White painted furniture and a surprise

I've had a run on bright white furniture lately although these pieces I finished today are not my usual style as I ended up spray painting them in a high gloss. Something quite different to my usual matte French style of furniture painting. I have never been happier to finish a job!

These cube shaped beside table and bench started out life, I'd say, in Bali. They spray stained in a dark, dark orange colour, and then top coated. Unfortunately for me where the slats of the bench meet the cross bars, the top coat wasn't sufficient and despite 2 coats of water based Zinsser primer, orange stain was still bleeding through. - More than bleeding, it was a full on hemorrhage. So I did what the professional say to do and that's spray shellac over the trouble areas. Still no success. I finally cracked out the oil based Zinsser BIN and gave it two more coats. Man I was getting sick of it by this stage.  Two coats of BIN seems to cover most of the bleed through except for one little area - I gave it a third BIN coat and then spray painted it in high gloss lacquer. It turned out beautifully... and I have never been happier to say good bye to a piece of furniture. 

If I had to do this piece again I would have spray primed it with Zinsser BIN from the outset. It probably would have bled a bit still but it would have been fixed more quickly than 7+ coats of primer. I have worked with bleed-through from old mahogany before but it has never been like this. Anyway all's well that ends well. 

The bedsides were much better behaved!  No bleed through - just lots of love from white paint. Lovely and glossy now ready for the beach house. I didn't style them as the paint was only about 6 hours dry and I didn't want to mark them but you get the picture. 

Louise came by this afternoon and picked them all up and was very happy  She said they had nearly thrown the bench out but they are so happy with it white. White paint really can breathe new life into your furniture!

I have two little surprises to share - one really lovely and one kind of funny. The funny one is last night when I was crawling into bed I lay my head on the pillow then crept my hand under the pillow to move it a bit and found this....(terrible late night iPhone photo, I was probably still shaking)

I actually screamed so loudly I woke both the kids...my husband thought it was pretty funny, he had put it there, not my son who I initially thought was responsible. The stupid tarantula is remote control, a present from my brother in law, luckily we've never got it working - not that I have tried too hard. It's scary enough sitting still (it's about the size of an adult's face). 

A much nicer surprise was waiting on my doorstep this morning when I got home from swim squad. Along with two cases of delicious Rockfords Alicante Bouchet we recently ordered, was a little thank you present from Jane at Planet Joy.

Isn't she thoughtful! so pretty in it's summery fabric.  Thank you, Jane.

Now to hide the damn spider somewhere to scare Phil back ... any suggestions?

Fiona xx