Hey, Mr. Deejay...

We all have this problem, right?  Old technology taking up room in your house?  Well, I can't say my old Walkman is taking up THAT much room, but apparently, the lovely radio cabinet was just gathering dust in someone's house, so my sister made its acquaintance at a yard sale in Maryland.  Note to the reader - it was a yard sale hosted by three dudes, which are our favorite kind.  Speaking stereotypically, of course, dudes have yard sales to GET. RID. OF. STUFF.  They'll practically give the stuff away, if only to avoid taking it back to the basement!  Consequently, this beauty was $5!!!!!!!

Now, she did have to suffer a little indignity to get back to my sister's house.  Dumped and Discovered really needs to buy her a truck......

Originally, apparently, this fine piece of furniture was a radio cabinet.  When iPods kicked vinyl to the curb, a lot of these fabulous pieces lost their purpose in life.  Enter Dumped and Discovered to the rescue!  We live to give new purpose in life to furniture that has absolutely given up.  First, a name.  In honor of her extensive musical history (she's no spring chicken, but she has GREAT style), we'll call her Madonna.  Now, Madonna showed up backless (not shocking), but we can fix that easily.  After getting a piece of plywood cut at the hardware store to cover up her back (backless doesn't always work in the daytime), we were ready to go. 

First, we gave Madonna a nice, clean coat of white.  Sadly, all those years of tanning showed through the white paint - you simply cannot cover that many years of sun abuse.  She didn't really look "Like a Virgin" with all those brown stains showing through.  Time for Plan B.  As you astute readers may have noticed, Plan B is almost ALWAYS covering with a coat of gray.  Shocking.  Since Madonna's beauty comes from her life experiences (and lots of hours in the gym), it just didn't look right to leave her all pristine and perfect.  Out came the sandpaper - we distressed all of the lovely details to give the piece some dimension and a sense of her history.  I'm sure those guns on the real Material Girl's arms are helped by a little shading and shadowing, right?  Please tell me that's the case?  Like when morning television taught me how to create a six-pack with just a little bronzer?  Anyway, I digress.  The original coat of white paint shows through beautifully, and she's ready to take on her new life as.......a bar, of course!  Because Madonna may not be spinning vinyl anymore, but she still likes to party.......

Happy Junkin'!
Sarah

The Many Shades of Gray

It is incredible to see what people get rid of.  I have the total opposite problem.  I wouldn't say that I'm a hoarder, but please don't EVER look in my garage.  Someone gave this beauty up to the Salvation Army in Washington, D.C.  I snatched her up as quickly as I could. 

Let's call her Bertha.  She's a little wide in the hips, but her overall character is to die for.

Some people get writer's block.  I get painter's block.  I couldn't figure out what color to use today.  Bertha deserved something spectacular and I couldn't decide on a color that would suit her perfectly.  Yellow seemed too bright.  Blue felt a little depressing.  White was too boring.  I kept grabbing paint cans.  (Again, no hoarding here, but I looked through all 37 cans in my garage.)  FINALLY, I decided on gray.  

 

However, there was one slight problem... I didn't have enough of ONE gray, so I had to get creative with my mixing skills.  Did you know that gray + gray + gray = GRAY???  Might have to teach that one to my fourth graders.  I mixed the two lighter grays together and then poured a darker gray into the combo until I had the perfect shade.  While I was pouring, I had another idea - this one will be shared in a minute - I don't want to ruin the surprise! 

 

Bertha is already feeling sexier with her new and improved look.

 

Ready for the surprise?  Wait for it... Okay... It's not that big of a surprise, but while we were pouring the darker gray into the lighter grays, I had a vision.  I wondered what Bertha would look like with her drawers painted the darker gray.  Her larger drawers were very plain, so I thought that this would give Bertha a little POP! 

 

I couldn't get one of the drawer pulls off because the screw was stripped, so I decided to just paint over them.  Nifty little trick on knobs... Screw them into the bottom of a box to help you paint them all the way around.  This gives them a chance to dry without messing up the edges.  

Here is the new and improved Bertha - 

And now she's officially ready for her close-up.

 

 Happy Junkin'!

Sarah