Sweet Dreams~~~~ A New Pallet Headboard

It all started 

 my son, his Dream, 4 Pallets and a piece of plywood........

Oh Happy Day!



My son and daughter-in-law just moved into their new home, expecting their first baby boy July 6th!



With that said you know there is much to do and little time.............



When my son sets his mind on doing something their is no waiting........


                   he jumps all in, excited with anticipation  

He decided he wanted to make a pallet headboard for the master bedroom in the new home.



I know you have seen them.......



Pallets are all the rage!




He knew mom ( that's me) had all the tools he needed to make this job happen quickly and efficiently.

Plus he knows I love a DIY project and




             ..................I have a love for Pallets

So he brought over 4 new pallets (not aged) to make this beaut!

When I saw the new pallet's 

            ..............I knew we had to put our creative hats on to make these look aged

First order was to take all the pallets apart

He originally tried to pry these apart

he quickly found out that was just too much work

...........Ain't nobody got time for that..........

he was in a hurry

..........I mean he has got a baby on the way........

so he came over to mom and dads to put to use a power tool 

...........A sawzall........

                               This is a remarkable tool {a reciprocating saw}.........

If my son were writing this post he would tell you.........

tell you that "it is his best friend" :)      OH HAPPY DAY!

...............tell you "how much precious time this power tool saved him".........

he would tell you that "you should never ever do a pallet project without a sawzall"

SERIOUSLY!!

lastly he would SAY" every DIY'er should own a sawzall"

Once you use it you will be so happy

 so happy you bought one, I mean you can do so much with them.

Within 30 minutes he all all the boards cut off the pallets ready to sand and stain.

After that a light sanding to knock down the roughness of the wood

NO SPLINTER"S ...........right!

now the fun part, we laid on the stain............


the stain colors we used were...............

• Special Walnut
• Dark Walnut
• English Walnut
• Ebony

I know your wondering how we got those new boards to look so weathered.


Well I got this idea............



with the use of some watered down paint



I lightly gave the new board {before stain}



..................................a light washing with paint



then over the top of that we applied the stain.

the different paint colors we used were a blue, cream, mustard, grey, red



we got some beautiful manmade weathered looking boards


                                       ...............I was in creative heaven............



I mean you should have seen the three of us, I mean the four, me, my son his wife and little baby in the oven,Trenton Samuel

we were doing a project as a family and having a blast being creative



                                                          "TOGETHER"



I mean that's what life is all about, making memories with those you cherish and love,

While watching a beautiful piece of art emerge.....



                                   After all the boards were stained




Brad, my son took a piece of 4x8 plywood and had it cut to 4x7, stained it with ebony stain



then we proceeded to place all the boards on the plywood like a puzzle

He did not want the boards seams to line up in each row


 so he put them in a lovely mismatched order, like hardwood floors


I & his wifey helped decide where the different color boards went within this beautiful work of Art

I could see the look of satisfaction on his face from building his very first project,


the satisfaction like when he was a little boy


                          and caught his first fish


                                   ................like when he hit his first home-run :)


ah, those precious memories.



With determination we pressed on, he was determined to get this project headboard up on his wall the same day!

I mean he is so much like his momma!



                      excited & can't wait to see the end reveal in it's new home




We all three, I mean four finished off the headboard by sealing it with a satin Polyurethane.



Step-dad took it over in his truck and then proceeded to helped him put it up on the wall.



Once it was on the wall with some heafty screw making sure it was in the studs,


We all stood back and looked in awe..........


                                         at how beautiful this looked with it all put together.



Brad still had one thing to do before this was marked



                                                             .........COMPLETE


 he made a trip to Ikea.......



                             He wanted to shed a little light on the subject 

Do the lights not look beautiful against the wood!!


After a day of fun filled project Pallet headboard,


at sunset, we all sat down to a grilled steak dinner in their new home, with a new DIY pallet headboard installed and a look of accomplishment on my sweet little boys face.



"SWEET MOMENTS"


have you done a pallet headboard?


   If so please share.




Transforming Life,

Digging Deeper.......{Practicing His Presence}

The mind set on the flesh (natural world) is death;


it leaves faith undeveloped and contributes to our lack of encounter and experience.


....................A mind set on the Spirit is life and peace...............


It has purpose. 


Graham Cooke

Beauty & The Beast " A Stained Art Sideboard Transformation"

So it begins,


A tale of Beauty & The Beast.


                         This once called the BEAST.............


Because it was a monster of a piece of furniture


It weighs Im guessing over 300lbs.....


A dear friend of mine saw it at a goodwill store and bought it for me to refinish.


She said this thing is big and ugly but I feel sure you can transform it.

     
      so I put on my thinking cap.............

Ugly it was and this is how she looked when I started stripping off the top layer of varnish.


She sat in my shop for a while while I decided what in the world to do with it.


I remembered seeing a creative blogger do some sort of stained art


.................................so I went on my search to find the picture to get some inspiration


Bingo The Inspired Room is where I had seen it.

                     I was in Awwwww

I was truly inspired, a great name for her blog.....Thank you Inspired Room!!!!



                        I am no artist, to say the least I was intimidated.


Could I do it?


