Repurposed Drawers Project

My mom found these drawers  for me at a thrift shop- I think they were $3 each?  I love the carving on the front, as well as the hardware.  Because I like the way they look when they are stacked, I decided to play off of that, and add words to the sides.

If you can trace, you can do this.  I decided I wanted my words to relate to one another...so I chose faith, hope, and love.  I also considered doing numbers with numerals on one side and the spelled out numbers on the other side of the drawers.....Numbering things is so popular right now, I decided to stay away from that option.

Once I decided on my words, I typed them out and played with fonts and sizes.  When I found something I liked, I'd print out the first page to make sure it would fit on the side of my drawer.

Then, I raided Max's crayon stash for a light color, which I used to color on the opposite side of the page.

After doing this, in order to find the middle of the word, I folded the page in half so the outer edge of the first letter and the outer edge of the last letter meet.

After finding the center point of the drawer side, I lined them up and  taped them to the side of the drawers. 

I then used an ink pen to trace the letters, making sure that the crayon was transferring onto the wood.  This is the method I used in our old house to paint the Emily Dickinson quote in the sunroom.

I then used white craft paint and a small paint brush (use smaller than you think you'll need, I also think brushes with stiffer bristles make it easier to control the paint) to color in the lines.  I bet you could use a paint pen, but I haven't tried it and actually, I prefer paint/brush method.  Silly me, I forgot to take a picture of the drawers before I distressed them.  I distressed all of the sides of the drawer using a hand sander and coarse sand paper.   I accidentally over-distressed some of the letters, so I just touched up the light areas.  Once dry, I sanded with a little piece of fine sand paper.

I was trying to wrangle toddlers and keep them from destroying anything, as well as take pictures, so needless to say, they are a little rough.

I decided to have the fronts of the drawers alternate ends, thinking it would make it more interesting looking.

  

I also thought some dried flowers sticking out might be pretty- like maybe some lavender.  And instead of jars on top, I thought of doing candles, a pile of pine cones or evens some little books.  I think it's something that could be changed with the season. 

If you can't tell from the pictures, I staggered the drawers so they could be stacked without falling over.

I also think that anything that you could stack could be substituted...boxes, books, chunks of wood.

Right now, I'm also in the middle of painting a chest, which I can hopefully share later this week.  I'm also working on this chest of drawers- I got all of the spray paint sanded off today, but it will be a couple weeks before it will be finished because it needs some love....and a new top. 

I'd love for you to check back in a couple days to see how my chest turns out (I'm pretty interested to find out myself!)

I linked to these wonderful blogs:

Remodaholic

Sugar Bee Crafts

Reason to Skip the Housework

          
                  

take care -