Bernie is someone that I met through my Aunt at a women's retreat this fall. I've dabbled in renewals and making old things new, but I don't hold a candle to Bernie, she's completely transformed an entire Eaton's house just outside of Saskatoon. How's that for a labour of love? She sent us one of her small renew projects, a cute bedside table she brought back to life.
Check out her blog here to follow her many of her ongoing projects at her home. Here's her project recap:
For many years my family lived in a suburban neighborhood in a 1980’s bungalow that we had built for ourselves. Oak was the wood to use back then, and so we had kitchen cabinets and fire place wall unit custom created as well as a little unit for the back door. We stored the phone book, school directory in the drawers, library books and sundry on the shelves and a key bin on the top.
Fast forward several years and we have moved. We took a leap of faith in ourselves and bought a 1918 catalogue house. We bought a parcel of land outside of Saskatoon and had the house professionally moved. We have painstakingly restored the house to its former glory while updating the infrastructure. I have been blogging our journey since the inception of the project in 2007 and although I don’t have much of a following it has allowed us to easily see our progress. Our house is slowly finding a home for many antiques interspaced with modern furniture. Our daughter really fell in love with the painted shabby chic look for her bedroom and so we have a few pieces of painted furniture as well.
We are currently working on our basement and that involved the initial de-cluttering. It was for several years our staging and work area as we had no garage or shop and a lot of woodwork to redo. So while we were cleaning it out we came across this little unit from our former house. A few months earlier I had met Terra and started following the Re-New Blog and her last entry gave me the inspiration to try something.
Before
As you can see the unithad seen a lot of wear and tear. With the oak and the square edges it looked so1980’s so I had my husband take the router to the soften the edges. This is the same edge look as an antique buffet that serves as a dresser/TV stand in the same bedroom. Then I decided to try the Liquitex paint that Terra has used in previous projects. It took three coats to cover the wood and get a smooth finish. I then sourced out a new handle that is very period for our house andafter several attempts we made it fit (the screw length was too short for the drawer depth so Ron had to countersink the screws down in).
After
A big thanks to Terra, Anna and Jade for allowing me to submit an entry to their blog site. I love their sense of adventure and their individual style shines through in what they do. I hope that if you pop over to visit my blog site you’ll get a sense of the restoration style we have and please feel free to leave comments.
Thanks for the reveal Bernie! It looks fantastic!
~T~
Thanks for the reveal Bernie! It looks fantastic!
~T~
