Today a reader, tomorrow a leader!

I am the biggest bookworm. One of my favorite things to do is read a book that is soon to hit the theaters just so I can compare the storylines. The movie is rarely as good which is one reason I love reading so much. This is an enjoyment I plan to force onto my daughter. I long for the days I can curl up with her while reading "The Secret Garden." Right now she just likes to eat the pages which means we will stick with the cardboard books. In hopes of making reading something she loves as much as I do, books will be everywhere. Especially in her bedroom which leads us to our next DIY!

I knew I wanted to make a great book display so again, I headed to Pintrest for book storage ideas. I wanted to keep it simple and cheap. The real star of the show here are the books. I really just needed something sweet and simple to display them on.

To be honest, I feel a little silly even blogging about this project because there is so little to it but none the less it was a DIY and incredibly time consuming.

I started off at the greatest place on earth, IKEA! Oh! How I love me some Ikea. I stumbled across these spice racks. These were a perfect find for me because they were unfinished which are great to paint and they are SUPER affordable! They were only $3.99 each! This allowed me to buy 10 of them.

I considered leaving them the way they were but again, my OCD took over and I decided they didn't blend well enough with her room design. I busted out my paint brushes and my Martha Stewart "Medallion" tinted glaze.

I laid out an old shower curtain liner that I was going to toss anyway and went to work. To be honest, I felt like I was part of a labor camp. If you have ever purchased anything from Ikea, you know their items come in thousands of pieces! Luckily, these shelves did not come in a thousand pieces, only four BUT! I bought ten shelves. I painted over 40 pieces of wood, 2 coats, each side. It was time consuming.

 

 

I swear this glaze NEVER dries. I was having to wait at least 12 hours between coats and there were still some sticky spots. This may have been because it was glaze and possibly not the intended purpose. Either way...NEVER DRIES. When it finally did dry the color was beautiful! It was not an overwhelming gold. It was very close to the original wood color but was enhanced and has a sweet glisten to it. My favorite part was that it still maintained wood grain features.

Hanging them was a nightmare and we measured and moved nails around a million times. Eventually we landed on "good enough" and this was our finished product. I ended up painting one too many because we only had room for nine.

Until next time...

 

Bear Hugs,

 

Angie