Updating an 80's Dresser

The last few weeks have been busy with preparing for the baby.  After our baby shower (which was so cute, thanks guys!) we found that we had more baby clothes than we knew what to do with.  We received so many cute baby outfits and hand-me-downs from two friends who recently had babies that we definitely needed a dresser for the baby.........woohoo, painting project time!

When my parents came up to visit we scoured the local thrift stores to find a dresser.  We ended up with one that was the same style as one I grew up with in the 80's, the off white paint with gold embellishment.  So, it would definitely be needing a paint job!

Here we have the before picture of the dresser in all it's glory:

I got to work removing the old drawer pulls, roughly sanding all surfaces for better primer adhesion and  then applying the primer.  For the color, I was going to go with leftover Martha Stewart paint in "Peony" that I used on a nightstand already in the room but Brian complained that the color was too much like flesh color, the crayon that you never really used.  Personally I liked the color but sometimes you have to compromise so I found a color that was a little darker that Brian approved of, Dutch Boy's "Nantucket Red".  They didn't have no-VOC paint at Orchard Supply where they carry Dutch Boy paint so we went to Home Depot where they color matched it and mixed it up using Behr Ultra's no-VOC paint.  I also bought my favorite Martha Stewart pulls that I previously used on our dining room corner cabinet and are using on a project still in the works.

So I applied two coats of "Nantucket Red" and attached the handles and we had a new dresser!

The colors not really a red, closer to the "Peony" that I had wanted to use, but Brian says there is a difference and likes the color so that's all that matters ;o)  And it adds a bit of femininity to the room as we had kept most of the decor gender neutral up until this point.  I also added some leftover shelf paper from the dining room corner cabinet to the drawers for a bit of contrasting color:

We still have quite a bit of organizing to do but here is how things are coming along.  We placed the dresser in front of a window with the bunting I made recently.  You can also see the alphabet rug that I fell in love with and had to have :o)  I still need to re-organize the bookshelves with some baby items and find a new home for our old stuff.  One of the neat ideas for the baby shower was to have people sign books instead of cards so the baby has her own library started so I'll be filling the bookshelf with those. 

On the opposite wall is the "flesh colored" night stand with more baby books and the butterflies:

And then we have the crib and all sorts of baby items that need to find a permanent home!

So things are slowly coming along but are still quite a mess, but compared to before things are a lot better!  Hopefully we can get everything done in the next few weeks before the baby comes!