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A new kind of shopping therapy.

It’s official.  I will not be running in the Salt Lake Half Marathon in April.  (Sad Face.)  I have a stress fracture in the ball of my left foot and I can hardly run for a mile, let alone 13.1 miles.  (Double Sad Face.)  It sucks.  Last year I had to drop out because of my car accident (curses!) and this year…well, maybe running distance races isn’t in the cards for me.  I suppose I should be content with 5ks.  The problem is I need something to get rid of all this pent-up frustration, anxiety, stress and energy.

I go to yoga.  I breathe correctly (loudly).  But it just doesn’t do it for me.  Don’t get me wrong–I love yoga and I feel great after an hour of pretending I’m all bendy and flexible and stuff.  I won’t stop going to yoga, I just need something else too.

So, I’ve started scouring thrift stores and adopting sad furniture, packing it into Roxy the best I can, and bringing it home to be washed–scoured in some cases–sanded down, repainted, re-stained, refinished and then put to good use in my apartment.  I’m 2 weekends in to this new hobby and I can’t stop.  On Saturday I went to three different thrift stores, purchased a whopping $7.50 worth of previously-loved junk stuff, and now have the rest of the week to plan how, exactly, I will make this junk stuff into something I will truly love.

Mind you, I am still very new at this whole idea; but I’ve got a staple gun and I’m not afraid to use it!  So far I have rescued an old sewing machine table, gutted it, and after getting rid of some very grungy “beige” paint/dirt, it has been put to work as my bedside table.  It should be noted, that until this find came into my life I was using a stack of cardboard boxes to hold my every-increasing pile of bedtime stories.  It wasn’t pretty.  This temporary solution had been “temporary” for four years.  It was definitely time to upgrade.  I still need to find a new knob for the door and install a shelf to hold even more bedtime stories–and as soon as that is completed I’ll be splashing some pics up around here.

This weekend I finished an ottoman–what was once dirrty pink corduroy is now a delicious, creamy-tan suede.  I also found a sturdy, nice-sized wooden tray that just needs a few touch-ups, a hideous lamp with gorgeous lines that needs a new shade and a slick coat of red paint, and a couple of flower pots that I think will end up black with white polka-dots.

Here is what I have learned, so far (I figure Google and YouTube can teach me the rest…like how to paint over an ugly glazed ceramic vase):

• Projects take 2 weekends.  One weekend to find said project and acquire appropriate materials to finish, and another weekend to actually finish the piece.
• There are a lot of scary, irredeemable furniture pieces at thrift stores.
• Sanding off layers of bad paint is surprisingly therapeutic.
• Working up a sweat by using a hack-saw to gut a sewing machine table releases as many endorphins as running 3 miles.  Sold!
• I am AwesomeSauce with a staple gun.  Big things will come of this investment, just you wait and see!
• I am terrible–TERRIBLE!–at taking “before” shots.  As soon as I have the Makeover Candidate in my apartment I can’t help going at it with a scrub brush and some sand paper.  Or, in the case of the ottoman, a overdose of frustration!  That poor little thing had no idea what was coming, within 10 minutes it was completely dismantled and I was sewing up a gorgeous new slipcover.
• Ripping pink corduroy to shreds with your bare hands is like an hour of therapy, an intense yoga session, and a 5k all at the same time.  It was fantastic.

Ya’ll, it is amazing how quickly I became addicted to this whole refurbishing furniture thing.  (And yes, I did just “ya’ll” you.)  I am not an expect in any sense, I just watch a lot of HGTV.  I’ll for sure post pics of the finished projects, and I’ll *try* to remember the “before” pics.  Do you scour thrift store?  Craigs List?  Do you have any secrets or tips you’d like to share?  A favorite project?  Would you ever consider picking up furniture from the side of the road and using it in your home?  (If so, you’re totally hard core and I want to be you when I grow up.)

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