The Bluebird Express Rides Again

Thank you to everyone who has wished Josh and I well on our recent home purchase. Luckily we're moved in and have completed most of the construction that coats the house in at least an inch of dust, which I'm apparently allergic to. So in lieu of boring construction pictures, I thought I'd offer up a "best of" post and give you the low down on the transformation of by bike "The Bluebird Express" that Josh and I rehabbed last year and have now brought out of storage.

I bought a 1978 Tyler one speed bike out of Poland for a grand total of $40 from an AmeriCorps member who lived down the street from me:



The bell is what sold me. For weeks Josh had kept murmuring "bring bring!!!" whenever he tried to convince me to buy a bike. Eventually he won.



So a few weeks after I bought it, Josh took it apart while I was away and we stripped most of the finish with sandpaper when I returned:


Then I sprayed it with two coats of a flat gray auto primer:



Then it got three coats of silver:



At some point I realized this was not a good thing to do barefoot. Turns out my feet became an structural part of the porch on N. Winooski Ave:



Then, the color! Baby blue turns out to not just be an awesome color, but also a great spray paint to find in several local paint stores that typically run out of the paint I'm using mid-project. But they were so flush with baby blue I still have extra:



With ten coats of poly and a couple of stickers from Michael's, "the Bluebird Express" was born:



And then we realized we had to put the bike back together:



I even made my bike its own metal face plate:



Viola, the finished product!!!



Not only is my bike awesome, it's super fun to ride around town and it can hold all of my groceries from the farmer's market. Yeay bluebird express! Bring Bring!