This dresser was quite the challenge for me! It took me from August until November to strip all layers of paint and varnish off, sand it down, and restain it. The biggest issue that I had with it was I wanted it to be perfect. Every step of the way I was afraid that I would do something and make it less than beautiful. I knew the potential that this dresser had, but I was afraid that I couldn’t bring it out.

This poor dresser has been sitting since November, waiting for the hardware to finish it up. Finally, last Saturday, I spent two hours searching all over the internet for the ‘perfect’ hardware. It shouldn’t be difficult to find, should it? Now, to be fair, I was fighting a lot of sinus issues while doing this so I wasn’t exactly feeling my best. Here are the issues that I ran into while doing this:

1) I didn’t want to spend an arm and a leg on the hardware because I was going to need six handles and three key hole covers.

2) I wanted the hardware to look like it was placed on there right after the dresser was originally built.

3) I have all of that beautiful carving on the front and I didn’t want to pull the attention away from it due to the hardware.

4) I wanted the key hole covers and handles to match so that it looked like they actually were a set.

5) I just wanted to find something that I would be happy with and wouldn’t regret picking.

I’ll let you judge. Here are the final results…

What do you think? Can you tell that the hardware was a recent purchase? Does the hardware overshadow the carving?

I have to admit that I am happy with the results. I think that I have done this dresser justice and that it’s a piece I’m proud to have in my home. This dresser used to belong to my grandma, but I’m not sure what the story was behind it. I don’t know if it was in the family for a long time or if it was a piece that she picked up along the way just because she liked it. My grandma and I weren’t horribly close, though she did make it to every recital and chorus concert that I ever had. I was also the only granddaughter who was named after her. The other day, though, I found myself wishing that she could see this dresser. It sounds silly, but I would like her to see that I’ve taken something she owned and made it into a beautiful piece of furniture. I think that she would be really happy with it, too.

In other house news, Jay and I finally replaced our basement windows.

You can somewhat see what they used to look like in this picture. They were a single pane window that let all kinds of wind through them. Two of them had plastic placed over them to help cut the wind, but it really wasn’t working very well. I also didn’t care for them because if somebody had wanted to break into our house they would have been the perfect way to do it. One pane of glass would be easy to break and the windows are large enough that a person could easily crawl through them.

After we installed the furnace we knew that the next step would be replacing the windows. We called up the guy who tore our bathroom apart for us because he does the glass block windows. He had measured them previously so when we called him up on a Friday he said that he would be over on Monday to install them. Wow!

They turned out really nice! We had him put vents in them so that we can open them in the summer, if we want, and they fit into the openings nicely.

Also, you could tell the difference as soon as you walked down the stairs. In my area of the basement it used to be VERY cold and drafty, but this improved it drastically.

Even the window that has the dryer vent in it turned out really nice!

Jay and I calculated how much we’ve spent on home improvements this year and it’s a bit disturbing. Yet, I think that you can really tell the difference.

The driveway is wonderful in the winter and makes shoveling so much easier! Except… when you break the shovel. Yes, I broke another shovel. I let my temper get the better of me and I used a little too much pressure to try to break apart a clump of icy snow. If you’re keeping track, this is the second shovel that I’ve broken. *sigh* I am no longer allowed to do any unsupervised shoveling.