My Grandma passed away in the spring of 2013, following my grandpa who we lost nine years earlier. With her passing the cleaning out of her 100 year old farm house, barn and out buildings fell to us. In the end I ended up filling one whole stall in our garage with everything from dressers to tables as I could not bare to part with anything that was still good. So, I embarked on my refinishing adventure of the summer/fall of 2013. Check out my Refinishing Tips.

So what’s left you ask? Well there is actually a couple of pieces left! I will post them here when I am finished with them. There is the “entry table/dresser thing” that I received from my dad’s mom in her passing. I plan on sanding the hell out of it and staining it as black as I can possibly get it. Why black? I like black that’s why. But, mostly, in all of the rest of my projects I used several different kinds of walnuts and red cedar stains etc. I’m ready for something a little different that will still bring out the wood and, besides, everything looks good in black (I stand ready to take back that statement – until I strip it down to bare wood and it has a chance to talk again, I won’t know its true potential. Kinda crazy? Yeah I know.). It will be my future entertainment center.

Then there is the oldest piece (at least my best guess as the oldest piece) it is a dresser that I liken in my mind and heart to the old oak dresser that lived out on the porch and transformed into a real beauty that’s going to be a bathroom vanity. This one is not near so ugly but it is just as solid, heavy and old. The drawers in it are coming a part so its going to need a bit more work then the other dressers that I’ve done (good thing I got a miter saw for Christmas!! Thank you mom and my awesome brother and sister-in-law!). Its heavy but not terribly huge (pretty short as far as dressers go but at least 3 feet wide still) so it will remain a dresser and I am also going to stain it black and replace its hardware like I’m going to do with my future entertainment center. Why black again? Well there are all of the reasons listed above but this piece is going into the bedroom of my Beloved’s tween son so I think black will go with any colors he picks for his bedding and curtains etc. He will also be getting the queen bed that’s been upstairs in my grandparents’ house also forever. Its got a steel head and foot board I’m going to paint in his favorite color (right now he’s voting for dark hunter green but he’s allowed to change his mind until I start painting lol).

And (phew!) last but not least there is an old Edison radio stand minus the radio. So its basically a shelf unit with tall ornate legs and a very pretty and unique front on it. I could not come up with a use for it that utilized it as a shelf and as a lovely piece of furniture so I stuck it in my garage and tried not to let it bother me which, of course, it still bothered me. Then this spring I was working on a kitchen island design that included a shelf for recipe books (as my kitchen design for grandma’s house includes space for an island) when it dawned on me that I already had the perfect shelf unit. I plan on putting the radio stand on a base that includes very big and nice casters that a person can lock if they want to. The only thing I’m worried about in the plan here is that this narrow and very tall (39 inches) radio stand might be very pretty but it also feels cheap, fragile and rickety. Once I slap a four foot slab of butcher block on it I’m a little concerned my radio stand might simply crumble… The top and the front of it have water damage and the whole thing is made out of veneer so there is simply damage I can’t/won’t be fixing. I am going to paint it either white or, hell, maybe even red! I plan on making my own butcher block too so that will be a new adventure.