Two Little Teasers

Because I'm impatient to put up a project post, here are a couple of small makeovers.  I was redoing a chest that was once a radio chest but now has been gutted, and needed some things to organize note-taking tools (paper pad, pens, etc...).  I didn't want to use the typical cup penholder, etc...and am in an "I-love-things-that-are-sparkly-and-pretty" phase.  So I decided to use some different pretty things to help me organize.

First, this is a silver teapot that had been calling my name in a thrift store for a couple of weeks and I finally broke down and coughed up the $1 to buy it.

 As you can see, this little teapot needs a little TLC to make it pretty again.  People my age don't know much about polishing silver, but I saw a post  here by centsationalgirl, (one of my favorite blogs to follow), about a little silver cup that she saved with a little silver polish.  So enter my Mom, saving this little teapot with her silver polish that she let me use.  Thanks, Mom.  Because now this little teapot looks like THIS:

 Perfect?  No, but I'm okay with that.  It's not brand new, and I think it's okay if we know it.  But I love that sparkly little thing.  Do you have any old silver that needs a new life?

Next on the plate is a little thing that might cause some controversy.  This little gold candleholder belonged to my great-grandmother and was given to my Dad in a box full of china and crystal.  My parents are giving the china to my brother, the crystal to me (when I get a place to put it), and I also snagged this little candle holder.  I did not know my great grandmother, so although I don't have a personal connection with her, I do have a lot of respect for objects that have history, especially family history.

However.
I don't own a single gold or brass object besides a few pieces of jewelry.  I'm really a silver or white gold kind of girl.
So...I painted it.  And if I had hand painted it with care, that's one thing, but I didn't even do that.  I spray painted it!  In a moment of unabashed creativity, I spray painted my great-grandmother's candle holder.  I know that might be a crime, to paint my great grandmother's  candle holder, but would you put the insanely gold object in your living room?  If you would, good for you.  The world needs people who love yellow gold.  But I decided that for me, I think that painting an object and making it a pretty little thing in a prominent place in my home is better than preserving the original finish and putting it in a box or the back of a china cabinet where no one ever sees it.  What do you think?  Would you have put your great grandmother's candle holder under the nozzle?

Now, I am a firm believer that you can spray paint just about anything, but you need to get the proper type of spray paint  (Sometime I will post my philosophy on spray paint and the safety precautions I take when I use it, but right now, I just want to show you this mini project).  However, in a pinch, if the object will not undergo much abuse--if it's not really ever going to be touched, as in the case of this candle holder--then regular spray paint will do the job on just about anything.  This candle holder is ceramic, and my paint job is holding up very nicely.  Here are the paints I used:

First, Rustoleum's Iris Blue, part of their American Accents line.  I spray painted the whole thing with this can first.  And THEN for some magic, I found this great Metallic Shimmer paint from Krylon, part of their Fusion line for plastic.  With a light coat, it makes any color metallic with a light silver-like shimmer.  That's amazing! It does, though, make all the colors lean toward silver, so keep that in mind.  It does not totally retain the integrity of the original color.  I sprayed a very light coat of this on top of the blue and gave it a little shimmer, so enhance its great textures. (Ignore the little pieces of hardware, you'll learn about those in a later post).

And this is where they find themselves today.

The Teapot is filled with pens, pencils, and highlighters.  It is joined with the pen and holder from our wedding, a small pad of paper in a crystal dish that is also from my great-grandmother, and all of them are placed on a pretty plate which was a mismatched piece from the box of my great-grandmother's china.  I love it, and it's practical and keeps me organized.  It's almost impossible to let it get messy because it's too pretty.  Oh, and behind it is some basil that needs some water.  I'll get on that...