Repurposed! Tips for giving new life to old things

Do you have old furniture, or frames that don't really go with your decor? Here are a few tips and tricks to re purposing them and making them useful.

Picture Frames:

 These are two old frames from my grandmother's home. Pictures of my grandparents hung in these frames in her hallway wall for as long as I can remember.
My grandmother passed in 2008, and last year, the pictures and frames were handed down to me, however by the time I got them the frames were worse for the wear.
I didn't want to get rid of the frames because they were a very big part of my childhood I absolutely loved the pictures that hung in these frames, and I like the idea of having a piece of my grandmother in my house.

• I first cleaned the frames up the best I could. I also made sure that any fixable damage was repaired.
• I then used some left over paint from when we redecorated our bathroom to paint the frames. This is a great idea for when you are re purposing something, reuse left over paint from previous jobs. Not only will this save money, this will also ensure your project will go with your current decor, it will tie in different rooms with each other.
• While you are waiting for the frames to dry make sure you clean up the frames glass. In my case these frames had hung in a home of a smoker for decades, so there was a good bit of nicotine built up on the glass.
• Once the frames where dry I used this great product available at Home Depot it is Martha Stewart's Specialty Finish. This is a black Textured Metallic finish. This gives the frames a little bit of a shimmer. Keeps the paint job from looking flat.

This is the finish product. It is a little hard to see the finish in pictures. The finish is not very expensive, but adds so much to the finished product.

Might I add my grandmother was beautiful!

 

Furniture.

Now you can go to almost any blog and find out how to re purpose furniture, however they are missing that Heat originality.

As you may have realized I love bringing pieces from my childhood into my ever day life. It is away I can pass on my history to the current generation.

This book shelf is no different. My mother bought this book shelf when I was probably ten. It was in my room as a kid for a few years. About two years ago my dad gave it to me.
It is a solid oak bookshelf, in relatively good condition considering it has been moved around for the 15 years. Still you could see the age on the book shelf. My husband and I decided to give it new life, and make it apart of our spare room/ the kids room.

• Just like with the picture frames we used paint left over from when we painted the very room the book shelf is in.
• When painting furniture, there involves a little more prep that when painting frames.
• First you need to clean the shelf off, dust it get any stuck on dirt off.
• Typically when painting furniture a little bit of sanding is required however with this bookshelf because of how it was it did not require any sanding.
• With bookshelves they often have a backing on them that is a type of composite. We took the back off when we painted the bookshelf. It was not hard to take off, it was just stapled on, there were a few finishing nails in it where my mom had fixed the backing when it started to come off.
• With all furniture you will first want to put a primer coat on. We painted this bookshelf outside because it allowed for a shorter drying time.
• Once your primer coat is dry you can then apply your paint. It may need more than one coat, this book shelf required two.
• Once it was finish it was now time to figure out what to do with the backing. If you are on pinterest you might have seen the bookshelf with the fabric backing, I thought of doing that in read because the room has light blue walls with red accents, however some of christmas wrapping paper caught my eye, and this is the finished product!
  *How I did the backing : I covered the backing with the polka dot paper with packing tape, then we used small finishing nails to reattach the backing. One of the best things about using wrapping paper, it is cost effective (though you will want to use a thicker wrapping paper like the kind you find at Hobby Lobby or Halmark), it is also easy to change if you get tired of it, and you wont have lost a lot of money in it.
  
  *Once you are done, you need to wait at least 24 hours before placing anything back on the furniture.
  
  This bookshelf looks completely new!

The Tips

1. Just because it is old doesnt mean it is not useful. Bringing Older things upto date is a great way of passing on family history, however becareful, make sure you are not going to ruin something by painting it sometimes a frame is not just a frame, but worth a lot of money so do your research
2. Reuse materials from previous projects. This will help create a flow to your home, without painting everything khaki. And the best thing is no one will know why.
   also this will help you with that one question that holds people back "what color should I paint it?" You obviously already liked that color enough to put it on your walls.
3. Don't be afraid. It can be intemidating to think about repurposing furniture, take on small tasks first like picture frames, and work your way to furniture. It really is no different than painting a room.