Refurbishing a crate...

 I have a thing about crates. I cannot resist them. If they're plain I paint logos on them. If they have old writing on already, all the better but this can make them more expensive.

At last weeks flea market I saw a lovely crate that had some age, and writing on the side that said, ''Produce of Sweden.'' Now how perfect would that be for my fantasy Swedish country farmhouse dining room? Quite perfect. Apart from the fact that it also said, ''Pigs Kidneys'' which shattered my romantic dream. I left it there. The font of the ''Produce of Sweden'' wasn't that nice anyway.

Moments later I found this teeny little crate for £2.

I thought I might come up with some lovely font and do my own ''produce of Sweden'' crate that didn't involve pig offal.
So I said to Jason, ''What else do Sweden produce?''
''Volvo'' he said.
Not that helpful.
''Abba!'' he said.

These are two suggestions for words that I will not be painting on a crate. If anyone has any better ideas I would love to hear!

In our dining room we had a very boring old wine rack. I don't know why. We don't really drink wine. But every home needs one right? Somewhere to put those bottles we win at the bottle tombola, until we donate them back the following year anyhow.

But I've had this crate for a while so this is going to be our new wine storage.

I think it came from the flea market. Someone has waxed it. I hate that! Most of the crates on eBay are waxed. Stop doing this crate sellers! It means I can't do a driftwoody paint effect on them!

What also irks me about this crate is that the text on it is quite faint. I thought I'd try to rectify this. The last thing I want to do is make it look brand spanking new, I just want to be able to read it more clearly. I used a permanent marker pen in grey (NOT BLACK) from a stationary shop to go over all the lettering.

(not green either!)

The marker doesn't mind  the wax coating and just brings out the lettering subtly. If you're going to do this you need a fine tipped marker and you should apply really light pressure. Some parts of the crate were really dry and if you press too hard on the pen the ink can bleed over the lines.

Here's a shot of it when I'm half done so you can see the difference...

 It's just a little darker but still has transparent areas...

And here it is in the room...

A lovely new home for the alcohol. I don't even mind it not being Swedish.