Even better than I pictured

Even better than I pictured

You ever have those ideas that seem kind of crazy, and people doubt you, and then you start to think it might be a really crazy idea, and you start to doubt yourself? Well, I have gone through this whole process with my living room walls. Before we even moved in, about a month ago, I decided I wanted to do a wainscoting of pallets on the bottom half of my living room walls. Pallets are free, I love the rustic look of them, and it would be so much less boring than painting my living room. In that month I have doubted it several times. I have tried to come up with fancier ideas (fancier = money we don’t have to waste). I decided cedar planks would be so much more amazing, and my lowly pallets wouldn’t cut it.

Looks gross huh

Luckily Paul kept me on track. He didn’t doubt me once. He tracked down pallets (remember when he tied them on top of Wonder Car?) and last weekend we had finally collected enough to start on a few walls. The only thing he worried about, was the old ones were cool, but a lot of the wood falls apart when you start sawing at them. They are much more fragile. And the new wood, was easier to work with, but didn’t have the same charm. Luckily I had the solution. I had found the recipe for aging wood on Pintrest, but pintrest has let me down before, so I was doubtful. But we forged ahead anyway. 

You can see them darkening here.
Ones on the left are just done, one
on the right haven't been yet

The recipe I found called for Apple Cider Vinegar, steel wool and a bucket. Let the steel wool soak in the vinegar for a while (I went with overnight). I started putting the mixture on the next day, but it didn’t seem to be aging the wood. I was worried I had messed up, so I got back online. I found a different recipe where they first rubbed coffee or tea on the wood, let it dry, and then applied the vinegar. I’m not that patient, so I dumped coffee grounds into my mixture, and applied again.

 

This is the same pallet as before
Just an hour later. 

Can I just say I am SO IMPRESSED? It worked. My new pine looking pallets, were darkening before my very eyes. And after they dried the smell of vinegar was completely gone. Paul then took the sawzall to them and began cutting the nails to separate the planks. There is a trick to this as well. The saw will cut through the nails easy enough, but it kills the battery MUCH faster if it has to saw through any wood. (Yes a corded sawzall is on our Christmas list). So we took a hammer, and banged on the back of the planks a bit to loosen them. Not too hard, but enough to separate the wood from each other. Then the saw can get in there and slice through the nails.

We have quite the system going now, and I can’t wait to get the rest of the walls finished. We finished one full wall this weekend, and the rest will go up easy enough now that we have a system and an unlimited free supply of pallets (I talked to my maintenance guy at work. They just throw theirs away, and get a ton each month).

See how dark they ended up.
And yes I helped. 

My walls are AMAZING. They turned out so much better than I expected. Mom was worried about my living room being too beige. But the aged pallet wood adds so much warmth. I love it. I told Paul when all our friends see it, they will want it in their house. We will have to charge money to do it, because while it is amazing, it is labor intensive. Which makes it so much better. We are fitting each piece together exactly where it fits best. We have picked out each crooked piece and fit them together with love. So much better than cookie cutter box store wainscoting. 

There is our cute wood stove too. 

We also built a pantry this weekend. I had one from a pallet Paul had made me about a year ago, and we came across one that was the same size for a second one. Add a few shelves, and they are perfect for holding cans. I think we should go into business building these kinds of things. Or maybe I am the only one obsessed. I don’t know.