Making The Curvy Straight and Rub'nBuff Rave [Dresser Makeover]

When my husband gets a text that says "Does your wife want this dresser taking up precious space in our garage?" he knows he doesn't even have to ask me. That'd be like asking the one thousand pound sisters if they want ice cream.

First thing I did was remove the ugly pulls and sand the top down to bare wood.

Sometimes curvy is good. 

But nah.... not for this guy.

I've seen where people rebuild a new base for the dresser to make the lines straight. 

But nah.... ain't got time for that.

Just needed a quick chop-chop!

Mid Century Modern is "it" right now. And Mid Century Modern is loads of lines. Straight lines.

This dresser may not be MCM, but we're going to update him to a new level of sophistication.

I used a square, drew my lines, and cut off the curves with a scroll saw.

Easy peasy lemon squeezy.

Sorry, no pics of the paint process, but I used a really good primer and then used my new paint sprayer (piece of junk from China if you really wanna know, but it does the trick) with a flat black.

Now the pulls. I found three for the top in my stash and four matchers for the bottom. Unfortunately I needed different sizes and that was not easy, hence why the top differs from the bottom. Sorry OCD people. 

Enter Rub'nBuff, which is pretty much magic. Takes old dingy looking metal and makes it gorgeous in seconds. It's one of those things I've heard about for years. Decades. But since I tend to use products I find in the free box at estate sales... it's not something I've come across therefore have never possessed!

Let me tell you, I'm highly annoyed at my little self for not trying this sooner. You can just rub it on with a rag or because these pulls had lots of grooves, an old toothbrush worked well. My friend said she uses a makeup brush.

The bare wood got a couple coats of polyurethane, which changed the color of the wood more than I would have liked, rats, but I'm not about to take it off and start over. It ain't what it ain't. (My friend and I were discussing how we're over the saying "it is what it is"...so it ain't what it ain't.)

Pretty paper in the top drawers.....

And now if you'd please share the love by pinning this image on Pinterest I would be ecstatic.

Thank you!!

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Repurposed Vintage Stereo Speakers

You've seen it all, I know!

Well just when I think I've seen it all...  someone sends me something that makes me say "WHY DIDN'T I THINK OF THAT?!"

So this might not be one of those "blow you away" makeovers,

but I'm not sure I've seen anyone turn old speakers into nightstands before so let me know if you have!

I started by prying off the front. This one was pretty cool how it popped off and I could unscrew the insides pretty easily.

The taller one had more "guts" to "gut" but the front was just velcroed on so that was extra easy!

Also very easy to recover with fabric, as I just used my hot glue gun and went over top the existing fabric. There was so much insulation stuffed in there, I was pretty sure a mouse was going to scurry out at some point... but one did not. Not even a little mouse turd to be found.

After painting the wood with a dark taupe, I decided to recover the blacks, oranges, and browns of the front. These had such a modern look to them that I had to really dig in my fabric stashes. Past the colorful dated chevron prints, past the farmhouse grain stripes, the flowers, the damask, the faux black fur.... ah HA! What it this swatch of modern contemporary fabric that I have the perfect amount of to cover both the fronts of these speakers?! I remember buying this years ago because I just loved the colors, but really let's face it. It's not my style. It's not really the style I do anything in! But I like to do something out of the norm sometimes, so today was the day.

I even quick threw some of the taupe paint I put on the speakers onto an old headboard I had just for the photo op. Yes, I really have that many headboards sitting around!

What do you think? 

Even though these would match absolutely nothing in my house, sometimes it's just fun to be creative.  Now... hopefully someone will be brave enough to by them... ;)

You know what I was thinking while taking those apart? I wish I could hear the top ten songs that pumped out of these speakers back when they were new and someone was so excited to crank that volume dial up!

I would appreciate it oh so much if you were to pin this!

Pinterest gets me the most traffic and if you want fresh content, then please take a second to put this on your boards. Thanks!

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Beachy Vibe Dresser

My mother dear is the best. She sees little dressers like this for a few dollars at a garage sale and she snags them for me, even though she has to bring it 500 miles to get to me! :) Maybe it's her excuse to see the grandkids.  Maybe.

When I stashed all of these wood dowels upstairs in my workshop, I had no idea I would end up using them in so many different ways - especially for drawer pulls!

I had to break one of my rules about "buying new" because I really wanted to try using these metal "two hole straps". What on earth, I was in Lowes looking everywhere for these, I didn't know to say "Hey sir, can you tell me where the Two-Hole Straps are? Something tells me Mr. Lowes Dude wouldn't even know what I was talking about. It took lots of aisle wandering before I found them.

I used some wood glue on the back of the dowels too, because some of the clamps ended up a little loosey-goosey and I didn't want them sliding out so big brother could use them on a little sibling. Just kidding. I don't care.That's what makes younger siblings so tough. Uhhh... just kidding again.

