My Great Find

At the moment Joslyn has this captains bed with a matching dresser... not "girlie" at all, when we bought it I painted it ivory and a light lavender. It's okay, but not exactly what I was looking for.

So every once in awhile I'll cruise Kijiji and FB buy and sell pages and see if there are any good deals on there.

Well, a month or so ago this dresser set caught my eye. I was hoping it was made out of wood... I'm really REALLY not a fan of pressboard. The stuff breaks and is just not quality.

The set was a dresser, desk, and an armoire. As long as it was wood, I wanted it. It was very feminine and my hopes soared...

So I called the lady, and lo and behold, it was solid wood. She said she'd bought it for her daughter and had never refinished it like she had wanted to. I told her I wanted them, and I'd send my husband over (whom I had to convince that I really wanted this set). She told me she'd hold them (because she was located an hour and a half away.

I sent my husband out and when he returned he had my set! :) He told me they were very good quality and we'd gotten a steal of a deal. Very true, looking at the back they are made by Shermag, and they make good stuff. I was, am, so excited!

And then I began sanding them so that I could prime and paint... and found that the wood underneath the paint is gorgeous! So now I have a dilemma. Do I sand them down and prime and paint them because it's easier? Or do I sand them down which is A LOT of work, so far I've worked a total of about two hours and the one piece isn't even half finished, and then clear coat them? What do you think? Here are some pictures... and one picture of part of a sanded piece, not fully finished as you can see...

Desk... (this top piece comes off and it's the only piece I've worked on so far)

Mirror that goes on top of dresser

Dresser

Armoire

Semi-sanded piece (it has some of the sanded paint on it as a powder that I need to wipe off)

So what do you think? Should I go the easy way out and just paint or sand every piece down individually (because I have to see if all of the wood is in this good of shape first) and then clear coat them?