Running & Wine-ing: tropical depression maggie

I'm pretty good at finishing any project I start. Actually, I'm very good. I'm so good that I get impatient if I can't do everything RIGHTNOW. Waiting for paint to dry so I can move on the the next step is tedious.

Scot has been in Las Vegas again for work for the past 2.5 weeks and I got bored. So I decided to redecorate. Well, sort of. I didn't have any ideas about what exactly I wanted to do, so I took his (very roomy when the seats are folded down) vehicle over to the Antique Store Of Fabulousness to browse. I really don't remember what it was I had in mind that I was kinda-sorta looking for, but I found a nasty looking headboard in the back of a pile at the back of the store. It was a yellow-y, multi-textured mix of fake wood, rattan, and bamboo and it was calling me desperately for help. So I took it home and made it beautiful! More on that in a second.

With ideas for my new headboard (which would find a new home in guest room #2) swirling around in my head, I sighed in sadness staring at the (America's Next Top Model reference coming up!) sheer drecktitude that was what we'd taken to calling "the Maggie Room" because it housed the random bits of furniture I brought with me when I moved in. "The Maggie Room," at best, could be called the "Tropical Depression Room." Old palm tree bedspread, random vintage-y tropical posters (which I heart very much), and a sad looking paper mache parrot my grandparents brought back from Acapulco like 20 years ago. His name is Pablo and after I dusted him off and hung him back up we're both much happier.

I started off with the headboard and over the next week I'd replaced the bedspread, cleaned out the junk, and fashioned a curtain to hide the shelves of the "Random Bookshelf Of Shame" which held anything that I couldn't bear to part with but couldn't find a home for either.

Here's the run down for the headboard- The only place I had to paint it was if I leaned it against the rickety fence surrounding my garden. Keeping careful not to spray paint my bell peppers, I covered it with a coat of primer, followed an hour or so later by several coats of shiny black paint. It was simple and striking. And for some weird reason the black paint dusted off right on my hands whenever I touched it the next evening. I really don't know why this happened (if you know, please enlighten me) but I found a can of clear gloss enamel from when I did Chandy ('memba her???) so a couple coats of that sealed it up. Because this is a sort-of surprise for Scot, I wanted to finish it up before he gets home tomorrow but there was no way in this lifetime I could (or wanted to bother with) attach the headboard to the frame by myself. So I took some of the pavers we had left over from when the guys did the porch and stacked them behind the frame to sit the headboard on. It's kind of precariously perched back there but since no one sleeps in that bed anyway I think it's okay. BTW, consider yourself warned and if you come visit me you are responsible for telling me to tell Scot to put your bed together so you don't wind up with a concussion in the middle of the night. I'm good at delegating like that, I just need a reminder.

Room Makeover:
Headboard: $35
Primer/Paint: $8
New Bedspread: $42
Fabric and tension rods for bookshelf: $9
TOTAL for NEW guest room: $94! Not bad if I say so myself.

Enjoy :)

TROPICAL DEPRESSION BEFORE