Now THAT'S Entertainment!

Remember this big brown monstrosity?

It's the entertainment center that used to be in our living room for most of the '90's and a lot of the '00's. 

My first idea was to throw the thing out. It's not the most solid piece of furniture in the world, it looks outdated, and the way it was dark and looming always made the room feel smaller.

But I know my mother, and she doesn't like to throw stuff out. So I immediately came up with Plan B: PAINT!

In a perfect world, I would've spray-painted it myself. But this thing is truly a monstrosity, too awkward to carry too far and only heavy because of its size. I had to have Mr. Cheddar and his brother move it into the hallway just to paint the bedroom; getting it downstairs and into the backyard or garage would've just been cruel. 

So we settled on paint. To be specific: We landed on Valspar's "Subway Tile," since I had a mostly-full can of it leftover from my hallway project.

My sister Kara claimed this project as her own. I supervised on and off, focused mainly on painting Shane's room, but she did a great job. I recommended sanding it down, and Shane helped her with that.

I wish it could've been sanded down more, but oh well. They did a great job and spent a lot of time on it.

After the sanding came the painting. What an endless source of frustration for everyone.

Shane insisted on helping with the painting, too (it was the only reason he'd done any sanding) so he was assigned the skinny paintbrush with directions to paint the trim that faced the front. But he's nine and he's not very thorough, so there were huge, thick paint drips down every side. 

Kara missed these drips since she was painting in other areas, and I missed them because I was spackling. The big ugly drips had dried before anyone had a chance to fix them.

Still, even if it sounds like I'm complaining, I'm not. I took this all in stride (who really expects a nine-year-old to consider paint drips?) and didn't stress. To me, we were painting a piece of furniture that would've gone to the curb otherwise; who wants to stress out about that? 

I tried to teach him how to look out for drips, but the joy had gone out of painting for him by then, so he left the rest of the painting up to Kara. She was thrilled to be left alone with the sole responsibility.

As soon as she was done with the first coat, Kara moved on to the second. She got two coats done that night. She was sick and tired of hunching over the entertainment center to paint, but she was determined to finish the project, you gotta love that drive.

I had been hopeful that two coats of paint would suffice, but it didn't, so Kara and I picked up another can the next day. She got right back to work and ultimately applied two more coats, totaling four.

I'm sure proper sanding and being able to spray-paint would've yielded better results, but I'm still very happy with how this guy was looking after four shiny coats. But we weren't done yet!

Lucy and Bear were respectfully staying out of Shane's room. How cute are they?

After Shane's room was done being painted, we got Mr. Cheddar to haul the entertainment center back into the bedroom, just to free up space in the hall. 

Remember how I said Shane's favorite color is red? Well...

RED BACKS TO THE SHELVES! We bought a can of "Flame" by Valspar for the backs and Kara dutifully applied two coats to the backs of the compartments that actually have backs. (She encountered a bit of a snafu with the first coat, which is what caused the delay in this post.)

Not bad, eh? She had our mum's help with it, since mum is the expert painters-tape-er, and the pop of color looks awesome in the white cabinet.

Most of the shelves will be blocked with books and toys, but at least the red is back there peeking through and adding the extra oomph to his room.

Isn't it pretty? Not bad for something I wanted to throw out, huh?

If this picture looks serene and professional, just know, this is what was happening all around it:

Clutter, a television, an audience of three people and two dogs, and apparently, a beam of light from heaven.

Here it is with my family's ancient TV, a digital converter box, a DVD player, and a VCR. My brother will also alternate hooking up his PS3 and his Wii to the front of the VCR so that it will run through the TV.

(Sorry about the quality of these after pics, Debby the Tropical Storm is blocking all of the natural light today.)

And once the shelves cure up a little more (they're still a little sticky because Florida humidity is relentless) those shelves will hold books, toys, and games.

So what do you think? Not too shabby, huh?