flathead screwdriver in the screw, tap it down a bit with a hammer and presto, screw will actually turn.

To create the chevron design, I used FrogTape to cover the areas of the drawer that would remain bare wood.  First, I measured the height of the drawer, divided it by two and drew a pencil line straight down the middle of the drawer (length-wise).  This line would be where my triangle points met.  Setting my first line was the hardest, but I used a triangle ruler from my quilting kit to determine my angle (60 degrees) and make sure it lined up with the center line I drew.  

I used a pencil to mark the two sides of the triangle.  Using 1.41” FrogTape, I followed my triangle lines to lay my first triangle.  At the peak of the triangle, I used a straight edge and box cutter to cut the tape into a peak (which lined up with my original center pencil line).  

Cutting excess to get a crisp peak

Now that my first triangle was set, I placed a piece of FrogTape on my clear straight edge to use as my measuring device for the rest of the angles.  For each triangle, I placed my flat edge along the previous piece of tape, using the tape on the flat edge as my guide.  

The top tape is what I stuck to the ruler; right below it you can see through the ruler the tape line that is stuck to the drawer.  Pencil mark was drawn on drawer following ruler above top tape line.

I then traced the new edge with a pencil to my middle line creating perfectly spaced angles along the whole dresser.

Tape ready to go with my dresser model

Once the entire design was laid out, I sanded the areas showing bare wood so the paint would stick better.  

Sanded

I painted three light coats, waiting for the paint to dry in between coats.  

1-2 coats of paint

The instructions on the FrogTape recommend removing the tape before the paint is completely dry.  I followed these directions with pretty mixed results.  I think I need to work with Andy on inventing a painters tape that actually does everything it says it will.  I had to remove the tape VERY slowly, making sure I took it up evenly to prevent any paint from peeling with it.  The places I had the most difficult time with peeling paint were at the triangle peaks.  Overall, this tape bled less than blue painters tape I have used in the past, but I still had issues with bleeding where the drawer lip cut into the design.

Looking at the edges, you can see a bit where the paint bled past the tape

Once the tape was removed, I used my box cutter to carefully scrape any places that the paint bled through the tape.

Bleeding removed

I also went through with one of E’s paintbrushes to fix any places that had peeled when the tape was removed.

You can see a spot at the peak that peeled with the tape

Paint totally dry, I decided to give the whole piece a distressed looked by hand sanding.  I first used a 220 grit sandpaper but then upped to a 100 grit when the 220 wasn’t making a big difference.  I sanded down to bare wood in places that would normally see wear-and-tear like the edges and corners, trying to give a natural, worn look.

Distressing on edges of dresser top

Some distressing on the drawers

This is definitely the step that I am most uncomfortable with and still experimenting.  I keep telling myself that if I take off too much or don’t like the look, I can always repaint but it is hard to sand off work that you just did!

After I was happy with the distressed look, I decided to try a wax product- Creme Wax by Americana.  

Finished pieces should be sealed somehow either with a wax or varnish.  Varnishes usually give a harder finish that is good for something that will get a lot of wear and tear or get wet (such as a vanity).  Wax is a little less durable but gives a nice sheen look, rather than gloss.  It can be buffed to desired sheen and reapplied at any time.  I have used furniture wax on pieces before but found this Creme Wax when I was picking up Chalk paint for E’s new bed.  

The directions on the container are pretty vague but the website gives a few more tips and a video that was helpful.  The consistency of the Creme is almost like lotion as opposed to a harder wax.  I did not have a special wax brush, nor the inclination to purchase one so I used the second option, a dry, lint free rag to apply.  

I applied with the grain of the wood in light layers, wiping off any excess that gooped in corners.  

Looking to the right of the Creme Wax container, you can kind of see where I have applied wax and where I haven't.  Definitely adds some richness to the paint.

It dried very quickly so I applied two thin coats.  After the second coat dried (again, this took 30 minutes or less), I used a white, smooth cotton rag to buff the piece.  Buffing is not required; no buff leave a very matte looking piece.  I decided to buff a bit in hopes of smoothing out any sanding and waxing lines.  

In the light, it is a pretty noticeable difference between buffed and non-buffed areas.  I tried buffing with the grain as well as in circles and preferred the with-the-grain look since you can kind of see stroke marks in the wood/paint.

Finally, I screwed the original hardware back onto the drawers, with new non skin cutting screws and Viola!  Updated dresser perfect for a kids room!

Once Andy is done with the room and we get the dresser moved back in, "we" will work on building a bookcase on the top creating one, cohesive unit.  I can't wait!