Before & After: Vintage Metal Porch Glider

When the bees are out and the blooms start to open, it’s definitely time to grab your sweet tea and head to our front porch for some seriously lazy hang-time. My front porch is probably my favorite place in the world. It’s where silly and serious conversations take place, where I can sit and enjoy the view of my beautiful garden and where my children play. It’s a place where memories are made with family and friends.

Growing up, one of my favorite places to hang out was my grandmother’s covered brick porch at her 1950’s brick ranch home. I would spend weeks at her home in Pennsylvania in the summertime when school let out…hanging out with my cousins, drinking ice cold Coca-Cola and chasing fireflies with mason jars in the back yard. She had a large, forest green metal porch glider that I practically lived on during those days…rocking back and forth, curling up agains Grandma’s lap and sometimes falling asleep. When she passed away, I was only 18 at the time and off to college, so there was no where for the beloved metal glider to come home to. Sadly, it was given away and I never saw it again.

When this past spring rolled around, that warm, nostalgic feeling started to wash over me again. Coincidentally, the Mr.’s father had generously offered to give us a vintage metal glider set that had once belonged to his mom (who passed away from cancer back in the fall of 2012). The glider and matching chair sat in a screened in porch for years and had hardly ever been used…so it needed a good cleaning and a good home.

A few weeks had passed and the metal glider and chair finally made their way back to our house. Man…they looked pretty sad. They were in great shape, but had years of dust and dirt stuck to them. They needed some love…

 

So now what? What color were we going to make them? How would we do it without powder coating them? The Mr. and I combed the web for days, looking at a million different color combinations for inspiration. Then we spent a lot of time in the spray paint isle of Home Depot debating over what color to use.

Here were a few images off of Pinterest that we used to point us in the right direction:

Before we applied any new color, we had to sand, sand, scrape and sand them some more to get any rusty paint flakes to come up. Luckily, the Mr. used to be a painting contractor…so I knew they were in good hands!

Next we applied a healthy coat of Rust-Oleum’s Rust Reformer to any areas that had a lot of dark rust spots. This is supposed to help stop the rusting process…only time will tell how well it really works!

Then the Mr. applied a generous coat of white enamel gloss to any of the areas on the glider and chair that had the basket weaving…so we would end up with a cool, two tone look.

After the painted basket weave pattern had dried, we taped off all of the areas that we did NOT want to be turqouise. This is the tedious part of the project…and we actually enlisted the help of our 14 year old son for this job. You don’t want to go sloppy on this part of the project…because when the furniture is painted and the tape is pulled off, what you see is what you get!

This next part serves as a warning. DO NOT and I repeat DO NOT select a day that is almost 100 degrees with almost 100% humidity to do your outdoor, home improvement project. My husband is saint! He went outside on an early Saturday morning, where the temperature had already reached 90 degrees, put on a respirator mask and goggles and repainted the glider and matching chair. After several hours and six cans of Rust-Oleum’s Turquoise spray paint….he came inside our house and looked like someone had cooked him in a frying pan and drowned him in vegetable oil. Not pretty!!

But look how pretty everything was starting to look with a fresh coat of paint!

Once the furniture had literally baked in the hot, southern sun for a day, we felt confident enough that it was okay to remove the tape. When the tape was gone and the drop cloths were put away…this is what we were left with…

 

I can’t even tell you how much I love our new/old patio set. I’m so excited to create new memories with our family on the porch. We also get to remember those we loved while we enjoy the sunshine and sweet smell of our rose garden, just a few feet away. This was a long, drawn out restoration project…but worth every second (and every ounce of sweat out in the heat!). Do you have a restoration project that you are working on this summer? If so, I’d love to hear about it!

Before & After: The Closet-Bathroom

Look! Over there! It’s a closet! It’s a bathroom! Wait, what? It’s a….closet-bathroom? That’s what I said out loud to the Mr. the very first time we saw what would become our master bathroom.

