The Apple Street Cottage

Welcome back!  Last week you saw a garage sale dresser transformed with paint and decoupaged napkins.  If you missed it, click here .  Today I have a little tutorial showing how it was done.  Let's get started, shall we? The drawers were sanded down to bare wood and the edges were painted black to match the rest of the dresser.  The napkins were found at the Dollar Store. Notice they are 2-ply napkins?  You only need one, so separate those layers! Iron the one-layer.  It helps when you are ready to lay it down on the wet decoupage medium.   Since the napkins were not wide enough to cover the entire drawer, I was going to have to piece them together.  These napkins also had a very definite pattern that was going to need matching, so it was time for some measuring.  I found the middle of the drawer and matched it to the middle of the napkin.  Then I marked the edges of the napkin on the edge of the drawer with ch...

It's been a bit of a whirlwind around here with cutting and sanding.  Winter will be here before we know it and it will be too cold for those activities!   So, I bring to you - this little chest of drawers that was advertised on a garage sale site: This is a small chest, only about 40 inches tall, but perfect for small-space living.  Advertised on-line, it looked like this: It had that lovely orange, 1940's look, but it was solid wood.  The original plan was to paint it black and give the drawers a lovely stain to show-off the wood grain.  Out came the sander and here's what I found: Poplar!   Poplar is and inexpensive hardwood. The tell-tale green tint gives it away.  It is usually painted because poplar is notorious for being 'blotchy' when stained.   On to Plan B!  After all, it was solid wood and and the drawers were dovetailed. The chest itself was painted with 2 coats of Ink Chalk Paint (available at ...