Unexpected Cottage Furniture for Front Porch

Renovation work has been slow for the last couple of weeks. We've either been busy with other things, or sick. The only thing, really, that was accomplished this weekend was shoveling a couple of big loads of dirt into one of our landscaping beds. Last week, I did paint an old ladderback chair red and it turned out great. I may add some antiquing glaze to tone the red down a bit, but we'll see. I have another old chair that needs to be painted red, too, and it will join this one on the front porch.

Also for the front porch, I'm working on painting an old dresser I bought for $25 over a year ago. This little dresser has been floating around our house, looking rather sad, all this time. It's not in the best of shape...it's missing the mirror, has a hole in the back and a smallish plug taken out of one drawer fronts near the bottom, for some reason- and it's a wee bit rickety. It also needs some hardware for the two top drawers. Originally, I thought I'd patch it up and use it for the kidlet's dresser, but it's just not big enough and they don't have room for two. The dresser itself is a little too fancy to be placed elsewhere in the house (if we even had the room) but I think it's so sweet and want to use it somehow. I thought it would warm up the front porch - it along with the red chairs, so I gave it a good coat of primer and have applied one of two coats of exterior semi-gloss paint. Our front porch is covered but I do want to give the dresser a little added protection. I plan on opening the drawers and inserting various, colorful potted plants, and letting ivy, etc. cascade down and around. At least that's the way it looks in my head:) It will go against some lattice work that we have on the porch and wouldn't it be pretty to have some kind of climbing, blooming vine behind it, perhaps clematis? Here is the progress so far..One more coat of semi-gloss to go.




For the next few weeks, I'll be be decluttering the house and storage areas and getting rid of the things we don't need. My closets (which I've been ignoring forever) need serious attention. This is one reason I've been doing these odd little painting jobs - if I'm not going to put an item into our upcoming yard sale, then I need to be using it, even if that means having to spruce it up a bit first.

I came across this photo online last week and can't get it out of my head. Call me crazy, but my heart skips a beat every time I see it. It's not much of anything and needs just a little bit of TLC, but I can imagine stumbling across it out in the middle of the woods, abandoned and calling out to me to live there. And I would! I would grow a veggie garden, and plenty of herbs and flowers, too... When it rained, I would be lulled to sleep by the pitter-patter on the tin roof:) Ahhhhh!