I found a piece of wood trim and cut it to fit across the bottom. I keep every piece of wood - just in case! And there's always eventually a "just in case!" I mean if I have the room (sheds and barns).... why not hoard all the things? It's what keeps me out of the hardware stores!

I used different shades of grays and blues, mixing them together and adding tans... The stencil on the top drawer was just one of those cheap all-over stencils you get in the big packs at Walmart. The annoying ones that you have to punch out the whole design and not rip any while you're at it since they're made out of tagboard. It's worth it though, they're cheap and I use them a lot!

So I loved how it turned out, but it didn't sell at my huge two-day barn sale. It was still in my barn a few weeks ago when one of my sweet Airbnb guests asked if she could take a peek inside the big old building. She spotted this and thought her daughter would love it. She packed it into the back of her little Prius and drove it 530 miles home, where her daughter welcomed it with open arms. Yay!

Like it? Pin it! Please and thank you!! :)

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Tinting Green Paint Olive & An Antique Dresser Makeover

If you could describe this "before" in one word, what would it be?

Kitschy perhaps?

Once I started sanding the paint off, I actually felt some pangs of guilt! At one time, someone had used their artistic talents and hand painted those flowers on the drawer fronts. So unappreciated now, and I felt some remorse for removing all that effort with my orbital sander.

I love my Ryobi orbital by the way. I accidently bought sandnet once while in Home Depot and have been using it every since. I still use conventional sandpaper, but for my big jobs I use this for the first tough layer. It definitely has a longer life than the regular stuff! You can pull it off, shake it out, put it back on, and keep at it.

In typical Kammy style, I mixed my own paint color.  But here's a trick for ya!

I'd like to give you a second to see if you can guess what color you add to green to make the shade more "olive-y".

Brown? Wrong. Gray? Wrong. 

If you have a green paint that you would like to tint to be more of an "olive", "army" or "sage" green, you add some red! Trust me, it works! I think for this one I started with a John Deere green, added some dark gray, and little tan perhaps and the magical ingredient - RED barn paint! Can't remember the combo for sure, but don't be afraid to stir in that barn red to get the most beautiful tints of the trendy green colors!

My mother in law gave me a gift card for Hobby Lobby awhile back. I was ecstatic. Pick out ANYTHING IN THE STORE?! The decisions seem endless and overwhelming. I rarely buy any decor new. And I most certainly never buy new pulls for my refurbished furniture! But there was a great choice of boho pulls that I just couldn't resist.

It was equally hard to decide what to put new said pulls on... but I decided they looked great with this green and would do the trick on this beautiful dresser!

I gave the raw wood top a white-wash treatment (watered down white paint, then wipe it off with a rag). You can probably find a good tutorial by googling it. Cuz I'm coming up short in that department today.

If you happened to notice the painting above on the dresser, it is one of my mom's originals. 

I'm so geeled she has revived her talents after hardly painting for over two decades! If you're interested, she sells her paintings locally in Cedar Falls, Iowa or I have them in my booth at the Parma Antique Mall in Parma, Michigan.

Like it? Please do me a huge favor and pin it! :)

A peek into my booth where a few of my mom's paintings are available

top left:

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Charming Chalkboards From Old Headboards

Is there anything more abundant on the curb than headboards??

Maybe it's just where I live.

It's probably cheese boxes in Wisconsin.

Not being one to waste anything, I pried off the wood embellishments and used them on other projects. Then using a circular saw, cut the left and right sides off. I cut a board to run the length of the bottom and using wood glue and a nail gun secured that to the bottom for a little shelf. With some white and paint for the trim and chalkboard paint for the body, here's what we've got!

Now let's move on to this dark plastic-made-to-look-like-wood beauty straight out of Grandma's house in the 1980's!

I literally stashed this in the "I'll do something with it someday" pile for ELEVEN YEARS. Folks, we don't even live at the same house as we did eleven years ago, which means it got hauled to our new place just to sit and be a home to spiders and dust for a decade! I wish I could say this was the only thing I brought from our old house and then let hang out in the barn untouched but.... Don't worry. I'll eventually get to them. Just like I did this one! Maybe.

Make the cut...

spray paint white and add the ledge at the bottom

Then after painting the main body with chalkboard paint (I got lazy and instead of making my own like normal, I bought the version Rustoleum makes). And you have a cute, useable chalkboard!!

Sorry you missed the sale being advertised on it, that happened in November of 2023.

But if you follow Kammy's Korner on Facebook, you won't miss the next one! :)

That's yours truly on the left and my "partner in crafting" Becky from Hollow's Market on the right.

Here's my DIY recipe if you'd rather:

And here's a graphic for you pinterest board for later.

If you pin it, I'll love you even more than I do now! And that's a lot.

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