Happy Halloween...

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Happy Halloween!.. are you eating lots of candy!?.  I must admit... I had some mini chocolate bars for breakfast!.. time for some toast and tea I think... now that the two stools are distressed and waxed and the roast is cooking away in the slowcooker its time to sit back and chill out... perhaps carve the pumpkins on the front steps... tonight is Halloween afterall!.. 

Refinished Wooden Stools...

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Eeee!.. So excited... I slept in a bit this morning... and that means oh after 8:30 but before 9:00 am... hahaha... thats so late now that I think about it... seeing that its 2:35 now... perhaps I shoulda got up a little earlier!.. once I was up I headed to the basement to give the wooden stools that I got for $10... yeah!..  $10 for the pair!.. a final sanding ... here are the stools...

They're pretty plain jane bar stools... but they'll go perfect with the table and chairs that I picked up to refinish... and they match the style of the kitchen way better than the asian styled stools we currently have... perhaps I'll paint those red and sell them...

Here's a close up shot of the stool... I wasn't super in love with the shape of the top... looking down onto the top of the seat there was a sharp line around the top... so I sanded that down and rounded it...  it's much nicer now...

Here is the stain that Furs and I picked up yesterday from Home Depot... its Dark Walnut... Ooo... and did it ever turn out nice when I put it onto the seats!.. I only did one coat... that was enough I think...  I didn't want them to be super dark...  I used a stain applicator pad again and it was great... I did remember to wear gloves this time... luckily!..  last time I didn't... wasn't good...

Here are the stools now as they sit in the basement... I'm going to wait for the paint to dry really well before sanding it down... I went with a semi gloss paint... if I had it back I would have went with flat... I'm going to wax the legs anyway so that'll give a shiny finish to the legs... for the stained seat I'm going to sand those after the legs are distressed and waxed... then I don't have to worry about getting stain dust on the cream legs or cream dust on the unsealed stained top!..  I have some clear varathane to protect the stained seats... 

Once I get the legs sanded and waxed later today I'll add the pictures to this post...

For now I'm gonna dust off... change out of my painting clothes... get a cuppa tea... toss some laundry in the washer... and tidy the kitchen...  perhaps I'll stain up a couple books so that tomorrow they'll be dry and I can twine them up...

...I'M BACK!..

Ran out of 400 grit sandpaper to distress the painted surfaces of the stools so couldn't finish them yesterday... well I guess I could have... Furs and I ran to get groceries last night and then picked up more sandpaper at Home Depot while we were out... but instead of working on the stools I got some movie snacks together and we watched the Rocky Horror Picture Show!.. love movie nights with my Furs... and of course the fur babies were nearby chilling out with us...

...soo... I just finished the stools this morning... after sleeping in until 9:44!.. I know!.. lots of sleep!.. anyway!.. check it out!..

All thats left to be done with the stools now is to spry the stained seats with a coat of clear to protect them... I was going to wax them like I did the painted parts but am worried that sitting on the waxed seat might result in some ruined pants... if you know any different please let me know!..

I learned a lesson while sanding the paint on the legs... use flat paint... I used semi gloss... big mistake... it takes much more sanding... and the paint pills up when you sand it...  flat paint seems to sand so much easier... and because I wax after distressing anyway I don't need the paint to be glossy at all... the wax takes care of the gloss factor!..

I love how these turned out...  They go with the kitchen much better than the old stools...

You can see the edge of the old stool next to the new one here in the shot below...

Whatcha think!?. Check out these before and after shots:

Quick question... if these were for sale what would you be willing to pay?.. what's fair?.. I'm not actually selling these ones because they're for our kitchen... but I have to start wrapping my head around pricing things... and your thoughts are greatly appreciated!..

Time to link these puppies up to some linky parties:

House Of Thrifty Decor The DIY Show Off Sumo's Sweet Stuff Skip to my Lou C.R.A.F.T Making the World Cuter House of Grace Savvy Southern Style Coastal Charm The Shabby Chic Cottage The Shabby Nest Frou Frou Decor Chic on a Shoestring Decorating My Romantic Home French Country Cottage Miss Mustard Seed What Allie's Making Now

Happy Friday All...

Feathering My Nest has moved!... come check all of this out over at www.featheringmynest.ca/blog

Loves a Friday I do!..  Been a bad blogger this week... but I promise more regular posting... its just been a frizzly week... going to be switching jobs soon...

