A Fresh Look For The Booth

After Christmas, I packed up what little bit of Christmas things I had left and moved some things around in my booth. I added some new things and tried to accomplish a fresh, bright Spring look. I moved in the freshly painted dresser (see HERE if you missed the 'before') and moved other pieces around.

Remember this is only a 10X10 space so it's not a whole lot to share...but I moved the chalkboard doors over to the left hand side and flatten them up behind the dresser to hide as much of the pegboard as possible. For now, I've got artwork and plates hanging versus chalk art. It might look a little weird in the pictures having black on black, but in real life it doesn't look too bad. The dresser is high gloss and I really like it against the matte black of the chalkboard paint. I ordered in some huge purple snowballs and put together a giant arrangement.

I bought another bi fold door at the Restore store in Joplin and decided these would be perfect in the color of the year. Here the door is before I painted and took it apart:

I took each panel and painted it in a beautiful emerald (Emerald Lake from Behr) and set them on either side of the chalkboard doors

I hung some funky sconces on them too. I love the added color...how are you liking the color of the year? I might bring a little bit of it in the house here and there, but much like here at the booth, just as an accent.

This cabinet is from the Restore too...it's a nice tall narrow cabinet. It was pretty beat up  and a coat of paint was a sure fire way to liven it up. I have it priced, but it's really more for display. The before with doors closed:

...before with the doors open:

...and finally in place all painted. All black with teal inside. I really wanted the milk glass to pop off that blue. Keegan and I moved the walnut buffet over to the right side of the booth (it was along the back) and put the cabinet on top.

I'll be adding more things soon and I'll take even more pictures. Hope you've enjoyed my little booth space so far!

I have chemo again on Monday (boo) so I'll be away for a little while until I recuperate again. I'm itching to do a mantlescape at my house so hopefully I can get that done, it's pretty bare right now, for me anyhow!! Talk to you soon!

Little Black Dresser

 Now, I can imagine that if you read blogs long enough, that a simple paint job transforming an old piece of furniture is, frankly, getting old (so I hope you find this interesting). But for me, I never tire of spying a piece of furniture in it's current run-down form and imagine what it could be. Deciding what approach to take, what color, what sheen, should I replace the hardware? Questions and decisions circle feverishly in my head until I decide.

 Sometimes it's a quick process, sometimes it's slow, but above all, I let the piece tell me what to do.This dresser clearly has good form, nice lines and in fairly good condition. Since the finish is outdated and the top is covered in cigarette burns, I ultimately decided on paint.

 Because of it's fantastic shape, it really said regency to me...which in turn calls for a classic color, so I settled on black. Again, just your normal paint job with black I had on hand and a thin layer of polyurethane for some added shine.

 For the handles, I considered replacing them, but why? They are certainly in scale with the dresser....I just had to come up with a technique to make them stand out.

 First, I painted them black and let them dry. Next, I used a painter's brush (one of my gnarly ones) and Rub-N-Buff  to get a gold tone over the black.

 It was just what it needed. A good solid color, a lot of shine and a little glam.

This one almost stayed home with me but alas, it's available for sale in my booth. Sigh.

I'll be showing you some more of my booth in the coming days and show you how I've incorporated the color of the year: Emerald. Talk to you soon!

***

Thank you for commenting on my return to blogging. I had chemo on Monday with the new regimen. I have been down and out for several days so much so my dear MIL had to keep Logan for me....I just couldn't move. That's to be expected I suppose since it's a new drug and my body has to get use to it.  Luckily, no vomiting, knock on wood. Knock.Knock.Knock.

Hello Again and What's Happening!

 Hello friends! You've waited for me and for that I am so grateful. As you know I took the month of January off to reevaluate some issues, spend time with my family and do other stuff, you know...life. Cancer. Chemo. Cocoa Puffs.

 One of the thoughts I was reevaluating was keeping my booth space or not. I was torn because, well, I wasn't sure that I should be spending my time on a 10X10 space when in reality I'd like an entire store. Having cancer offers up a whole other host of  fears when stepping off into the unknown of opening a store....it's been a dream of mine since I don't know when but now I feel like "opening a store?" what if I can't maintain it, take care of it, run it? Business ownership is not easy. Throw cancer and a dose of chemo in there and it's just not sensible. Right now anyway, and I can see that clearly. I will be patient....and in the mean time, I will make my little booth the best it can be and do what I can to make it excel.

And the cancer. Naughty, naughty cancer. I was doing ok on the new regimen and had a CT scan after 3 treatments. The new regimen is not doing any good. The tumors on my lungs are bigger and another showed up on my liver. Needless to say, "I ain't happy!" The doctors decided on a different regimen that I actually start tomorrow. There was no sense continuing the current regimen when the tumors are growing. So tomorrow, I start a new treatment, or as the doctor called it: "the 3rd line of treatment" (is there a 4th?, don't know). It's a weird one this time...1-3 hour treatment on Monday, then another 8 days later, then another 8 days later and then a Nuelasta shot the day after, then a free week...then it starts over again. We'll do another CT scan in 3 months and see how I'm doing. The side effects seem to be the same as always, but hopefully I will tolerate it well, the doctors seem to be happy how well I tolerate chemo at all.

As you can see from the bad phone photos below my hair is coming in quite well. I no longer look like a cancer patient, just like I have a short hairstyle. 

Justin and I went to see Silver Linings Playbook this weekend. We had a pre-chemo date night. :) Wanna know how long it's been since I've set foot in a theater? 3 years. I know crazy. It has to look like a REALLY good movie before I will actually spend the insane amount of money on movie tickets and concessions. And let's face it, Bradley Cooper will get me to the theater. 

We went to eat at Applebee's afterwards which is another place that I haven't been in a really long time....probably 7 years? I don't get out much-ha!

 My hair is coming in so nicely that I actually called my hairstylist to shape up my neck...it was looking really scraggly. I was in the chair for exactly 8 minutes which I thought was hilarious.

 I found this old blurry picture of me right before the cancer came back, I've got a little way to go!

 Another thing I decided while on hiatus was to pick up my schooling again. I started out strong, but then when I got sick I put it on the back burner. I have decided that I WILL get my interior design degree. My goal is to get it on, in or around June 2013....pending chemo side effects. This was another one of those things that I was like "what are you going to get a degree for?" Lord, I have a lot of those nagging questions....but I can do this.

 Anyway, I am so thankful you all are here and thank you for sticking with me through this. I know this is just a blog, but you all offer such a support system for me and I'm happy to be here again. I'll let you know how the new treatments are going and I have to show you how the booth is looking too, so I will talk to you soon!