Table Facelift

I won’t go as far to say that my table got a full makeover, but she did get quite the facelift.

Still need to get around to doing something with my roadkill rescue chair…

If you recall in this post I said I had been meaning to get around to fixing her up.

This table was my dining room table before it was my craft table, and my in-law’s dining room table before it was my dining room table. Basically, she’s been around. If you know what I mean.

Her in the first rental on move in day. (I put the legs on backward when I put it together then haha)

My craft room in my last house.

Looking at these pics it’s hard to believe how much my taste/style has changed since then. But style does evolve and I’m sure a year from now I’ll be thinking the same thing about my current decorations.

I had been toying with the idea of painting her a really bold fun color after seeing these inspiration pictures.

via

via

(Still crushing on the all white…)

via

However, after seeing Katie Bower’s Table Makeover, I decided to keep it simple and classy (for now anyway).

Katie’s Masterpiece

I didn’t do a good job of taking before pictures of just the table, but there’s been enough before pictures of it so I didn’t think it was necessary. I’m sure you’ve seen one just like it at a garage sale or thrift store. Just begging for a makeover.

I basically followed all of Katie’s steps for the facelift so I’m not gonna do a tutorial. I’m really good at being lazy and not reinventing the wheel.

I sanded with my power sander! I used another one too for the first sanding and it was sooo loud. I was the only one making noise in my neighborhood. It had a high pitched squeal and sounded like a chainsaw at the same time. It was awesome. And Remi got covered in sanding dust. I mean seriously Rem. Who stands under a table while it’s being sanded? Hmm?

After sanding I wiped it down real good and opened the box to my compressor for the first time so I could blow off the dust with my high powered air sprayer.

Fail.

Seriously, who just has oil laying around for a compressor? Unless you’re my Dad?

Ugh.

Plan B, wipe, wipe, wipe some more with a clean cloth.

 

Then I got to staining.

Oh, like my makeshift lifters?

It went on Super Dark and I was really excited.

Until….

…I wiped it off.

Seriously? The stain did not take like I was hoping it would. I mean it was darker yes, but not dark like Katie B’s turned out. I’m guessing that means I didn’t sand well enough? Well I wasn’t about to drag it back outside and re-sand it.

So after waiting the 4 hours like the instructions said between coats, I put on the next coat and left it on even longer.

Only for it to come out looking the same.

Double ugh.

I let the stain dry real good all the next day then put on the first coat of oil-based Polyurethane. (Which did a little magic and made it seem darker)

That stuff stinks. I wouldn’t recommend doing it inside. And the only reason I did is because the table is super heavy for one person and it was already hard enough to get it in and out to sand it, and once I poly’d it I wouldn’t be able to turn it on it’s side to bring it back in, so inside painting it was.

After it dried, 24 hours later, I sanded it with In-Between-Coats sandpaper. Then I put the second and last coat of poly on and let it dry another 24 hours. I am so impatient and it was so hard to wait for all this proper drying time, but this table gets a lot of use and I wanted to make sure it holds up in the future.

During times when I was waiting on drying I also painted the legs with two new coats of fresh white.

“Lieutenant Dan, you got new legs!”

Name that movie.

After 4 days of patiently waiting for everything to be done and living with my most used room in disarray, it’s all done.

Again, it’s not nearly as dark as I wanted, but I think it has a cool rustic look about it that’s perfectly imperfect. And it looks a lot cleaner and more polished than before.

Ugh, I hate pesky cords. Seeing this pic makes me need to wrangle those things up.

Always Mr. Happy

And because everyone loves a before and after side-by-side.

 

What do you think? An improvement? I’m definitely loving it!