Thrift Store Treasure

On a random trip to Salvation Army this past spring, I stumbled upon these two cute porcelain owls.  

I know owls are trendy right now in blogland, but I really bought them because I know that Dylan likes owls (and they were only $.99 each !).  They had some good heft to them, so I immediately had the idea to make them bookends for our nursery.  But leaving them as is wasn’t an option…I’m a bit clumsy, so I pretty much assume that I’ll knock stuff over at some point.  These would get broken the first time I reached for a book, not to mention what would happen when our little one becomes mobile.

First I found some 1x4 scraps in our basement, cut them to size, and made two L-shaped pieces that I would later glue the owls to.  To make the L-shaped pieces I made pocket-holes using my Kreg Jig and screwed them together.

After rounding the edges with a handheld sander, I wiped the pieces down and stained them using some “Jacobean” stain we got on clearance at Ace Hardware.  I put the stain on heavily, allowed it time to sink in, wiped off the excess, and put on a second coat.  I haven’t used this stain before, but I really liked the final color.  It was a dark brown without any hint of red, which is hard to find.  Two coats of polyurethane later, I was ready to attach the owls.

The owls were primarily white to begin with, but they had creepy, beady yellow eyes, so I gave them a coat of white spray paint (Rustoleum’s Painter’s Touch White).  To attach the owls to the wooden pieces, I used an epoxy.  After allowing them the afternoon to dry, I put them in the nursery bookshelves.

They look so cute holding up those well-loved children’s books (well-loved at least by myself and my siblings, maybe even more generations!).