Friday, June 14, 2013

My Workshop

Some people have garages.  We are some of those people. (Hey in DC you can't always be sure of that when you buy a house.  Some people just have car ports.)

Maybe I should say we USED to be some of those people.  I've "ahem" taken over the garage . . .




It has become my work space, my furniture refinishing workshop, and it could be my woodworking shop if I HAD RECEIVED THE ELECTRIC MITER SAW THAT I'VE BEEN ASKING FOR FOR EVERY BIRTHDAY AND CHRISTMAS FOR THE PAST 2.5 YEARS!!!!  Sigh.  Oh well, I have more than enough to do now.  Building furniture can wait.

But yes this is now the place where I paint and stain all the really yucky furniture in the basement.  It's always nice to receive furniture especially when you've just moved across country and gave all your furniture to a friend who knew a family in her home town who had gone through a divorce and needed everything including hangers and lamps . . . it's a sad world.  Everything that they didn't need went to the Jardine vultures.  WHATEVER YOU DO, DO NOT TAKE FURNITURE FROM THE DUMPSTER IN JARDINE!  (Jardine is my old apartment complex btw).  Taking my particle board tv cabinet is fine but I've seen people grab couches and vacuums and even mattresses (gag.  omg it's gross).  The problem is that this furniture has been passed around multiple times.  People will use it and when they leave it will sit by the dumpster and be taken to another apartment till they leave etc etc etc.  It's called bed bugs and the old apartments had them.  I lived in a new apartment thank goodness.

ANYWAY, the old furniture I got from my dad's old office mate was appreciated, it just looked awful.  Sooooo I'm refinishing it piece by piece and I'm using the garage as my staging grounds since you can't prime furniture on carpet!  The fumes would probably ignite which is bad. 




The first picture was my painting station.  This picture is my staining station.




This is another painting station.  Omg that chair was ridiculous, and it's still not done!  It had so many twists and turns that you have to prime as much of it as you can reach while contorting your body into odd shapes, then wait for that to dry, turn it over and prime all the parts you couldn't reach, wait for that to dry, lightly sand it, put a coat of paint on, let that dry, turn it over and paint the other half, and guess what you still have to paint and let dry and paint and let dry and then seal!  Ahhhhh!

Can you tell I'm not a very patient person when it comes to watching paint dry?  Needless to say, the car is not going back into the garage any time soon!

And to make sure the car (and the person driving it) didn't forget that I have all my furniture laid out and drive right into it, I stationed the trash cans as sentries at the entrance.  Whatever works.




And this is my brush and paint and primer staging station.  I'm only keeping it here because it's the spring.   If this was the middle of the summer I'd store the paint and primer in the cool basement.  You can never be too careful around flammable liquids.

And last random fact, that cloth that I've set all the furniture on to protect the garage floor?  Those are the old curtains left by the previous owners.  They were so dusty and faded (and who knows what else) they were beyond repair.  I think I get too much of a kick out of spilling paint on them . . . ;)

No comments:

Post a Comment