My mom collects stuff.  A LOT OF STUFF.  The worst part is she will find stuff (garage sales, vacant houses, estate sales, the side of the damn road), and have no use for it, so she will just stuff it in a shed somewhere.  For years we have battled over her "antiques."  I don’t like them.  Still don’t.  However, some of the stuff I love, the stuff I classify as vintage and funky rather then old and junky.  We have battled because she is terrified to die because GASP I might not keep all of her treasures stored in their various sheds.  I’m kind of a believer that if you have something it should be SEEN!

Anyway, the point.  A few weeks back I was putzing around the garage at the office and saw my great grandmas old desk.  Hmmm.  That would look awesome in Codi’s room.  So I casually mentioned to my mom that I was stealing it.  While I was taking that I noticed a great red tin bucket thingy.  PERFECT for storing toys in Codi’s room (dammit I need to take pictures for ya’ll).  While I was in the office informing her that I was going to steal her stuff my eye caught this beautiful old vanity she had just sitting in our office holding pictures.  Add that to the list of things I’m going to steal today.  Off it went, up in my room and boy does it look great.

Fast forward to yesterday when I was in the shed getting out the next size up of clothes for Codi.  I was also in the process of cleaning out my garage and in all of my mania I got the bright idea to put a small desk in my living room so I had a place to sit and play while keeping my main desk with important info hidden in the other room.  My cousin and I come up with the idea to take the desk from Codi’s room and put it there.  I spy a cute dresser in the back of the shed and decide it will be mine.  I will put that in Codi’s room.  But then my mom mentions that if I look a little further her old desk happened to be in there to.  So I grabbed both things, took them home and wondered what to do.  First my cousin and I painted the back of the desk since it was just particle board.  Then I grabbed a cute table runner, some other crap and set it all up.  Here is the finished product.

I chose not to repaint the front because I liked all the scratches and dings.  Isn’t it purdy!

After that I still had this old dresser (I think the proper term is blanket chest) to deal with.  I was sitting at my new desk when it dawned on me.  I knew right where it would go.  I scrubbed it up and here it is.

Isn’t it beautiful?  I love the color and it really brightens up the whole entire room.  Plus it is tall enough that I can put out a couple pieces of my china, and the vintage green cordials that I might have also stolen from my mom.  And I can finally stick out my favorite multi colored wine glasses. You can also see some of the amazing roses I cut out in my front yard, more of my flowers to come.

My other cousin Lisa teased me last night that I was going to end up loving my moms old junk.  While I will admit I do love certain pieces I can’t say I’m going to love it all.  For now, my little blanket chest does a terrific job of storing my china and lookin fancy in my dining room!

In case you are wondering, here is my dining room table before.

Doesn’t it look a bajillion times better now?  Yes, I know, I’m a marvelous decorator! 

Of course, the thing that my china used to be in happens to be an entertainment center.  Since I couldn’t leave well enough alone I decided that needed to be moved into the man room.  Why?  Because the current entertainment has shelves in it that are wide open in back.  That means little Codi has a blast climbing through the shelves knocking the PS3 around and playing with all of the cords behind the TV.  I decided the perfect way to put the kibosh on that was to put a totally closed entertainment center in it’s place I AM A GODDAMN GENIUS!  It looks extra pretty and I am so proud of my decorating today.