horse sense

So. I do love horses – I think when they canter, it’s poetry in motion, they have beautiful form, and they seem like they would be such lovely animals. Everytime I’ve gone near a horse though, I’ve felt inexplicable terror – I don’t know if it’s their huge larger than life size, or their massive chomping teeth, or just my insanity. It could well be the latter.

I tried to get over the fear last year, I really did. We were in India, and I actually touched a horse – not a well bred, trained, locked in a stable horse that couldn’t hurt me, but a wild (albeit skinny) horse that was just roaming a field. I didn’t want to touch it. Sonia made me.

"hey guys, let's make sharon touch the horse!"

I didn’t cope very well.

SO ANYWAY, I’ve decided I must stop being scared of horses this year, so I’m going to make Lys take me to see Murphy, and when back is better, I may even ask for a riding lesson. But to start with I thought I’d surround myself with some reminders of this resolution.

I picked these babies up at the antique store the other day. Ugly as sin, yes, cheap as chips, also. In fact so ugly that S saw them sitting on the sideboard and recoiled. But I loved their shape, and remembered this post by the lovely Young House Love people, and got inspired.

mmm. puke coloured.

Now, there’s a lot of purists out there who say you shouldn’t spray paint things willy-nilly because they could be secretly valuable, etc etc etc. But I’m of the opinion that if I can make something un-ugly, then it’s probably worth it. And whilst we’re at it, can we just have a moment about how fabulous the phrase “willy-nilly” is?

So, whilst S was out in the garden doing manly things like painting, wielding a pick-axe, chainsawing and more, I took a damp cloth and gave them a bit of a clean. I didn’t use any cleaning product because I wanted a clean surface with no residue. Then I got out my can of black gloss spray paint, and off I went. It needed 2 coats (the first coat didn’t cover all the little nooks and crannies), and the finished result is quite gorgeous indeed!

mmm. handsome horsies!

nayyy!

MUCH better! And I’ve decided to pop these black beauties into the office. They look magnificent in front of their backdrop of floral paper.

as a bookend!

pretty!

What do you think? Vast improvement, I say, and cost almost nothing. The spray painting took about 10 minutes per coat, and I let them dry for 2 hours each time. After the 2nd coat dried, I handled them gently, and let them sit inside (it’s cooler so I figured they’d dry better) overnight. And ta-da! This wasn’t a weekend job, it was a breakfast job. Quick and dirty awesomeness.