Auction lots

We live in the Scottish Highlands. We chose to live here to get away from the hussle and bustle of the credit card lifestyle we had in England. We wanted a life of clean air, no mortgage and freedom for our children in relative safety as they grew up and we got that, all of it.
We love living here, despite the naff weather we literally love living here. The only slight niggle we have ever had is the lack of shops, the nearest town is 15 miles away but has no bargain stores or shops where I would have a choice of brushes, paints etc. Homebase is the only DIY store and while it's certainly handy to have in a town with not much else, the choice is limited.
We can drive 2 hours south to Inverness City and we used to do this on a regular basis but now it just seems like a chore that neither of us wants to do so I mostly have to buy online.
You can imagine the joy then when a town store decided to open a weekly auction - hey, it's somewhere to go in a county that has nothing!
Mr CH and I went to the auction a few weeks ago and I bought a wooden trunk to renovate and a side cabinet with strange carvings on it to renovate as a fish tank stand. But this week we went with the intentions of bidding solely on a freezer Mr CH needs to keep the food for the birds of prey in.
Mr CH won the freezer but no one was bidding on the furniture that was that - I mean literally no one!
Well what's a girl to do when furniture such as a Stag cabinet was in danger of ungoing unsold at £2 - buy it of course!
This set the tone though and I ended up buying 5 other pieces for £2 each and I'm not even sure what I can do with them.

This is the Stag sideboard is the only piece that I have a mission for so far.

 I guess I'm going to be scouring Pinterest for ideas for all these items for quite some time.

Auction furniture revival

A new auction place has opened up in town and last week Mr CH and I went along to see what was up for grabs. It was an antiques and jewellery auction and I had my eye on a few pieces of furniture but I'm quite tight fisted and won't go over what I want to pay for an item. Mr CH on the other hand knows what we should pay for something but gets caught in the excitement of a bidding war and doesn't like to back down, a few times I had to tell him no more!

I particularly liked a very large, carved chest of drawers, I had so many ideas running round my head for what I could do to it but when it came to bidding it hit my limit very quickly and while Mr CH would happily have bid until he won, it would have taken some of the pleasure out of the project for me if I knew I'd paid more than I wanted for it.

We did win this lovely wooden trunk though

If I only came away with one thing from the auction this trunk would be the one thing I would want.
It even still has the original top box inside

Thankfully all the metal work is still in situ with just one nail missing from the front lock.
I'm looking forward to transforming this trunk and can't wait to start taking all that dirty ugly canvas off to the lovely wood below.

We also had the winning bid on this lovely solid wood sideboard

Not sure what the carvings are all about but they certainly add some interest.
Initially we didn't realise the unit had drawers as they're very concealed when they're closed. It wasn't until we got it home that I discovered them.

It's not without its damage though - the previous owners obviously removed the original backing and replaced it with some nasty fibre board. They've also mullered the base panels for some reason and haven't done a very good job of making good.

A piece of carving from the bottom back has also been removed, probably to make the side board fit somewhere and it also looks like it used to have a top half attached to it as you can see where something has been removed just at the back of the top.

Two projects I'm looking forward to getting my teeth into. The trunk will be a blanket box for the front room and the sideboard (after much work) will be the new fish tank stand, at 4ft the tank fits on it perfectly.