Last week I made a trip to our local Habitat for Humanity Re-Store, which specializes in left-over material home improvement projects (tile, paint, wood, etc.) They recently moved into a larger space so they now have room to sell furniture and home-wares. Hidden among the picture frames and loose wood pieces, I found an amazing wood-framed mirror, with a half-circle, fan embellishment. I payed $8.00 for the mirror.


I have been looking for a mirror to go over my dresser, so this was the perfect find! While I loved the look of the mirror, I didn't quite like the light stain of the wood, so my husband and I decided to try our hand at staining.

We went to our local Ace Hardware to gather some supplies. We bought a small can of Minwax wood stain, for about $3.00, in Red Mahogany we had a variety of sizes of paint brushes at home. We started by sanding the wood frame of the mirror, in order to get a nice, smooth surface for the stain to adhere to.

Rick, sanding away!

Next, we taped the edge of the glass, to make clean-up easier. The stain does come off the glass, if wiped off right away, but if you let if dry, there will be some scraping involved to get if off.

We used painters tape to tape the glass.

We laid out a piece of card board on the grass in our backyard and started staining! In hindsight, we should have worn gloves, but we didn't know that when we started, so we ended up with red hands! If you're going to try staining, I would suggest you invest in some latex gloves so you don't get caught red-handed (Get it??)!

Work in progress.

It took us two days and two coats to reach the color we desired on the wood, so when staining, remember that it's a process and might take longer than you think!

After letting it dry for about twelve hours, we hung it above the dresser!

Look how much darker it is!

A little closer. You can see my cat, Oliver, photo-bombing in the mirror.

It's not perfect, but I think for a first attempt, it is pretty darn good. We didn't sand it enough initially, so the stain didn't adhere to the wood as evenly as we would have likes, but it does give it some character! We learned a lot and for a grand total of about $11.00, I have a beautiful new mirror that I am super proud of!