Swoon! It's my new shoe cabinet!

You may remember that, a month or so back, I rescued a free cabinet from outside a junk shop up my road. It was dirty (complete with spider corpses) and rain soaked. But it was FREE and exactly what I had been looking for, for ages for glamorous shoe storage purposes!

That's Mr Scribbler's bulging collection on the right.

No really.

The first thing I did was get a nice bowl of warm soapy water and a sponge and I gave the thing a darn good clean. When it was dry, I hoovered up the spider corpses. Then it was sanding time. I didn't want the dark finish - it's too oppressive. And this was when I discovered that sanding is a bitch. A massive bitch. I sanded free hand, then sanded with an electric sander. I sanded until I could sand no more and got the worst of the varnish off. Then I did what any self respecting, if slightly lazy person, would do and said 'fuck it' and started slapping on the paint! (after re-hoovering, wiping down with a damp cloth and letting it all dry again)...

Scratchy, sandy and partially painted...

Then...

Voila!

The finished piece.

Yes, that is a picture of me on the Log Flume at Alton Towers - awesome!

 I went with a nice pale greeny blue (B&Q eggshell in case you're interested) and the light, brightness of it means it feels less imposing than it might otherwise have.

And now...

More importantly...

Here it is STOCKED WITH SHOES! YAY!

For the beady eyed, yes there are plenty of shoes in there that haven't appeared in the shoe challenge yet. I've, er, invested a bit in my shoe collection lately.

It's like my dream. But in real life in my own bedroom. Gosh I'm shallow!

In less shallow news, I am typing this on Friday but have scheduled it for Sunday and, while you're reading this, I'm probably mid way through a 50ish mile sponsored bike ridge for Maggie's Cancer Centres (www.justgiving.com/LlaraGeddes if you're feeling flush!). If you're reading this later on Sunday, I bloody best be finished and well wired into a bath and bottle of rose! Please all cross your fingers that Sunday's weather forecast is wrong and that it doesn't rain heavily and blow a gale.

My favourite price is...

...free! Yes indeed, I am a self confessed bargainista and, while I do splash out from time to time, as a general rule, if it's a bargain, it is more likely to reel me in. So, for ages, I've been blethering to Mr Scribbler about wanting a glass fronted cabinet in which to display/store my unboxed shoes (what else really would I do with it!?) and I keep meaning to check out Gumtree and eBay. I did a while back and there was nothing locally/cheap enough and I keep forgetting to look back. However, today, as we drove home from the train station in the pissing rain, properly pissing rain, I spied a cabinet outside our local random junk shop. On occasion, if they've leave something outside, it's going free and I figured, on account of the aforementioned pissing rain, it may indeed be free - why would you leave something you were selling out in that? So I pestered Mr S and back we headed up the road for a closer look. It was perfect and it was free! I felt like Vintage Vix (constant amazing bargain finds and an awesome house - you should check back her old posts for her house posts if you've not read them)! But it didn't fit in the car - massive bummer. I am a bit of a weakling when it come to the ol' arms and my grip is shit. So that made for an interesting and pathetic stagger (with me having to stop every few steps to readjust my grip and shake my weedy arms) home. Let's not even discuss carrying it up three flights of stairs. However, here it is in it's dark shiny glory.

And, yes it is covered in rain. I didn't just spray it with a hose to add weight to the first part of this post. I have now cleaned it down - it was manky and had a spider's old skin inside it - and have begun sanding. Man, that's a bitch. I'm just thinking whether I know anyone who'll have an electric sander! My plan is to paint it a twee pastel-y duck egg colour to girlie the fuck out of it. T'will be tres chic and macaroon pretty! And look how ornate the feet are! I literally can't believe this was free!

Here's the Elle MacPherson getting her face in my blog post - yup, Top Model just isn't big enough to contain her ego (have you seen it this season?) so she had to get her mug all up in Little Scribbler - even if it is being covered in sanding dust. You're welcome Elle. Then, yes, next to it is Elle Magazine's Runway Edit. Nothing is sacred in my house.

I shall be sure to keep you up to date on my progress with the cabinet and to share pics of it in it's completed shoe filled state! Whether you want to hear about it or not.