A "New" Buffet Table- Brought Back to Life

Happy New Year, everyone!

I really hope you had a great Christmas break and hopefully are looking forward to 2017. The past year seriously flew by and just like that, a new year begins. 
 
It has been a long while since I have been able to browse a thrift store for a piece of furniture that was just waiting to be brought back to life. Finally, a couple of weeks ago, I was able to check out a local thrift store that I love with 2 of my kids in tow. While browsing the furniture section, I spotted a pretty sizable buffet table in the back behind some other furniture. I quickly tried to move some furniture around to get to it. I wanted to make sure the doors opened and closed properly and to see if it was even a project that would be doable for me to complete. 
And of course, there was the price tag that caught my attention. It was priced at $18! What?!

Funny thing was, I didn't buy it that day. There was no way I was going to be able to get it into our car all by myself. So I went home and told my husband about it. :) He was pretty willing to go with me to look at it the next day and help me load it in the car if we were to buy it. I think the price tag helped him make that quick decision. ;)

So we took the kiddos and went back the next day. I was also able to "haggle" a little and get the price down to $15. I was pretty excited about that and once the lady told me she would sell it to me for $15, that was it- we quickly bought it! 

Thankfully, a friend of ours who lives not too far from this thrift store let us borrow her truck!!! Yay!!  That helped a ton because this piece was a beast! It's very heavy and sturdy- made in the early 70's. After we bought it, there happened to be a young man who was dropping off some miscellaneous items and offered to help us load the buffet into the truck. That was awesome! We did take the drawers out to help lighten the load a little bit. 

So here are some photos I took (once we got it home) of the work that needed to be done to restore this piece:

It clearly needed some help. There were parts missing and areas that needed to be sanded and caulked. The tough part, however, was all the cleaning this thing needed because you could tell it had sat for a while. There were spider webs, spiders, and even rodent droppings. Yuck! It definitely took some time and elbow grease to get it cleaned up before I could even paint it and bring it into the house. 

I did prime it first with KILZ- that stuff is amazing, by the way, for things like this.

And here is what she looks like now after being painted and decorated a bit.

I love how the artwork my husband bought me last year really stands out on this buffet table!

This baby has great storage!! We have been using it to store all of our games.

The top drawer is one of my favorites. It came with these wooden boards that made 6 different storage spaces. Perfect for little items to be held- like cards and yo-yo's. ;)

I kept the knobs, so they are original to the piece. They were just cleaned up a bit though. 

I'm so happy we got to rescue it! This buffet table had been sitting for a long time, like I mentioned earlier, and just really needed to be cleaned up and brought back to life. I don't know why it makes me sad when I see things like that- I mean, it's just a piece of furniture, right? But, I know that it had great potential and am so glad we were able to get it and put it to use in our home! We love it so much!