Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Driving Dresser from a Changing Table


My Boy is loving his new dresser!


This dresser started it's life (with our family) when I found it peaking out of the trash area at our student housing complex in California.  I knew if I left it there until Hubby came home to help move it, someone else would claim it, so I moved it by myself across the street and into our apartment.  Since that time we used it for toy storage.  (Here are the best "before" pictures I could come up with.)

When we moved into our current home, though, Boy got his own room.  That means it doesn't work for him to share a dresser with Firecracker anymore, and he needed his own.


The drawers were starting to fall out occassionally because the sides were splitting apart a bit.  It's just laminated particle board, so the whole thing needed to be taken apart and put back together and reinforced with glue.  I figured as long as (my Mom always said those were dangerous words) I was taking the whole thing apart, I might as well paint some roads on it for him.  He's had a love affair with matchbox cars since the first time he held one.

...And while roads are popular at our house, parking lots are even more beloved...

...So we have two layers of parking goodness.
Here's a quick rundown of what I did.

I made the roads approximately the same width as the fabric roads I made a while ago.  I measured it with my quilting ruler (they come in handy for a lot of things.)  One thing I would do differently next time would be to mark and measure all the roads BEFORE taking it apart.  I did it after.  After measuring it, I marked it all with blue painters tape and sanded it with a small electric sander.
Then I put on a coat of primer.  (It probably would have been better to use dark primer, but white was what I had.)
After the primer dried, I put on two coats of black acrylic craft paint.  I let that dry really well and peeled off the tape.  Then I used the painters' tape to mark off the yellow road lines. 
I went over that with two coats yellow acrylic craft paint (or white for the parking lots).  The yellow paint seaped under the tape a bit, so at the end I had to touch up those areas with more black paint using a really tiny brush.

The kids were so anxious to play with it, this is what it looked like by the time I was done nailing the backing on.
The handles took about 3 coats of paint because the color underneath was so dark.  Then I painted "Stop" and "Yield" on them, and were the last thing to be added.
Drive on...

22 comments:

  1. Awesome Polly. I'm sure he loves it!

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  2. That is really Awesome I might have to steal it

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  3. Awesome idea! You can tell by the look on your son's face he loves it. My 17 year old son just walked past and saw this and said he would have loved it when it was a little and run he cars all over it. This would be an fab addition to any little fellas room. Thanks for sharing your creation with us!

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  4. This is totally fabulous!!! What a great find! You're so creative and it's going to be loved sooo much! :D I'm happy to be your newest follower of your delightful blog and I'd love to have you as a friend at FrouFrou Decor! I would also like to invite you to show off your sweet creations each Friday at my Fabulous Friday Finds party! Hope to see you there!
    Hugs,
    ~Terrell @ FrouFrou Decor~

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  5. Whoa... that is SO creative! I love it! Thanks so much for sharing, I'll be linking to this.

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  6. This is so cool and creative. What a lucky boy! I figured you bought the knobs at some specialty store...I should have know you would have created those, too. Nice work!

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  7. Great idea! My boys would have loved this.

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  8. LOVE IT! My son loves his cars too... i step on them and trip on them all over the house. ;)

    Thanks for linking with What little boys are made of.

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  9. This is too fun. I can envision my boys running cars all over this dresser too - even though my boys are now past this and have moved on to real cars and girls. :)

    I am also hosting one of my first linky parties at Becolorful and would love for you to link this up there too.
    Pam

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  10. Hello, I am visiting from Be Colorful. This is the most adorable thing! I can see your son loves it, he looks so cute! You are a GREAT Mom for thinking this up for him.
    Best regards,
    Gloria

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  11. SOOOO freakin' cool!! You are so clever to have thought of that!! Lucky kid!

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  12. Such a unique and clever idea. Thanks for sharing it on Motivated Monday at Becolorful.
    Pam

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  13. I just wanted to stop by and let you know that I linked to this post today from the Home & Garden channel at Craft Gossip. :)

    Your feature will appear in the main Craft Gossip RSS feed, on the main home page and can be found directly here
    http://homeandgarden.craftgossip.com/4-creative-dresser-redos/

    If you would like a "featured by" button, you can grab one here!
    http://homeandgarden.craftgossip.com/grab-a-craft-gossip-button/

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  14. This is a lot of fun. My boys would love it! Thanks for sharing. Good luck on Crafting w/the Stars! :)

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  15. I LOVE this!!!! Seriously, so amazing and creative!!!!!!

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  16. featured this on my blog today

    kimboscrafts.blogspot.com

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  17. I added this on my blog after founding it on Pinterest http://jolynnshobbyshop.blogspot.com/2012/02/tuesday-likes.html

    So creative makes want try this out!

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