On the way home from work Furs and I are going to pick out a brown stain and proper cream for the two kitchen stools and the kitchen table and chairs to be redone... I got to get those projects knocked out quick so I can get onto a pile of pieces for a vintage sale next summer... more on that once I get a chance to sit down and think about it!.. 

Tonight my goal is to get those stools done...  we'll see what the rest of the weekend brings... perhaps if its half warm tomorrow I can strip the little end table that I found in a free pile a couple weekends ago... 

What projects are you working on this weekend?..

Weekend Recap...

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Other than refinishing the wooden chair this weekend I decided that it would be a good idea to take everything out of the sewing room closet...

And then I pulled out the shelf that was in there and patched all of the holes and painted the closet with that Sea Salt paint that I had picked up for the table set I'm going to redo... good thing I did... turns out that it is much white than I'd like for the kitchen table!.. but perfect for this closet... makes it much brighter inside...

I haven't found a solution that I'm set on for the closet yet though... so everything is still everywhere in the sewing room... I was thinking four full length shelves would be the best... wire ones so that it would help to keep the closet light... only the only pieces I've found to outfit the closet like that are super expensive... so I've got to look around some more to see what's around...

After a few coats of paint and a big messy room around me I felt very overwhelmed...  So after a bit of chilling out on advice of Chris we got ready and headed to the mall to do some Christmas shopping... I feel so behind...  Usually by now I've got just about everyone's presents sorted out... not this year!..  We got a couple family members looked after now though... 

On the way home from the mall we stopped at Sea in MacKenzie Towne for some fish and chips... Mmm... its always good in there...  and its always packed in there!..  We got the special that was on... a mug of chowder with garlic toast and the two piece fish and chips... and we ordered popcorn shrimp too... we should have shared a fish and chips because we ended up with a lot of leftovers... but that was okay because it made for an easy lunch yesterday!...

The chowder is very nice... there were bits of zucchini... I think... in it... It didn't look the most appealing... the pieces of zucchini...  but I tried them and they just added a little something to the chowder!.. We'll definitely be going back for some bowls of chowder as the weather continues to get colder!.. Mmm...

The pieces of cod are long and skinny... they look kinda funny and I'd much rather one medium piece of fish as opposed to two skinny pieces...  less batter more fish... but it tasted great... Mmm... tartar sauce... Ooo... speaking of tartar sauce... yesterday when Chris and I were having the last bit of fish and chips for lunch Chris made us some tartar sauce... it was yum!..

Saturday night Chris and I had a stay in movie night... we picked up lots of snacks... ringalos... chocolate covered almonds... beef jerkey... popcorn...  I love movie nights at home!..

As you know from the post below part of Sunday was spent finishing the wooden chair that I got from Pam's yard sale... And of course most of the day went to laundry and tidying...  Weekends are just not long enough... 

Oh hey... check out Leigh's blog...  I'm stealing taking inspiration from Leigh with my Monday postings... calling them Weekend Recap...

What did you get up to this weekend?..

Refinished Wooden Chair...

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Luckily I started with the $5 wooden chair I got from Pam's yard sale a couple weekends back... turns out the ebony stain is very dark...  I know ebony equals dark but from the sample at Home Depot it didn't look that dark... it is darker than I'd like for the kitchen stools and kitchen table and chairs... so I didn't finish the stools this weekend... I finished the chair!..  the stools are almost completely sanded though... perhaps they'll be next weekends project... just gotta find the right stain...

Here is the wooden chair in the original state... very orangy...

You can see how orangy it is here outside...  its looking extra shiny because there is stripper painted onto the seat...

After the stripping and some sanding... its a very nice sturdy chair... manufactured in Canada by Brooks and Corning in BC...  It got some more sanding after I got the Black & Decker Mouse...  the standing attachments that come with that sander are very handy...

Once it was all sanded I wiped it down and then taped off the parts to be painted if they were touching the parts that were getting stained... I put the water based ebony stain on the seat and the two back slats... then once it was dry... like dry to the touch... I waited maybe 10 minutes... then I painted a layer of latex Kilz onto the unstained wood...  I just brushed it on...  That was all Friday night... 

