The knitting I mentioned in the previous post turned out badly (I wasn't surprised, it usually does these days) and so has been consigned to the bin. I then started a little cross stitch project, so little I can't see the holes to poke the needle into, so that's been shelved.
Now I'm trying my hand at painting. Not pictures, I know I'm no artist. Furniture. A smallish bedside cabinet, to be exact, which could be used in a recently decluttered bedroom. Not that I have a good track record in painting furniture. Not that I've ever painted anything. Well, apart from the bathroom door in our first house when I used the slap all the gloss on at the top and spread it down technique. It took absolutely ages to dry before the mister could set to with the sander.
Made from a dark wood and with ball feet, this was the cabinet that was always next to my bed when I was growing up and which has followed me to whichever house I've lived in. The mister was very clear from the beginning that me, the cabinet and the piano came as a package.
It's been languishing at the back of the garage for ages, filled with DIY odds and ends and an unused car vacuum cleaner. It was also host to an enormous spider which was speedily rehomed with the help of a Kilner jar, the Betterware catalogue and a pair of oven gloves.
My dad had a couple of attempts at renovating the cabinet over the years. I came home from university one summer to discover he'd painted it the colour of lint dressing which is still evident in parts. I have no idea why he chose pink, or that particular pink, given my bedroom walls were dark purple at the time and he was allegedly aiming for a 'psychedelic effect'. He repainted it white just before the mister and I were married and trying to furnish a rented house on a very limited budget and it hasn't been changed since. Even allowing for the passage of time, I think I can safely say furniture painting was not my dad's forte. I have a feeling I may be about to confirm it isn't mine.
Annie Sloan chalk paint is everywhere in blogland and Pinterest and I realise I'm very late to that particular party. It's also rather expensive but, seduced by the assurances of quick drying, that preparation and priming is unnecessary and no painting experience needed, I ordered a tin along with a tin of wax.
The first coat was applied yesterday. It doesn't look good. It looks the exact opposite of good. The mister has been critical. 'There are drips on the doors'. 'They're not my drips', I retorted huffily, 'they're my dad's drips and I quite like them as they're part of the cabinet's story and anyway they're on the inside so won't be seen.' Unlike the huge blob I did manage to leave on the front of one of the doors which his eagle eye appears to have missed.
The cabinet is back in the garage awaiting a second coat of paint.
It may be there some time.
