rockin' chair redo

In the land of blogging and Pinterest, the transformation of ugly, unwanted things into treasured beauties is what inspires me most.   After reading several amazing blogs about refinishing furniture, I decided to give it a try myself.  For several days, I hunted for just the right project to start with; something small but useful.  Finally, I found an old child's rocking chair at the Goodwill for $14.99, and the rest is history! 

BEFORE

AFTER

HERE'S THE SCOOP:

The first thing I did was make repairs. One of the legs had been damaged and the previous owner had tried to fix it with some witch's brew of sawdust, glue and hair.  For all I know there were bat's eyes in there, too.  See the hair?  GRODY.   I sanded that crap off with glee.

Then I painted. I used Behr Plus which is paint and primer combined.  The color is 'Silver Sage' which is a nice grey/green.  I sanded some weird parts of the chair down before painting but I didn't do the whole thing. I didn't strip or stain it prior to painting either, because I was happy with the color of the stain already on the chair.  Oh, and I just used a cheapo sponge brush!  The pros use a paint gun but guess who's not a pro?  ME!

THE ROCKIN' CHAIR AFTER PAINT (TWO COATS)

After the paint was dry I distressed the whole thing using a 60 grit sanding block.  This was one of the more fun and creative parts of the process. I imagined where little hands would rest, where feet would rub, and where the chair would get banged into walls, and these were the areas where I sanded.   I even put wear marks on the seat to make it look like little bums have been scooting in and out of it for years. 

AFTER DISTRESSING

The last step was glazing.  This stressed me OUT!  I really liked how the chair looked after distressing and wasn't sure I wanted to risk messing it up by glazing it.  But I wanted to try it out so I went ahead and did it.  Just slap your glaze mix on and wipe it off with a rag. It gets in all the nicks and nooks and looks like a million very old bucks when it's done. 

 I mixed three parts Behr Faux Glaze with one part Minwax Wood Finish in Ebony.  I would NOT recommend using the Behr Faux Glaze.  It mixed poorly with the wood finish and over time morphed into a gelatinous, chemical snot ball.  Did I mention I'm not a pro?  The insanely talented  Sausha from The Show And Tell Blog recommends using Clear Mixing Glaze by Valspar from Lowe's.   See her very helpful post on glazing furniture here. 

GLAZING

Then I let it dry for a day or so, tied a big bow on it with some muslin fabric I had, and that's it!

Sigh. I just LOVE happy endings.