Back in March we went to an estate sale in our neighborhood {Andrew sniffs them out like a hound dog sniffs out a criminal} and scored a beautiful antique chest of drawers.

Here’s Andrew and the designated furniture-mover-man loading it into the back of our truck.

We got it home and our military-man neighbor helped him bring it into our living room and there it sat.  Until yesterday.

{YAY!!!  Can I just take a second to tell you how good it feels to get SOMETHING done?! Thank you.  I’m done now.}

 

So this Saturday, as we took a break from our July 4th events and the kids were passed out {!!!} in their beds, I assessed the situation with the chest of drawers.

It wasn’t in terrible shape.  But it needed some serious TLC.

Back in March, when we bought this thing we’d talked about sanding it down and painting it.  That was the plan.

Until Saturday.

So I was standing there looking at this pretty piece of furniture and I say to my beloved, “Hey babe, so what color should we paint it?  Navy?….Some shade of blue…?”

“Paint it?  Why are you painting it?”  He questioned, as if he’d never talked about this ever before in his entire life of 2015.

“……What?  We talked about this….” I started.  Confused.  Bewildered.  Had I had that entire conversation all by myself?  Surely not.  I’m not THAT crazy.

“Remember, we talked about this a long time ago…back when we bought it.  I was going to sand it down and paint it….” {waiting for the light bulb to go off…any moment…}

“Why?  What’s wrong with it?”

“uhmygosh.”  {sigh}  “So do you want to paint it or…?”   We basically had the conversation all over again.  ALL.OVER.AGAIN.

I love that man.  I LOVE that man.

“If you paint it you might as well sell it.”

?!?!?!?!?!

“Why don’t you just re-stain it?”

“Sand it down and re-stain it?  Re-stain it what  color?  The same color it is now?  Why?”

Do you know that song by Soul Coughing: Circles?  {I don’t need to walk around in circles…}  That’s how I felt.

“Why don’t I just clean it up really good and see how it looks, and then we’ll go from there….”

So in the beginning…there was this pretty wood chest of drawers that was dull beyond dull…with blah wood knobs.

I took the knobs off…vacuumed the drawers out and cleaned them.

Then, with the monitor watching my every move…I introduced my little friend: Old English.  She’s amazing.

 

Top two drawers….

Then the rest of the drawers….and the legs done….  This poor little fella had seen better, much better days at some point in his life.Old English brought him back!!

My hand was pretty nasty…like I’d been changing oil at Jiffy Lube all day long…glad I hadn’t done my nails…

 

Ewwwww.

But he was glistening when I was done.

And since this was Reynolds’ new chest of drawers, and his room has a nautical theme I had to upgrade those blah knobs to something more fun.

Last year when I got R’s night stands at World Market, I’d also found some jute knot knobs.  So back to World Market we went yesterday afternoon to get 10 more.

And while I like for y’all to think I have all sorts of knick knacks and tchotches to add to it…

This was the best I could do.  Sweet momentos from Reynolds’ “Uncle Jon-e” and his travels on the WEST coast.

And while I also like y’all to think his room is perfectly staged and that it stays that way, it’s not and it doesn’t.  We live in real life, real time and this is what it really looks like…diapers and wipes right next door.  Pillows on the floor for when he’s not careful trying to sneak out of bed…

It’s big.  It’s beautiful.  It should hold all of his clothes until he’s at least 30, at which point he’ll be allowed to date and/or move out.  At which point he may or may not be allowed to take this with him.