Projects Galore

I have an Aunt Cheryll.  Having an Aunt Cheryll is like having a personal shopper, interior decorator, thrift store, therapist, mom, and Ciscoe (a garden-guru) all rolled into one.  I wish everyone had an Aunt Cheryll.

Sometimes I go shopping at my Aunt Cheryll's house.  Not shopping for food (although my boys do that); I go shopping for cute things to put in my house.  Aunt Cheryll bought this cute cabinet at a garage sale for $.75.

I sanded and re-painted it.  It looked adorable, but when I went to put the drawers in they wouldn't fit.  Seems this cute little cabinet had one too many layers of paint on it.  So I started over, this time using paint remover and taking it down to its original coat of paint which happened to be a painting of a cheetah across the front of the doors and a nice cheetah print on the top of the cabinet.  I should have taken a picture...

After scraping off at least 7 coats of paint I repainted again and ended up with this.  The knobs were brass that I spray painted red to match the kitchen.  I also found those at Aunt Cheryll's house.

Aunt Cheryll also found some large plastic planters that she thought would look good on my deck.  I spray painted them "summer squash" yellow and she's right; they do look fabulous on my deck!  We planted carrots and lettuce (or as Trevor calls it "salad") in them.

And just last weekend Aunt Cheryll and I went to over 20 garage sales in the Phinney Ridge neighborhood in North Seattle.  At one of the sales I picked up this kitchen cart originally from IKEA for $15 (retails for $60).  It was a great deal.

With a little help from a quart of paint, coconut oil to season the butcher block with, and some random hooks and rods I had laying around the garage; this is how it looks now.  I love it and I can't imagine how I ever cooked dinner without the extra space.

My Aunt Cheryll is also a great gardener.  Her yard looks like it should be featured in Better Homes and Gardens.  No joke.  In fact, here are some pictures to prove it.

When she mentioned that she was looking to get rid of a large potting bench that she had I immediately said that I wanted it.  After a quick sand and a new coat of green tinted stain I am excited to put it to good use.  The cute red, blue and yellow planters also came from my Aunt Cheryll's house.

So thank you Aunt Cheryll for helping to make my house feel a little bit more like home.  What would I do if I didn't have an Aunt Cheryll?