Amid my crazy pregnant lady planning and obsessings I decided I wanted a cute dresser for our baby's room. Okay, I didn't just want it, I needed it. I figured the kid was going to have a lot of clothes throughout her life and I wanted a cute place to store them. I also didn't really want to buy a new dresser. Dressers are annoyingly expensive in my opinion. Luckily, we had swiped a dresser from my in-laws when we got married (and by "swiped from my in-laws" I really mean "were graciously given by my in-laws"). It was a good, sturdy dresser with a reasonable amount of storage but it wasn't exactly cute. At least not baby room cute. So hubs and I started talking about painting it. As we talked about borrowing a sander, finding a place to sand it (we lived in a tiny apartment with no good place to really sand something), potentially lugging it to my in-laws to sand, types of paint to use, what color of paint to get, and so on it all seemed like a lot of work.
But then I remembered my furniture refurbing pro of a sister-in-law uses something called chalk paint when she refinishes her garage sale finds. I was pretty sure this magical chalk paint thing didn't need sanding. As I did some more research I learned that chalk paint was incredibly easy to use. You basically just slab on couple coats with a decent paint brush, add a top coat and - voila! You're done! No need to prep the furniture at all.
Now this! Was right up my alley!
Real "chalk paint" is ridiculously expensive to buy and actually a little tricky to find. Luckily, it's really easy to mix up a batch yourself using three easy-to-find ingredients.
DIY Chalk Paint Recipe
Ingredients
DIY Chalk Paint Recipe
Ingredients
- 3 parts latex paint
- 1 part Plaster of Paris
- Water to mix
(For additional chalk paint recipes using calcium carbonate, grout or baking soda check out this post from Salvaged Inspirations)
Step 1:
Mix Plaster of Paris with enough water to make a little paste. I prefer to only mix a little bit of paint up at a time as it can start to thicken over time. I like to mix about 1/3 cup of plaster of paris with a few tablespoons of water.
Step 2:
Stir paint into plaster mixture (1 cup of paint for every 1/3 cup of plaster of paris).
Step 3:
Get painting!
That's it! I was amazed at how easy the paint was to use. It covered the wood easily (which I did nothing to prep) and I only had to do two coats!
Once I was done painting I sealed the furniture with a couple coats of satin polycrylic
and added some new hardware. I relined the drawers using a cheap magenta polka dot wrapping paper I found at Target for about $2 and used this recipe for a paste (although if I were to do it again I might try this recipe instead).
And voila! A cute "new" dresser for my baby girl's room!
***This post contains affiliate links. I make a small profit when you buy products from these links at no additional cost to you***
Mix Plaster of Paris with enough water to make a little paste. I prefer to only mix a little bit of paint up at a time as it can start to thicken over time. I like to mix about 1/3 cup of plaster of paris with a few tablespoons of water.
Step 2:
Stir paint into plaster mixture (1 cup of paint for every 1/3 cup of plaster of paris).
Step 3:
Get painting!
Once I was done painting I sealed the furniture with a couple coats of satin polycrylic
and added some new hardware. I relined the drawers using a cheap magenta polka dot wrapping paper I found at Target for about $2 and used this recipe for a paste (although if I were to do it again I might try this recipe instead).***This post contains affiliate links. I make a small profit when you buy products from these links at no additional cost to you***
(more about that later). If we would have bought the car seat and stroller separately (without coupons, promotions, etc) it would have cost about $360 ($190 for the 
, $170 for the 
). Buying them packaged together in a travel system (without coupons, promotions, etc) costs $280 -- saving you about $80 right off the bat. Another nice convenience and money saver -- with a travel system you can usually click your car seat right into the stroller (great with a sleepy newborn) WITHOUT paying an extra chunk of change for a car seat adaptor. Now I'm not saying you absolutely MUST buy a travel system, just know you'll likely end up paying a bit more if you don't. 
, a 
, heck even a 
was a little too much for us when you add on extra costs like a car seat adaptor) we decided a Chicco was probably our best bet -- not too expensive but still fairly good quality. I'd heard really great things about their KeyFit 30 car seat, too. Other more affordable brands include Britax, Graco, BabyTrend, EvenFlo and Safety 1st.
or the 
is, without a doubt, acts of service. He is an incredibly kind and giving man who shows his love by serving others (especially me). As wonderfully kind as he is, however, he hasn't always had the easiest time identifying and expressing his feelings. This can sometimes pose a problem for a words-of-affirmation-love-languager like me. I know my husband loves me but it's still nice to hear it out loud sometimes, ya know? To help remedy this we decided to start a little tradition we call "I love you today because..." shortly after we got married. It's a quick, simple nightly tradition that makes it easier (for both of us) to express our love and appreciation for each other every day.
you like, cut it out and attach! I just used masking tape to attach mine and it's held just fine. You could also get out the big guns and actually glue (hot glue?) the covers on if you want something more robust than tape. Instead of using scrapbook paper you could use 
