Updated furniture

 It all started with this bookshelf.  It's been transferred from room to room trying to find a home somewhere.  It's pretty beat up and ugly - and the books have never fit well on it.  It's too narrow, and the shelves are too short. 

 

And then there was this dresser.  I got it for free when I bought Eric's bunk bed from KSL.  The reason she gave it to us was because the drawers didn't work well.  We thought we could work with that.  I spent a LOT of time refinishing it and making it look nice.  But - the lady was right...  the drawers didn't work.  They were constantly falling out, and the clothes ended up on the floor most of the time.  It was more frustrating than helpful!  It is beautiful though!  We inherited another dresser hand-me-down from a relative...so this one was going to go to DI.  That was about 6 months ago... and it's been sitting in our living room downstairs since then....

I was having a really hard time wanting to give it up - it was really pretty.  And I spent HOURS sanding it, staining it and finishing it.  Last weekend Chris said - it's time to get rid of this.  I knew it was time...but I still hesitated.  So, Monday morning while looking on pinterest, I found a great idea to make a shelf out of old dressers.  I knew I could do it.  I measured it - went to Home Depot to look through the scrap pile - and I found wood for 2$ that they cut for me for free!!! I bought a 4$ can of black spray paint...and my project started!

I got the wood sprayed, and drying while I took out all the drawers, took out the tracks, cut some of the pieces out and stained the marks that were left from that.   It only took the one day to finish it all -and I feel pretty good about myself :)

It ended up looking like this - a beautiful bookshelf that actually fits all the books that were on the other shelf .  The space on top I am planning on putting some baskets on to hold library books.  It makes that space look so much nicer!!!  I LOVE it!

What did I do with the old, worn out bookshelf?  Well - I thought about taking it to DI...but then I figured out a way to update it a bit.  I used the leftover blue spray paint I had for Eric's shelf...sprayed it blue... bought 6 of the dollar bins at Walmart and created tags for them.  Now it is our art shelf that I have been thinking of for so long now.  We needed a home for all the markers, crayons, pencils and other art supplies that just end up everywhere in the house.  I still need to make some labels for the small boxes I have - that is still coming... 

I love having the art shelf in the kitchen - because we are often found at the kitchen table doing some project or another - and now it's all here - ready to use!  My kids enjoyed some art projects this weekend.  This is something I LOVE to do with the kids... I think this shelf will become well used now.  I'm very excited.