Have you ever had a home renovation project that has plaqued you or haunted you? It’s the large project that just sits in the back of your mind and you keep telling yourself, “Oh, we’ll get to it…eventually.” Well, that was our master bathroom. This eye sore (which is putting it mildly) has been a project that we have been putting off for about 6 years. The family that built our home in the early 1960’s, probably turned what was once a tiny closet into an even tinier bathroom. Don’t get me wrong…its was a great bathroom if you had a headache, a long day or even a hangover….as you could sit on the toilet and place rest your head on the cold, porcelain sink at the same time. But if you wanted to stand up, turn around or dare I say, move about….forget. Too small.

Here’s what it looked like for the past 50-some years. Pretty scary.

 

Unless, of course…speckled, stained, cracked and peeling tile is your thing…than, I guess that’s cool. Love that stained, filthy grout!

 

The sink was the original Kohler sink, but it desperately needed to be recoated and was just too large for the tiny, tiny room. It also reminded me of something you would see in Orange is the New Black TV series.

 

Beige, beige, everywhere beige. The towel bar was a real hoot for anyone who dared to empty the waste basket….as one would receive a mild concussion as you stood up and nearly knocked your block off as you smack the back of your cranium on the rickety towel bar.

 

Nothing like coming home from a long day at work and freshening up in your lovely lavatory. NOT.

 

And as small as this bathroom is, this was one of the longest ongoing renovation projects that we have ever done. All said and done, I think it took us from this past February to May of this year. There were some tricky plumbing issues, demo days, painting, tiling, electrical work and of course…searching for a new sink that would actually fit in the space.

 

We used leftover tile from our kitchen renovation project, so we were able to save some cash there. We decided to stick with the same theme throughout our home and go with classic white subway tile with a dark grey grout (all tile came from Best Tile). We decided to keep our original Kohler toilet and here’s why. When we renovated our full bathroom, we realized AFTER we threw away our toilet, that we needed a toilet that had historical home proportions due to the original radiators being located directly behind the toilet. Modern toilets have a fuller skirt and therefore the base of the newer toilets are too wide. So, again, we were able to save money by cleaning up our old toilet and installing some new plumbing. We repainted our radiator covers and VOILA! Good as new! Ain’t she pretty?

The largest task by far was removing, installing and shopping for a new sink. We ended up finding this little cutie at Ferguson’s showroom. You can find a similar one here for around $177. Words cannot express how much I love this little sink. It’s all you need to wash your hands and brush your teeth. And the fun, little oil rubbed bronze faucet is just the perfect way to top it off. Home Depot sells a similar Kohler model here for $109.

I wanted to continue my vintage theme with a schoolhouse inspired light fixture. However, finding one that would fit just above the original built-in medicine cabinet was a challenge. I ended up finding this one from Destination Lighting for only $49.95!! SCORE!! It gives off the perfect amount of light and also offers a nice glow.

 

 

So what went wrong with our little bathroom renovation project? As we were putting in the finishing touches to our project…the Mr. and I looked at each and other and realized….WHAT THE SHAZAM??!!!! WE FORGOT TO INSTALL A TOILET PAPER HOLDER!!! Geez Louise!! How on earth could we have overlooked that when we had the bathroom tile installed?! I immediately started combing the internet for the best deal I could find on a free-standing, oil rubbed bronze toilet paper holders. After reading several reviews, we landed on this one from Taymor and I couldn’t be happier. The color is dark and rich (doesn’t have a cheap, spray on paint color) and the weight of the stand is much heavier than I expected. And in the end, I really like being able to move it around the small room.

 

We can finally sit back and enjoy our little closet-bathroom, as well as thankfully scratch it off the to-do list! I’ve been bringing fresh roses from our garden into the home this spring…as I did here with a little mint green vintage vase and an old Fairmont’s cheese box (perfect for hiding jewelry or other small trinkets). Enjoy your spring!!