Would I be able to make a beauty from this beast?


                I had to give it a try...................



determination burned within me like a runner trying to win a race



                  ..................blood, sweat and tears..............


I jumped in............ sink or swim.

After CitraStrip stripper worked it's magic this is what the top looked like

A beautiful piece of hardwood unveiled ..................


The whole piece is wood that is why it is so heavy

Since I am no artist, I began the transformation of the top by printing out a petal design with my cameo silhouette.

Then it took hours to draw out each petal of different sizes into the perfect place.

Excuse the ucky phone pics

I was too focused to run back to the house to get my real camera so I would shoot and move on

This was challenging to say the least, however I was determined so I push on with the staining

Sisters, I had absolutely NO CLUE what I was doing

But.............  I had a vision

So I started with dark stain and in the center of each petal and let it sit for a few mins

                                      .................OK, OK maybe seconds

and tried my best to make a gradient transformation from darker to light

                                  

I was so excited to watch each petal grow into a beautiful flower covering the top of the beast

                    Each day she transformed into this beautiful masterpiece.


After I completed all the gradient petal staining I went back with an artist brush with darker stain and a soft cloth

                     
                                 

                        Yeah I know Im no artist but I had to try,  I had a vision remember


I would dip the brush in some stain and draw some lines and then diffuse it with my cloth


I was in love with the look.


Once all the petals were as good as it was gonna get,


            I lightly stained over the rest of the top and added a low sheen poly to protect her petal glory


The top was finished.......

And boy did that take a long time

...........cuz I am picky, picky picky

I can say it was not perfect, it was a learning curve

the more petals I did the better they looked ..........I felt a little sorry for the first ones I did ...snicker

However that is the beauty of life nothing is perfect so I accepted her imperfectly beautiful imperfections and moved on.

Next up was the body of the beast now transforming into a beauty

She was boring and plain and heavy.....what to do

I painted it with a creamy off white and lightly layer a color wash over it called cappuccino 

Her doors were boring and plain so I went to hobby lobby and picked up some oh so cute

cast iron door pulls and added them for easy access.

                         
               Along with some molding from Lowe's to trim out the fronts of the doors for a designer look

Lastly I had to add feet to this piece and get her up off the floor.

So another trip to Lowes for some pretty bun feet and she is a PRIZE

   

so beast here

To Beauty 

So do tell me what you think?


Have you tried your hand at stained art?  if so Im dying to hear from you and see pics



If you have enjoyed this transformation would you consider liking us on Facebook and follow along with google friend connect on my Side Bar


You're the best and thanks for visiting............


parting at

My 1929 Charmer

Transforming Life,

"I am not here to make you aware of Cancer, I am here to make Cancer aware of JESUS"

My Son's Battle with stage 4 Cancer

I am a proud Mama!!

Yes sir reeeeeeeee......................

My son, Jared is such an inspiration to me


actually, he is an inspiration to a lot of people



                     Because....................


                                               in the FACE of adversity


He rejoices,  because he knows where his help comes from


                                            he understands that he is not his own and put's

his FAITH, his TRUST in              


                                      "JESUS"

You see, Jared just got out of the hospital for a 3 day chemo treatment

                                                         To bring you up to speed.........


Last year he went through 3 rounds of AVBD Chemo treatments 

                               
                                  from Jan- March 2013 until the pet scan came back clean.


Then after a check up and another pet scan the cancer was diagnosed again in Feb 2014 and this time in his bone Stage 4 HL.



So this is now his second round in 2014 of I.C.E. chemo treatments 

   
                                      which when taken he is admitted into the hospital for 3 days.

The day he arrived in the hospital he got busy about his FATHER'S business

He prayed with one of the nurses

Then later that same day at the hospital he prayed with the guy that came into repair the TV.

There were many more pray sessions through out the 3 days that just blessed my heart


and I have no doubt it 


                             BLESSED GOD'S HEART!!

The day after Jared got out of the hospital


                        he was ask to be the guest speaker at "Relay For Life"

He shared his STORY..............


He brought a message of FAITH & HOPE in Jesus to those that are fighting cancer, those who have fought and won, or sadly those who have lost someone to cancer.

He spoke with people



                                        ..................He Prayed with people

He took the time to love on people......

Jesus ask us to be his hands and feet and Jared does this so beautifully

this guy had lost his Father to cancer and was deeply wounded trying to heal from the pain

2013 Mustang .......The Memorial on wheels

Here is a cancer awareness car that Jared got the privilege to sign

what a beautiful memorial to all those we love and remember.......

This picture says it all.................


Jared loves life, he is an encourager.......he shares the life of Jesus that he has been given


does he get down, sure, does he have negative thoughts, Im sure


                       

But he knows all those are choices

                               .....................he chooses to live IN HOPE


he chooses daily to live IN FAITH


not in despair....................



I love what he said at the "Relay For Life" during his speech



"I am not here to make you aware of Cancer, I am here to make Cancer aware of JESUS"



Don't tell God how big your problem is, tell your problem how big your GOD is


So you see with a thankful and humble heart I am proud to call him SON!


PS: If you would like to follow Jared and encourage him you can find him on Facebook

Loving transformation,

Lori