Cleaning and (re-)Conditioning Curbside Cache

I just love Spring cleaning!!!! It's such a fabulous time of year! Oh, wait a minute - no, I didn't mean that I personally love to Spring clean. No way! I just love it when others do. Wonderful things are tossed to the curb as people discard their unwanted items!

The Hubby was elated when he spotted a lady and her young son carrying an old chest and dresser (complete with mirror) to the curb the other day. She happily told him she had purchased a brand new bedroom suite and was giddy with the thought of getting the old set out of her home. It worked out perfectly. The Hubby giddily loaded it into our van.

It had been painted brown (easy to deal with) but someone had glued linoleum floor tiles to the tops. The set now looks like this:

After scraping off the tiles, removing the sticky residue and giving it a good sanding, various kinds of wood was revealed in the construction. You can see a green Poplar on this top, with a kind of white Poplar at the bottom of the picture. Oak was used in some of the drawers. Other than having to remove the linoleum, these pieces proved to be in pretty good shape. Some minor sanding on the drawers corrected some warping that created problems in opening and closing a couple of them: We'll get it all ready for painting and then this set will be as good, maybe better than, new! The "after" photos will be posted later!

You've all seen those black ugly (yet functional) metal mailboxes that everyone once used. I find them curbside all the time. Anyway, here's one I just finished - it's no longer black and no longer functional (as far as the post office is concerned). It's now pinked-up and blinged-out and can be used to hold bills, family notes to one another, washcloths, etc. Closeup of the flower. It grew a button with a vintage picture of a little girl on it.

If you get a chance, check out my Etsy sales (in the sidebar) and EBAY ITEMS. We have a talking deer listed on Ebay but also made a video of him singing: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ON1Z2iel9GU (Beware of Tasha's screeching in the background)

Have a blessed week and happy Spring cleaning!