Craigslist find!

Ah, Craigslist. There are few things I check for periodically: an armoire for our bedroom (we don't have a closet in that room), a cupboard for our bathroom, and seating for our front porch. Among other things of course...Craigslist is wonderful for window shopping!
I was excited to find this cupboard when I started my search:

After a number of emails back and forth with the seller during the day I decided to drive out after work to pick it up before someone else snatched it up. As he told me, the first one to pick it up gets it. Well by golly, that person was going to be me! :) So I called my dear husband and asked if he would accompany me on a little road trip (about 40 minutes drive from home...hmmm). After all, I couldn't very well go to some strangers house I have been in contact with over email by myself, right?

Turned out the owner is in the process of moving to Canada and has connections to the Detroit Tigers, so I think my husband was hoping we could stay and talk baseball!

Once we got it home I went back to the bathroom and I'm pretty sure the room had shrunk! The piece will fit, but will completely cover the wall to the toilet. The room is so small that I think it will look too crowded. So, I changed my plan, which was accompanied by rolled eyes and sighs by my husband. But he just doesn't have the vision! At that point he gave up trying to understand me and went back to watch the game, telling me to call him if I needed help moving it somewhere. After nearly 10 years of marriage, I think he realizes that there are some things about me he will never understand. Some girls love shoes, and I love vintage furniture! lol Maybe one day I will find the perfect vintage couch to replace the ugly black leather couch from my husbands bachelor days, but even I have to admit it is practical with two kids...much easier to wipe off leather than fabric and I don't care if the kids are crawling all over it. One day though...

So once he left me to my own devises, I grabbed the can of stripper that I used this summer to refinish our front door and went to work. Yes, I am impatient, but I really couldn't wait to see what was under the green paint! It's actually a pretty color green, but isn't the color I wanted for this piece. And the owner said that the unpainted drawer was original to the piece, so I hoped the rest of the piece would be as pretty. I got the paint off the top, wiped it down with mineral spirits and found this:

Gorgeous!!! I was literally doing a happy dance in the middle of the room.

So now I have a plan: I'm going to finish stripping the top and the lip of the piece, then I will add some soft wax to the top to protect and seal the wood (I ordered Fibbes & Sons soft wax from Etsy). The rest of the piece I will paint white and I think some glass knobs would really look better than the white porcelain knobs that are currently on it.

Love the beaded details!!!

Next I need to look at the back of the piece. The panels that are missing seem to simply be a veneer, and I don't think they affect the actual structure of the cabinet. But I need to inspect it more closely to be sure. There are also two small pieces that have come off the bottom right of the cabinet that need to be attached. They aren't broken, just detached, which is good. I think some wood glue will take care of that without a problem. You can see the open spot in the top photo, just look at the bottom edge, just past the cabinet door.

Once it's all done, I think I will use it as a tv cabinet for the front room. We bought a very boring tv stand from the thrift store a year ago for our old tv that has since broken and been replaced by a smaller one. This will raise the height of the tv a bit and there is still plenty of room on top for the small cable box and the Wii console. The cupboard can hold games and dvd's, and the side cubbies can hold coloring books, etc. I wouldn't mind it for some craft supply storage, but at this point it would serve more of an aesthetic purpose, rather than a practical storage purpose...I have too much stuff! lol

So what do you think of my Craigslist find? Would you have jumped on it, or is it too "old-timey" for your taste?