I’m so excited to have one of my bloggy friends here today to share with you guys.  She is AWESOME at furniture transformations and I’m loving as I watch her add personal touches to their new home.  Take it away Miss Cassie…

Hello there!  I am Cassie from Primitive and Proper, where I blog about furniture makeovers (and host a weekly furniture party), my own home projects, and sometimes smaller crafty projects, too.  I am so excited to be guesting on Maryann’s new blog which is about my all time favorite fixer upper tool… paint.  And I am thrilled about this new blog- such a GREAT idea.  A whole blog dedicated to one of my favorite things.  Seriously.  I believe in the magic of a few things which are almost always guaranteed to make everything better…. glitter, brown sugar, whipped cream, and paint.  To me, those items are all fantastical!

Maryann asked me here today to share a little bit about how I de-stress with a few glasses of wine distress my painted pieces.  I know several people love power tools for painting and power tools for distressing.  Call me old fashioned, but I like to paint my furniture with a brush, gasp!  And I like to distress it with some sandpaper and my own two hands.  Why?  Wouldn’t it be easier to just flip the switch and use a sander?  Maybe, but I have tried it and I feel like I have much less control.  Sometimes the machine can take on a mind of its own!

Let’s check out the process on a little mid century nighstand I recently found.  I purchased this little piece at Goodwill last week, and forgive me because I forgot the true before picture.  Picture it with water marks all over it, and you will have a close idea.  So here is a picture of it after it was sanded with my orbital sander, which is the only step in this process that uses a power tool.  I sanded it with 160 grit sandpaper.  You can see all the dust that creates from my lovely handprint on the front.

Once it was sanded, I primed it with Zinnser BIN primer, and then I painted it with two coats of Benjamin Moore’s Wedgewood Gray in Aura paint (my all time favorite paint color!).

Now, I like to use sandpaper that has already been used on my orbital sander to distress.  I like to use that because it is slightly more worn and not as gritty and creates a nice natural look.  I also like to use it because sometimes it gets too worn too use on the sander, but I can keep putting that piece of sandpaper to use this way.  I fold it over a couple times to make it easier for me to handle, like this.

Then I take it in my hand and rub along the edges in a very rapid movement.  Since I was taking these pictures myself, I couldn’t get the exact shot of the movement.  I work in about 6″ segments at a time.
I move from here….

to here….

back and forth several times quickly to produce this look….

I prefer my pieces to look naturally worn, so I tend to lightly distress the edges and details, but I typically do not sand on any flat surfaces.  (Sometimes if I cam going for a more worn look I might).  Here you can see the other details and edges have been sanded.

And finally when that has been done to all edges and details, I apply a coat of finishing paste wax for a low luster finish, and reattach the hardware.  In this case I kept the original hardware because it was so unique!
And then you have a nicely worn piece that has a naturally worn appearance.  And of course if you like this look, you could even sand the edges more if you wanted the distressing to show up a little more, but it’s all up to you!  And that is the beauty of it!  No tools needed- just your hands!

Maryann, than you so much for having me here today to share my tips on distressing!  I hope you will hop over to my blog and visit me soon!

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