Yesterday morning I took the sander to the stained seat to make it look very worn...  Today I lightly sanded the Kilz primer with some 400 grit sandpaper... just to smooth out any paint brush marks or roughish spots... then I taped off the stained parts with seran wrap and painters tape...  The chair was ready to be sprayed... I used a bit of the $3.00 can of light yellow Oops paint mixed with some lighter cream... I watered down the paint mixture to thin down the paint for the paint gun...  

After I had the gun washed out and everything tidied I went back to the basement to check the chair... it was dry!..  I LOVE using the spray gun!..  I took off the seran and tape and used 400 grit again to give all of the painted parts a sanding... just lightly and to distress the edges and any nicks in the chair to make it look lightly worn...

After another wipe down to get rid of the paint dust... the paint dust got all over the stained wood so I really had to give it a bit of a scrub with a damp cloth to get the paint dust off... next time I'll keep the stained wood covered until the paint is sanded and wiped down... I broke out the cheese cloth and minwax and gave the whole chair a coat of wax and a buffing... the dark stain rubbed off onto the cheese cloth so I used a new cloth to do wax and buff the cream parts... I think I'll be giving the chair a few more coats of wax before I say its fully finished... The wax just makes it look so finished and rich...

These tags that were a part of my gift basket prize from this past summer's Vintage Chicks Sale look so good with the chair!.. 

I'm really happy with how the chair turned out... and how quickly I was able to get it done...  80% of the time spent on this project was getting it all stripped down to the bare wood...

Worn deail shots...

I would love to keep this chair... but I think its going to be part of the booth that I'm hoping to have at the Vintage Chicks Sale next summer...  more details on that to come!..

I'll be linking this one up to a pile of linky parties as the week goes on... go and check out these blogs...

Sumo's Sweet Stuff Skip to my Lou C.R.A.F.T Making the World Cuter Be Colorful Coastal Charm House Of Thrifty Decor The DIY Show Off House of Grace The Shabby Chic Cottage What Allie's Making Now Miss Mustard Seed French Country Cottage Chic on a Shoestring Decorating My Romantic Home Frou Frou Decor The Shabby Nest The DIY Showoff

Wooden Stools To Refinish...

Found these on kijiji... from people in the next community over!.. so close that we picked them up on the way home today!..  got them both for $10!.. an excellent find!.. I'm going to dent and scratch up the tops a little and then stain them with the ebony stain that I picked up a few weeks back...

The legs will be painted cream to match the kitchen table that I'm going to redo... I'm planning on getting these done this weekend... along with the small chair that I stripped last weekend... that chair will be painted in the same way as these... 

The little chair that I stripped last weekend needs a little more sanding though... only the big sanders that I'm using (thanks A&B for lending me your sanders!) couldn't get in around the spindles so that I could fully get it ready to be painted... so on the way home from work today Furs and I stopped at Home Depot to pickup this...

What's that!?. you can't see it?.. there is something in the way you say?..  Cleo kept head butting the camera when I was trying to get a few snaps of this item...

Oh you can almost see it now...

It's a Black & Decker...

mouse sander!..

I can't wait to break it out this weekend!.. it was marked as $59.99... but when we rang it in it came up at $49.99!..  It has a couple contoured pieces and then a tip attachment piece to get into small spots... see the second picture in the picture just above!?. it shows the mouse sanding the seat around the spindles!..

I'm going to be linking up to a few linky parties... I'll list them here as I link up!..

My Romantic Home

The DIY Show Off

Miss Mustard Seed

The Shabby Nest

The Shabby Chic Cottage

House of Grace

Frou Frou Decor

Debbidoos

French Country Cottage

My Favorite Things

Chic on a Shoestring Decorating

What Allie's Making Now

House Cleaning Sunday...

Yesterday I woke up earlyish... 8am... and hopped out of bed and started the routine weekend cleaning and laundry...  Chris had to work so I worked away at tidying the house and recovering that second wing back chair throughout the day... I squeeked in a 20 minute nap on the couch too...

Once I had the kitchen all tidied I decided to mess it up again by baking Chris a pound cake for a surprise when he got home... This is Christopher's Pound Cake:

I use my Nordic Ware Anniversary Bundt Pan for this cake recipe... Its also good in a loaf pan - the loaf slices are nice... I like that the shape of this bundt gives you big and small pieces...  This cake gets baked every now and then throughout the year... and I always bake one for Chris on his birthday...  his mom would always make this cake for him... and now that we live so far from home I bake it for him!..

