Tuesday, August 11, 2009

This Box's Life

Long ago, but not so far away someone built a storage box. And many many years ago it came to live in my Grandpa's barn. He painted a hideous color blue and used it to store seemingly important crap. Later, after coming into my Dad's possession it was painted an equally hideous color green and again was used to store a whole lot of crap. In the more recent past I took a shine to it and it ended up in my possession. I stripped the paint, and did a poor job of it evidently (see below) and painted it a lovely white and put it in my bedroom where I proceeded to load it with crap that I just couldn't bear to part with. Then I drug it to Kentucky to stay with me in my very first apartment where I was able to get even more useless crap into the poor box. My Dad loaded it up and brought it home for me after graduation, storing it (with all of my crap in it) until he remembered that it was there and then insisted I 'do whatever I want with it, but get it out of his garage'. By the time I got around to emptying the box of its contents I was pregnant. So I suggested that it be a toy box for the baby. This was a solution that worked in two ways. First, I would have a nice place to store toys for the new baby, and second, it was no longer my problem to deal with the box because it needed some work before it would be a 'toy box grade' chest.

My dad took over from there.

He stripped the white paint, finding layers of blue and green when he did it. Again, I must have done a great job the first time with the paint stripping. He made a few repairs for structural stability and then added some safety hinges specifically used for toy boxes, to keep little fingers from getting smashed. He then painted it a cream color to match a bookshelf that he had made. This just didn't seem to satisfy him. So he asked a friend who is an artist if she would want to paint 'a little something' on the newly refurbished toy box. She agreed.

Dad delivered it on Monday and I couldn't believe what I saw. 'A little something' turned out to be four separate paintings, one on each of the sides of the box, the front and the top. The animals look like, at any moment, they might step off of the side of the box and casually saunter across the living room floor. I can't believe I know someone who is capable of this. Thanks Lynn!!

Lilly putting her toys away. She is now the fourth generation to fill this poor box with crap.

The top.
The front.
Side.
Other side.
No one remembers where it came from, or how much my grandpa paid for it, but we have certainly gotten his money's worth out of this little wooden box.

3 comments:

  1. WOW!!!! Lucky Lilly to have such a beautiful box to keep her toys in. The animals are absolutely amazing.

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  2. The animals are so life-like. Keep all markers, pens and crayons away from Lilly. I'm sure she is truley artist but we don't want her artwork on the toy box.

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  3. This was Wes and Lindsay's toy box when we lived in the farm house, it has come a long way. Great job Lynn!!

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