I Pledge Allegiance

Hello! I am recovering from the second annual Wade Creek House Flea Market which we held in the garden at the shop yesterday. It was 90 plus degrees outside...which is uber hot here in Oregon. Thank goodness I had my fabulous hubby there with me because I ended up having to go home ill a few hours in. I don't know what it was, but I managed to sleep it off in a few hours time and head back to help him out.

In the few days prior to the sale I had been working on one of those freebie projects I acquired from a friend of mine. Now sometimes even free things aren't really worth the price. Do you know what I mean? I don't know about you, but my blood, sweat and tears are pretty valuable. This is the first project since the "9 lives dresser" that I had to strip to the bare bones. I've always wondered what provokes people to paint layer after layer of drippy, gloppy paint on something. Maybe they think if they apply enough layers the paint will eventually equal the drips? IDK...

I decided from the get go this would be my American Flag dresser. Maybe it was the Olympics and all the patriotism that put me over the edge? This dresser had pretty straight lines and the little drawers on the top seemed to be the perfect width for "the star" section.

As I mentioned, it was rough. So rough in fact that I decided to cover all of the cracks and chunks on the bottom with moulding rather than $100 worth of wood putty. Two coats of primer followed by two coats of white base paint and I was ready to start laying out my stripes. It took me a couple tries to get the math right, but eventually I ended up with a pretty accurate division and used a level to make sure they remained straight from drawer to drawer.

Now it was time for my go-to product, Scotch Blue Tape to make sure all that math wasn't  spoiled by messy lines. I used regular red acrylic paint for the stripes.  It took me three coats to get the true red color. I had some oops paint in the perfect blue that I used to paint the star section.

After the paint was dry it was time for my favorite part...removing the tape! Ta-da...only a few tiny touch ups needed. I roughed up and distressed the edges and accented them with my brown shoe polish. I waxed the whole piece with clear wax, except for the blue sections. I first had to glue on my white wooden stars. I had to get a little creative here though, I didn't want to be known as the American who wrongly depicted her own flag. Fitting 50 stars was a little rough but I did it.

I can't wait to show the finished dresser to the gal I got it from. I'd venture to say if I didn't tell her it was the same piece, she'd never know.




Linking up with these lovely ladies: