It was my mom that sparked my interest in stained glass windows.  She has excellent taste and has been my inspiration in my own decorating. I love that her style is so sophisticated and classic.  She has always been ahead of the trends and I’ve called her so many times to ask for advice when decorating my own home.

Some years ago, my mom came home with a beautiful stained-glass window. It was so elegant and pretty and as soon as I saw it I loved it.  I had never seen a window like that before.  The window craze had not happened yet.  NO one was putting old windows in their houses.  In fact, I think shows like Fixer Upper made putting old windows in your house cool, but my mom was working with old windows way before Fixer Upper ever aired.

That beautiful window still sits in my mom’s dining room and let me tell you, if she ever got rid of it I would take that window in a hot second.

My obsession with windows hasn’t stopped. I should go back and count all the blogs that I’ve talked about old windows. There is quite a few.   Because of this I’m always on the lookout for old stained-glass windows.  When I see something reasonable I pick it up—even if I have no clue what I’m going to do with it.

That certainly was the case with my last project. Time wise it’s been the longest project my husband and I have ever worked on.  It took us almost 2 years to finish.

So, two years ago I was at the flea market in Nashville and I found a pair of beautiful matching stained-glass windows.  The first thing that came to mind was to make those windows into a cabinet.  After a little bargaining we took those beautiful windows home.   I wanted to get started on our project right away, but that didn’t happen.  The very next month I found out I was pregnant and then my morning sickness hit so bad I could barely stand for weeks.  Right about the time I was getting over my morning sickness and starting my second trimester, my husband deployed.  He wouldn’t be back until about 3 weeks from my due date.  By the time he got back I gave birth to our son 11 days early.  As many of you know, after you have a baby you don’t do much else but take care of your new little one.  It’s like life stands still for just a little bit.

Fast forward 10 months.  My husband and I finally feel like we can do more and we after about 2 years  we get to build the cabinet I had dreamed up!   The whole process took about a month but when we got done with the finished project I was so so happy and excited.  I finally got my stained-glass window cabinet!  Check out our pictures below.

First thing we had to do was build the body of the cabinet.  A lot of work time and energy went into making sure the windows fit perfectly into their box.

We picked out pre-made legs for the cabinet. Something elegant but sturdy.

Then it was time to sand, paint and prime the windows and the cabinet body.

After we added a little chalk paint on the windows I began to sand it down a little to give it a little more texture.

Time to fit them back into the cabinet. Perfect fit!

We found these unique henges to finish our cabinet up.  I wanted the feel of the cabinet to look antique so this was perfect.

And there you go!  2 years in the making but worth the wait!

You could do this too!  Rethink how you can use a old window sitting in your house!