It's A Mom's World: Pink & White Two-Toned Nightstand Makeover

It's not very often I can say that something turns out the EXACT way I imagine it. But this is one project that did! I knew the look I wanted for this nightstand for my daughter's room. I had everything so beautifully imagined in this little head of mine. And I can happily report, that this is exactly what I wanted.

Here's the nightstand before:

I had purchased this nightstand with a matching dresser from someone local for $50. I was so excited because for the quality and size of this furniture, it was an amazing deal! It had a few scratches and dents, a broken corner, and some kind of weird marks on it that I couldn't tell you what they were. But there's nothing that a coat of paint and some elbow grease can't fix. So I knew I'd have a little bit of work ahead of me.

To get started, I removed all the drawers and using an air compresser, I blew out all the dust and dirt that was laying on the bottom and sides.

I sanded the whole nightstand down with 150 grit sandpaper. I didn't do a lot of sanding because I knew I'd be priming it. So a light sanding worked just fine.

Before I got right into painting, there was some work to be done. I needed to fix that chipped/broken corner. Here's what it looked like:

There was this huge gash of wood missing from the side. So I used some Elmer's wood filler and a plastic scraper to smooth it over and fill in the missing piece. I also filled it any dents or holes that needed a little work, too.

After letting it dry overnight, I sanded it with 100 grit sandpaper, by hand. I didn't want to use my electric sander because I didn't want to risk having the pressure of the sander leaving holes in the wood filler. I sanded off as much excess filler as I could, making sure it was a smooth as I could possibly get it.

Now it was time to prime it!

I used Zinsser Cover Stain Primer in white. I like to use this primer for wood or dark colored furniture. The beauty part of this primer is that there's no sanding required. But for some reason, I just can't seem to skip sanding. Even if it's just a light one, I always seem to maybe make a little more extra work for myself. I have no idea why!

The rollers I used to prime and paint the nightstand was a 4 inch foam roller that I had picked up at Home Depot.

I primed all the drawers first.

Now I know that some people say that primer isn't that important and it doesn't have to be perfect. I kind of agree with that, in a way. It doesn't have to be perfect, but you don't want runs and bubbles that you will see once it's painted. So I do try and take my time and get a nice clean finish, even if it is just primer.

After the drawers were finished, I started on the nightstand.

I like to do two coats of primer whenever I can. Especially when going from dark furniture to light. I wait about 2 hours between coats.

After the two coats were applied, I let it dry overnight. Now it was time to paint!

I used Behr Satin Enamel paint in the color Popped Corn.

I used the 4" foam roller for the big surfaces and a Purdy XL Medium Stiff Nylon brush for the detail and hard to reach spots. You don't want to cheap out on a brush because the last thing you want to be doing is picking out tiny brissles out of your freshly painted surface.

I gave the nightstand and the drawers two coats of paint.

After the paint dried overnight, I gave the middle of each drawer two thin coats of pink paint. The paint I used was by Behr in the color Musical Mist. It was the perfect shade of pink that I wanted. It's a pale pink that I thought would look really clean and nice against the white.

This was actually the sample size that I purchased because I knew the inside of the drawers wouldn't take much paint. The sample cost me around $2.50.

I decided I wanted to change the knobs on the nightstand as well so I went with these crystal like knobs that I had picked up at Home Depot. ( Are you seeing the slight obsession I'm developing when it comes to shopping at Home Depot??)

The last step was to apply a top coat to protect it from any scratches or normal wear and tear. And also for the fact that this was going in a 6 year old's room and Lord knows what she could do to this thing after a while. So for this I used Polycrylic by Minwax. I didn't want to use Polyurethane as I've heard it yellows over time. So I decided to go with this one. I applied it, but only to the top of the nightstand.