nightstand revival

I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday weekend! This bedroom makeover is well underway and the first item up for a face lift is my nightstand. I’ve had this little bedside table for years, and before that it was where my mom put all her doll clothes growing up, so needless to say it’s been around for a while and could use a little refresh.

During the initial furniture “merge” I put on those, shall we say, underwhelming knobs on to attempt to make it a little more “sophisticated.” I know. Quite the risk taker I was.

Now it’s time for a bolder change. What this nightstand really needs is a new color. A fresh coat of paint and a second take at the drawer pulls sounds just about right. Here’s what I did:

First things first: Remove the knobs and clean that furniture with some warm water and a general cleaner.

Once it’s dry, sand it with a fine grit sandpaper. I used a 220 grit. You may need to use a heavier grit if you have more heavy duty sanding to do. I just needed to roughen up the surface a bit for painting, so the finer grit worked wonderfully.

The little dog is not necessary. Lucy has a way of getting in to the frame of my pictures whenever possible.  She’s actually been cut out of the title image. Here is the pre-cropped version of the photo:

She never lays there! Only when there’s a photo opp I guess…

While I was cleaning and sanding my nightstand I found this little time capsule gem:

Look at those bubble letter skills! For some reason I found it necessary to mark “Stephanie was here on Nov 25, 1996” and let any future users of this nightstand know where it was.  A few years earlier I had made my mark on a dresser by carving a smiley face on the front of the drawer with a pick-up stick. It seems as though I had learned my lesson since I decided to do this one on the back of the drawer.

Alright, now its time to paint! I used a semi-gloss paint +primer in Valspar’s Royal Navy. I painted most of the nightstand with a 4″ foam roller, but used the foam brush for a few hard to get places. (do you see Lucy’s legs in that paint picture? I told you, she’s everywhere)

First coat complete! I realize I only needed those wood rails for the actual nightstand since the drawers could just lay on their ends, but since I went through all the trouble digging out that many 1×1’s from our dingy dark cellar basement (that’s the  cellar door on bottom right of the picture) I was going to use them!

Let the paint dry for a couple hours before repainting.

I know, no dog in this picture. That’s because she’s been busy painting herself in solid dirt. Shortly after finishing my first coat of paint, this is how I found Lucy:

Needless to say, she got a bath while the first coat dried.

Once the dog is clean and the paint is dry, give it a second coat. Two coats was golden for me.

After the paint is dry, put on your knobs and bask in the glory of a refreshed nightstand.

Did you check out those drawer pulls? A DIY for those will be coming soon, so don’t go too far!