Monday, June 27, 2011

Birthday Weekend Fun


Today's my 36th birthday.

We went out to dinner with friends on Saturday which was exactly what I wanted. Just something low-key and fun with fun people.

Afterwards, we came home and had my favorite birthday staple, Carvel Ice Cream cake. Mmmmmmmmmmmmmm....

Sadly, there aren't any Carvel's near us, so you have to settle for one from the grocery store. To me, that's like having to get your Krispy Kreme at the Mobil Gas station as opposed to being able to go into a store. But it was better than NO Carvel ice cream cake.

We had a hard time finding a babysitter since our go-to-neighborhood-babysitting-teenager is in Chile for a month. WHATEV'S!! Fortunately, one of our friends who came out to dinner with us had a friend visiting from out of town who was totally into babysitting for us, so we lucked out.

The funniest thing that happened over the weekend was that I ordered Pizza for the babysitter and Little G to have while we were out and my husband was supposed to pick it up. It was a 'Sardinia' from a local restaurant and it is covered in caramelized onions and is fan-FREAKING-tastic. But I failed to convey the order properly to my husband and he headed out to our normal pizza place to go pick it up. And strangely enough, when he said he was there to pick up a pizza for fill-in-last-name-here, the girl behind the counter said, 'ok' and handed him a pizza with onions on it so he left and brought it home. Of course the onions were raw, so I was annoyed at the restaurant for getting it wrong and was none the wiser until HOURS later when it came up that my husband had gone to the local pizza joint and not the local Italian restaurant to pick up the pizza.

Oops.

I did call the restaurant and apologize just to make sure we weren't going to be blacklisted or anything for stranding a pizza there and all is good. Phew. I know you were worried.

The other fun thing I did this weekend was traipse up to Beverly, MA to go look at and pick up a dresser I saw on Craigslist. Looks like this:

It is going to go in Little G's big-boy room once I'm all done making it more fun. The current plan is to do a reverse stencil on it of a big pirate ship so that the majority of the dresser is white, but the areas of the pirate ship show through with the wood grain. We'll see if I'm able to pull that off or not. In the meantime I need to figure out a way to make the drawers slide out a bit more easily since it IS going in a toddler's room.

Any ideas on how to make it easier to open? Or is that the big elephant in the room of all re-purposed furniture...you can make it look nice but functionally they all suck?

8 comments:

  1. Happy birthday! I have no advice on the drawer (since I am a complete klutz when it comes to all things home improvement) but I hope that you have one memorable, fantastic birthday!

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  2. That dresser is gorgeous!! Sure you want to paint it? (PS - Happy Birthday, again!) (PPS- Carvel is made of win (& cookies!))

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  3. Two options on the dresser: wax or oil the current track or replace them.

    I'm betting they're pretty typical wood tracks and the part of the drawer that slides on them is also wood. Try soap first and see if they just need a little smoothness.

    BUT... if that doesn't work, you can replace them, either with metal tracks in the exact same place (be careful to check depth dimensions lest the drawer then not fit) or along the sides.

    Certainly the first option is easier.

    Happy Birthday!

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  4. What a great idea for the dresser! I can't wait to see how it turns out.

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  5. Happy Birthday from Germany!!!

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  6. Happy Birthday!!! Can't wait to see the dresser makeover :)

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  7. I'd be lying if I didn't tell you that the thought of paint on that dresser kills me a little, though I know it will look perfectly adorable. Steve and I scoured CL in our Boston days for that style furniture, we still have a credenza and hutch that we use as a bar. A girlfriend and I wrestled both pieces into my Element while the two women selling it mocked us (they posted the WRONG measurements, I take little blame). Happy happy belated birthday to you!

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  8. That dresser is gorgeous. I think the stencil idea will look really cute on it too. Normally I'd be all OMG DONT PAINT THAT WOOD!, but it's for a little boy's room, and I don't think that's exactly little boy style! Anyway, Marisa covered the tracks. Since you're painting it anyway, I'd suggest removing the existing handles, filling their holes with wood-putty, and installing handles in the center of the drawers. Otherwise this looks like an awfully big dresser for Little G to reach across and grab both handles (when he gets old enough to fish out his own clothes). Heck, I'd probably relocate the handles on it even just for me--just because it seems like it would open easier with handles in the middle.

    Happy birthday!! Sorry about your pizza blooper; the caramelized onion pizza sounds amazing. That's one of my favorite pizza toppings lately and I rarely get it. Yummmm.

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