Through a Glass, Darkly

Once upon a time, I was given this cabinet.

It is not really my style. We used it in our bathroom and then we used it in our guest bedroom. But it didn’t really match any of our stuff. It’s a nice size and it’s well-made, so of course I wanted to keep it, but I always kind of kept it in the background. And then we moved into this house and Mike wanted to use it in our hall and I really didn’t want that cabinet to be the first thing that people saw when they walked in the door. So I decided to paint it. Buying this house has made me brave/crazy. It has made me believe maybe I can try to do these things. So I pestered Melissa about crackle glazes and I pestered Alisa about using some of her wall paint and I pestered Mike about my crafting abilities. And then we were at Lowe’s and I went to the bathroom and when I came back Mike was standing in front of the crackle glazes. And he made me read the directions and he made me buy it. There was no turning back. Also, he is mean. (Well, you know, spoiler, it turned out okay, so he’s in the clear. This time.)

So, first, I painted it Alisa’s brown. This is called Chocolate Kiss. Alisa’s walls are this color. Maybe you can see them after she moves in tomorrow. (Don’t tell her I’m blogging right now. I am supposed to be cleaning out the closet in her room.)

And then I let it dry overnight. There is no picture of me waiting. I think that I made dinner and then Mike and I went to church and I went for a run and we helped our neighbor with his science fair project. You can just imagine all of that. Then I put the crackle glaze on. There’s no picture of that, either. It was just like the brown cabinet, except more shiny.

And then, two hours later, I started with the white paint. You have to use flat paint, which we already had because we were going to use it on our ceilings. Bad news, it doesn’t match our ceilings exactly. So we have this can of white paint that we can’t really use. Which worked out really well for me.

I learned a few things, like you want a pretty light coat because otherwise it cracks a lot and then slides down the side. That is okay. It was my first try. Also, next time I would probably use a roller. It said a brush or a roller was fine, but I think I would go the other route. But, like I said, I didn’t know. And I am actually pretty pleased with how it came out.

I still need to buy knobs. I’m thinking ceramic knobs since it is kind of old-fashioned. Alisa has recommended some Anthropologie knobs (we get our own Anthropologie next month, yay!), but if you have a recommendation as well, I will be glad to hear it. Here is a close-up shot, and, yes, I should have switched lenses on the camera, but I just didn’t want to.

I am sure you could have done better, but I am still learning these things, so this is a good first effort. I spend a lot of time saying that I cannot do crafty things so it was nice to try and have the finished project be something I am not ashamed of. I suppose there is a life lesson there, if you are into those sorts of things. Something about spending your energy living and trying new things rather than talking about how you can’t do stuff. Feel free to learn something like that from this story. In fact, I would love it if you found this story instructive. I am too busy thinking about how this was probably a fluke and I will screw up the next thing to learn any life lessons like that.

Also, I have lots of glaze left. If you have something you want to crackle (or screw up), I am your woman.