Getting chalk paint crazy!

I will admit when I graduated from college and moved into my first adultish apartment I had no furniture or money and lived wayyyyyyy too close to an ikea for my own good. I will try to stand by what I've been saying for a while: there is some okayish stuff there if you're smart enough to pick the right products.  I picked the unfinished tarva dressers and rack nightstands because they were affordable (dirt cheap) and could be stained or painted. My master bedroom furniture is American walnut stained with new hardware and I think they look nice. My second bedroom has the same products but the room is a hot mess. One nightstand was stained a terrible color, one was just unfinished and sad and the one dresser looked like it had survived a world war.  What should I do with all this malarkey? Tell me, Pinterest! Ok! Chalk paint and destressing? How hard could that be?

Really freaking hard.

Reader has to remember I think I'm good at chemistry and I'm cheap (house poor but same thing). After many Pinterest links and youtube videos I bump over to Home Depot, pick myself up a box of plaster of Paris, and decide I'm going to risk a nightstand in the name of homemade chalk paint. I had leftover dark blue paint from the master closet and lots of light blue from the bathroom so I was ready to see if my interesting skills were really as stellar as I thought they were. 

I got lucky. First coat of the dark blue went on well. Behr paint works great with a plaster mixture. Know what doesn't? Valspar paint and primer mixed with plaster mixture. Instant chemical reaction.  Paint stiffens up like.. Nah. Not going to go there. But I was so determined to make it work I thinned it out and slapped it on anyway. Lucky for me the paint dried nice in the Carolina heat and I had a pretty cool light blue nightstand. Then came the hard part. I sanded for hours. HOURS. The Valspar top coat was super hard to work with, but I think I finally got it to how I wanted it to look. 

Tip: don't just start painting on your driveway. You add extra future projects. (Note to self, add "reface driveway concrete to master list) 

***Bigger tip: be consistent. Love of my life sanded the last nightstand. One of us sands heavier than the other :/