The recipe for this cake is so easy... This recipe is called Christopher's Pound Cake... and sometimes I call it cheater pound cake...

Ingredients list:

1 box of golden cake mix

1 box of vanilla jello pudding mix

1/2 cup oil

1 cup water

4 eggs

Directions:

Mix all ingredients and blend for 2 minutes.

Pour into greased and floured cake pan.

Bake at 350 for 45 - 55 minutes.

Once the cake springs back it's done!

See!.. easy!.. and it is tasty!.. its not to sweet... its nice and moist... it doesn't need any icing or frosting or glaze... its not heavy and its not too light... its just right... Perfect with a cup of tea!..

Linking up to a Foodie Friday Linky Party here

Saturday Evening Hookah's...

Feathering My Nest has moved!... come check all of this out over at www.featheringmynest.ca/blog

Popped into the tattoo convention yesterday to visit Alicia...  Got to see Ryan Stock lift a keg using fresh piercings that AmberLynn poked through his forarms... big safety pin type things... EEP!..  Then we checked out the tattoos being done and the merch being sold...

THEN... we took Alicia with us and headed out for supper with our foodie companions!.. Neibs Amy and Brendon...  We went for supper last night at this little place called Spiro's.  Looking at the outside doesn't make you very confident in the meal to come but once you walk inside the space is blocked with customers... sitting at tables eating and waiting for their takeout or waiting for seats...  and the food smells are reassuring that you're definitely in for a good meal...  The restaurant is tight and cozy... the decorating is way over the top but just adds to the cozy factor I think...

Some major ball dropping took part again here on my part... big cam was out in the car and I only had the iPhone on hand... and it wasn't until after we laid into the appys that I remembered to take a few snaps...  We started with Saganaki Cheese... Kalamari...  Taramosala... and piles of pita... Everything was delish... 

I thought to grab a few snaps of us all while the meals were arriving...

Gotta love a Saturday night that involves good food and good friends...

I had the baked spaghetti... with two meatballs and a giant slab of toast...  the noodles looked a little overcooked... they were so fat... but it tasted great and the texture was good...

Alicia had a Spanakopita and this pizza above... their crust looked amazing!.. and tasted amazing... the guys had a monster XL pizza... and Amy the Dolmades... I tried to try one but they're cold.. I just couldn't do it!.. she said they were delish!..

And as full as we were... and we have leftovers in the fridge today to prove it... there was still room to try out their desserts and for a couple cups of tea...  homemade cheesecake and baklava... yum and yum... 

Definitely two thumbs up for this meal!..  And I have to tell you that the waitresses were very nice and very helpful... and there was one lady who checked on us a few times... I got the feeling that perhaps she was an owner... she commented on the amount of gub we ordered a few times and took care of our left overs for us quite promptly... she had a warm smile and you could tell she genuinely cared how your meal was...

Then we went to check out Mirage... a restaurant and hookah bar over on 10 Ave SW... A&B said that the food there is great... but we were all so full we couldn't even think about eating... we went for the sheesha!..

Excuse the dark shots... luckily I bought the big cam in but it's so dark inside... I was on 1600 ISO and using shutter speeds that required the subject to stay still!..  I need to get some faster glass... 50mm 1.4 is what I really want to get... perhaps I'll have to rent it a few times to test it out to make sure that its the one!..

We got there earlyish... 9:30ish... luckily we got there at that time... shortly after we arrived it started filling up and it filled up fast!.. and there was a singer... very neat!.. there was one long table that had to have had at least 15 hookah's going down it... I really wanted to grab a snap but I didn't think it would have been appropriate...

Between the five of us the flavors we got were Double Apple, Guava and White Grape, and Orange and Vanilla...

Usually there are no photos of me because I'm the one snapping all of the shots... but I was taking so many that the camera was grabbed and a few shots of me taken!..

I loved the atmosphere in here...  It seemed like most of the people at the different tables and at the bar all knew each other... lots of handshakes and hugs... and once the music really started people were clapping and dancing in their seats... just as we were leaving a group of men had gotten up to dance...

Definitely need to head back here for more sheesha and with some faster glass... there are some awesome smoke shots to be had... and next time we're aiming for one of the couch areas... the only thing that could make the whole place more relaxing is chilling out on their couches and a game of cards... you can ask for cards there and they have packs behind the bar...