Facing my addiction

Chair before.....

chair after!

(the distressing looks better in person)

No one is safe from project mania!!

The footboard that we turned into a fabulous headboard!

Hi, my name is Cameron, and I am addicted to home decorating. It has been almost 24 hours since I have painted or reupholstered and already I'm getting antsy and anxious.....

If there was such a thing as home decorators anonymous, I would sooooo be there. In the last few weeks I have painted until my hands feel like they might fall off. I don't know what it is. I always like to have some kind of crafty project going, but lately, I've taken it to new levels. It all started three weeks ago when I decided that the deck on the front of the house and the shutters needed painting. Then I decided we really ought to install window boxes in all the windows. That fun little adventure stretched over two weeks, and it's still not completely done, we've got one window box left to install- trying to drill into brick is much harder than I thought. It was an insane amount of work, but yielded lovely results. I'd take some pictures, but it's raining, and like I said, we still have one window box to go.

But somehow that project started this whole ball of home improvement rolling. The next weekend brought the quest for kitchen chairs. My crappy, cheapo chairs were falling apart, so I decided to go junkin' to find some new ones that I could fix up. Sure, I could just buy normal, finished kitchen chairs that required no work, but where's the fun in that? The finding of the chairs was easy enough- found 'em the minute I walked into my favorite junk shop. And I didn't have any trouble finding the fabric to reupholster the seats either. But the amount of work it has taken to refinish them is insane. I wanted kind of a shabby chic look, so after I spent several hours painting them with three coats of white paint, I took sandpaper and scuffed them all up so they would look old and beat up. One might wonder why I didn't just buy some old beat up chairs to begin with? Well, duh, that would never do. I can't just have any old raggedy chair, they have to be beat up in a certain way! There's a science to this.

I claim no responsibility for the project that snowballed off the chair search. I blame that one entirely on my mother in law. After we found chairs, she mentioned that she had a seen a chest of drawers that might look good in Mason's room and offered to buy it for him. Sweet! But then we started worrying that this nice, new piece might make the rest of his furniture look crappy. Obviously that would never do, so what could she do but buy him a new nightstand and shelves? Which meant that he would need a new headboard. And we would have to paint his bookshelves. And hamper. And install new blinds. And while we found a headboard, it just wasn't quite right, so we decided to use the footboard as a head board and mount it on the wall- after I painted it. You understand right? We had no choice. It simply had to be done. On the upside, it looks fabulous!

See, it's like a drug habit. You try just a little bit, then you need just a little bit more.... then it spirals out of control and the next thing you know you're standing in Lowe's with a cart full of tools and supplies begging the guys at the paint counter to mix just one more color. And if I'm not redecorating, I'm thinking about it. Sometimes thinking about a new project will literally keep me awake at night. I know, I know, it's ridiculous. But I can't help it, it's an addiction!!

But I'm trying to get it under control. I'm nearing the end of project-palooza. All I've got left to do is refinish the kitchen table and reface the kitchen cabinets, and then I'm stopping. I promise. Maybe. Unless the the gussied-up kitchen starts to make the playroom look shabby and tired.....