I've had this wooden serving tray laying amongst my belongings for years. I don't remember where or why I got it. But last weekend, I realized I had the perfect shade of blue to go on it. I call it a Tiffany Blue color, but I think it's more aptly called seaglass. When I think of serving trays, I imagine serving a warm crusty bread and hot tea to my friends and family on a cold winter night. Or maybe some hot cocoa. (lets be honest, in this scenario, someone else is doing the serving. Because in my fantasies, I'm also rich. So my butler serves them. We'll call him Benjamin) So I thought maybe a french bakery (which is what boulangerie means - I had to google it!) was kind of the perfect theme for this cute little sucker! After I finished painting the text and the scrolly (is that even a word?!) design on it, I coated it distressed the lettering and the entire surface just a bit, to give it an antique feel. Now it looks like it's been serving warm crusty bread and hot tea to my family members for generations! Which it obviously hasn't. My family can't afford warm crusty breads! We're a wonder bread family. That's what Benjamin buys. When I send him grocery shopping for me because I'm so busy refinishing furniture and being disgustingly rich...
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| This should be called the Before and During photo, not After. It clearly wasn't finished when this was taken. But it is finished now, I just haven't mastered the art of staging pieces for beautiful photographic moments. Yet...
Join me later this week as I learn the techniques of staging and photography and maybe show off a few other pieces that I have on my to do list in the immediate future. Maybe someone will throw some ideas at me or maybe one of you would like to purchase something, because, hey, I'm trying to put my imaginary butlers kids through butler school, people.
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Wednesday, January 18, 2017
For Benjamin...
Thursday, January 5, 2017
Ctrl+Alt+Del (or....You Are Not a Tree)
What if you had a chance to start over? I'm not talking like, given-a-bazillion-dollars-and-move-to-Fiji type of start over. I mean just...start taking your life in the direction you wanted to a long time ago and just never had the courage or the resources to do it? Would you? Usually the answer to that is a really loud and enthusiastic "Shit yeah I would! Where do I sign up?!" You're in luck. Turns out, everyone has the ability to do this. How do I know this? Because I've done it.
Everyone has a story. This is mine. (The abridged version. Because ain't nobody got time fo' dat). I've been through some shit. 34 years worth of it. All 34 years of this shitstorm culminated in me being a creative, outgoing, self aware divorcee, who has a beautiful 4 year old daughter to show for it. The end! Haha just kidding. Hey, I said abridged version, didn't I? I'm not getting into the knitty gritty details. We hardly know each other!
But here I am. I was living in a small town that, while it was pretty great and the people there were awesome and I miss a lot of them and still talk to most of them, there was just nothing there for me. It was in such a rural area that jobs were sparse and if you were lucky enough to snag a good one, chances are it was a trek. I had an awesome job that I loved but the pay was...eh. (isn't that always the trade off?!) And it was 30 miles away. That was 60 miles on my 1999 dodge grand caravan every time I went to work. And I had a brand new child. So...I left. Turns out, I am not a tree. None of us are. If we are in situations we do not like, we can leave. (haha see what I did there? Tree....leaf. Tree puns!) Sure, for some of us, it's not that easy. I was fortunate. I packed up me and my daughters things and moved to a town I knew nothing about and didn't know a soul. It was the scariest and most exciting thing I've ever done. And you know what? It's worked out.
Through a series of the most confusing and strange and sometimes unbelievable events, I ended up exactly where I am right now and I'm pretty damned sure it's exactly where I needed to be, surrounded by people that I should be surrounded by. And from here, I've decided to do something I've wanted to do for a while.
I've always been a creative and crafty person. I used to knit, sew, make paper, jewelry, you name it. If it could be googled, I probably tried it. And as a result, I had lots of handmade stuff laying around my house. So I started selling it. at craft fairs, vendor shows, etsy, ebay, craigslist, facebook. Made some decent money. Once my daughter was born, I didn't have much time for that anymore. She's 4 now and she's also very creative and artsy. She likes to help out when I'm doing just about anything. I picked up my knitting needles a few weeks ago after a 4 year hiatus and she was watching me and says "Mom, can you teach me know to yarn?".
