DIY: Spray Painting a Dresser

I get so excited whenever I have a reason to decorate a room. So of course I started brainstorming almost immediately about how I would decorate the nursery. I wanted to get a "head start" while I'm feeling good and can maneuver well. 

I decided (I say I because Tim really doesn't care about decorating) on light grey walls, black furniture, and then an accent color when we find out the gender of the baby (light pink for girl and either yellow or turquoise for a boy). 

I knew I wanted to use a dresser as a changing table, so I got to looking on Craigslist and found a solid wood, well-kept dresser for $40. It belonged to a lady who was about to get married and they were combining households. I was very nervous about attempting to paint furniture, but felt a little bit less stressed since the investment wasn't huge. 

I read tons of tutorials on Pinterest, and finally went to purchase my supplies. There are many tutorials that did not include sanding, but there were a couple flaws on the top of the dresser, so I decided to go ahead with the sanding. I took off all the hardware, then I sanded each piece first with a 150 sand block, then a 220 (finer) sand block. It was easy and didn't take that much time. Next I wiped everything down with a mixture of water and white vinegar. After it dried, I started spraying! When all was said and done, I think I had 6 coats on this baby. I think it was 6 cans of spray paint! I lined the drawers with black/white damask Contact paper (similar to this).

I used Krylon Fusion because it has a good reputation of covering well. (only $3.24/can at Walmart!)

For the hardware, I used Krylon Brushed Nickel (also inexpensive at Walmart)

Here are the results! I am pretty pleased with my first attempt at spray painting a large piece of furniture!

Before:

After: 

Yay for baby's first project being complete :)