Life on 5th Street: Vintage School Desk Makeover

Last year I came across this vintage desk at a garage sale, but the leg was broken. I sat there for a good 15 minutes trying to decide if I should spend the money and it be broken. I walked away from it and hadn't seen another one--which didn't really bother me too bad, considering we didn't even live in our own house. It would just have to go into storage. BUT fast forward a year we are in our own home and i'm slowly but surely learning my style and remembered that desk. I posted to FB looking for one and within an hour i'd found probably 6. Only one had the decorative cast iron legs so I knew it was the one. I drove to the neighboring town and grabbed it from a super sweet lady.

As you can see though-it needed a little help to get it back to it's former glory, it had a few different coats of paint on it. I sanded the back then my friend told me just use some stripper on it(she'd told me to do it earlier but I thought sanding would be fine.) That sped up the process and i'll probably never not listen to her again when she tells me a shortcut haha!

Can you believe that beauty is under all of that? It is full of dings and scratches--but I love every part of it!

I decided to stain it pretty dark. So I brushed stain on with a foam brush and let it dry for probably 10 minutes and then wiped it off. I only did one coat. It turned out exactly how I hoped it would!

Now it's happy in it's new little home and it fits just perfect! Moral of the story--people of FB have errrything just post looking for it. My friend loved mine so much that she had me help her find another--which we did in literally an hour and it now living with her!

I also found an old church pew. I have big plans for it.