I don't really knit too much anymore. But I've always loved painting. And painting is something she can join in on as well. I used to paint murals. People paid me to paint pictures in their houses! I have also always wanted to get into woodworking. I wanted to make stuff. So it was only natural, that once my life came together in a way that made me happy, that I would start doing something that I love. Something that combines things I enjoy doing, and I have support in doing them, and my daughter can occasionally join in and help out a little and we can have quality time that results in something tangible.
Which brings us all here. Where my small child and I are refinishing furniture. Unloved pieces that someone else was done with and getting rid of. We're giving it new life. That old dresser I got at a garage sale may not have gone through a cross country move and given birth for 32 hours, a foreclosure 3 days before it's due date, a divorce, and a move to a new city, but it still needed to start over. Just like me. (aaaaaaand we've come full circle!)
So stick around and see some of the stuff we've been doing. It's a pretty cool story and a pretty cool process.
Everyone has a story. This is mine. (The abridged version. Because ain't nobody got time fo' dat). I've been through some shit. 34 years worth of it. All 34 years of this shitstorm culminated in me being a creative, outgoing, self aware divorcee, who has a beautiful 4 year old daughter to show for it. The end! Haha just kidding. Hey, I said abridged version, didn't I? I'm not getting into the knitty gritty details. We hardly know each other!
But here I am. I was living in a small town that, while it was pretty great and the people there were awesome and I miss a lot of them and still talk to most of them, there was just nothing there for me. It was in such a rural area that jobs were sparse and if you were lucky enough to snag a good one, chances are it was a trek. I had an awesome job that I loved but the pay was...eh. (isn't that always the trade off?!) And it was 30 miles away. That was 60 miles on my 1999 dodge grand caravan every time I went to work. And I had a brand new child. So...I left. Turns out, I am not a tree. None of us are. If we are in situations we do not like, we can leave. (haha see what I did there? Tree....leaf. Tree puns!) Sure, for some of us, it's not that easy. I was fortunate. I packed up me and my daughters things and moved to a town I knew nothing about and didn't know a soul. It was the scariest and most exciting thing I've ever done. And you know what? It's worked out.
Through a series of the most confusing and strange and sometimes unbelievable events, I ended up exactly where I am right now and I'm pretty damned sure it's exactly where I needed to be, surrounded by people that I should be surrounded by. And from here, I've decided to do something I've wanted to do for a while.
I've always been a creative and crafty person. I used to knit, sew, make paper, jewelry, you name it. If it could be googled, I probably tried it. And as a result, I had lots of handmade stuff laying around my house. So I started selling it. at craft fairs, vendor shows, etsy, ebay, craigslist, facebook. Made some decent money. Once my daughter was born, I didn't have much time for that anymore. She's 4 now and she's also very creative and artsy. She likes to help out when I'm doing just about anything. I picked up my knitting needles a few weeks ago after a 4 year hiatus and she was watching me and says "Mom, can you teach me know to yarn?".
I don't really knit too much anymore. But I've always loved painting. And painting is something she can join in on as well. I used to paint murals. People paid me to paint pictures in their houses! I have also always wanted to get into woodworking. I wanted to make stuff. So it was only natural, that once my life came together in a way that made me happy, that I would start doing something that I love. Something that combines things I enjoy doing, and I have support in doing them, and my daughter can occasionally join in and help out a little and we can have quality time that results in something tangible.
Which brings us all here. Where my small child and I are refinishing furniture. Unloved pieces that someone else was done with and getting rid of. We're giving it new life. That old dresser I got at a garage sale may not have gone through a cross country move and given birth for 32 hours, a foreclosure 3 days before it's due date, a divorce, and a move to a new city, but it still needed to start over. Just like me. (aaaaaaand we've come full circle!)
So stick around and see some of the stuff we've been doing. It's a pretty cool story and a pretty cool process.
x
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