It's the FINAL COUNTDOWN *dun na na na, dun na na na na*

#28

After this post, there are only THREE left to do.. and technically my post on the 31st will be announcing the winner of my giveaway so there is only TWO more blog posts I have to come up with.  YAY!!!

Well I finished the box.  It is slightly more amazing then last time.  Some of you know the story, and others may not.  Basically I bought the plain wooden box and painted all the edges a Antique White which turned out to be a darkish cream colour and then glued the paper on, and then distressed with brown ink.  The colours don't show up too well on the camera but all three colours/designs clashed and I hated it!  So here is the before.

And then came the not so fun part.  Getting it all off.  Hello lactic acid in the arms!!

The cream paint was THICK.  I did SO many coats of the stuff.  It started like this..

And I sanded it down to this...

It's hard to see the difference but I pretty much got it back to the original wood.  I did this to all the painted parts of the box.  So the rim around the top (in the picture), the underside of the lid, the interior of the box, and the trim around the outside of the box.  It took forever.

Then it was time to spray paint!  Luckily for me the sun was shining nice and bright and it only took about 10 mins for each coat to dry.  So it was all done in about 30 mins.

But there was already a dilema.  I used cheap and nasty spray paint and on the trip upstairs I managed to chip paint off in three places.  I immediately felt discouraged, but got over it quickly and came up with some solutions.  Next was glueing the paper down.  Last time I just cut the paper to size, put PVA on the wood and stuck the paper on top.  This time I wanted to seal the paper in so it couldn't be water damaged.  So I put PVA over the top aswell.  As I stuck down each piece of paper, I used my hairdryer to dry the glue before putting on the next piece.  This made the process 10 times faster, but the sound of the hairdryer going for about 2 hours gave me a headache (which isn't hard to do).  But I just ignored it because I was determined to finish the darn box!

The paper rippled.  I did my best to smooth it but in the end decided to get over it and pick my battles.  This was a battle I didn't have the patience to deal with.  I'm glad I ignored it too, cause in the end you can hardly see it.

Next came some sanding in random spots, distressing with black ink and a sponge, and then a coat of glitter paint to seal it all (so there is no more white paint being chipped off!) to finish it off.  I did this on the underside of the lid, the trim on the lid...

...the interior of the box, and then the bottom trim of the box.  Then I glittered the rest of the box and dryed it.  And I ended up with this!

But I wasn't done yet.. I still needed a knob on top.  I thought that I'd love a glass or clear plastic knob, but when I went to Bunnings this afternoon, I quickly discovered it wasn't going to happen.  I could have ventured to craft stores to find the exact knob I was looking for, but I felt sick, weak and hungry and decided to just get this handle..

It's a kitchen one, but I like it.  There were SO many to choose from but this one was my absolute favourite.  Now all I need to do is wait for hubby to attach it.  I'm not game to use his brand new manly power drill yet.  I know how to use them.  It's just his is new and he probably doesn't want ME to use it hehe.  But isn't it SO MUCH BETTER now!!  Yay!!  I'm so glad it turned out this time :)

All this fuss is for this little angel..

Who loves vegemite :)

Next on the list to get done before our trip in TWO WEEKS (woohoo) is for my nephew.  I need to paint Thomas the Tank Engine characters onto these 4 wooden train cut outs I bought.  Then I'll make it into a garland to put in his bedroom.  My nephew loves many things.  Thomas & Buzz being probably the main two, closely followed by being a Kangaroo carrying his Joey.

I'm thinking of making him a pouch and tail next year.  He loves to dress up and use his imagination.

Well that's all from me for the day.  Thank you all for the lovely comments you leave on my blog every day.  It is so nice to be appreciated and to get to know all of you and what you get up to in your spare moments.

Friday tomorrow!! YIPEE!!

Until then...