Coffee table is finished

... and I'm officially out of the furniture refinishing business.  I'm TIRED of painting furniture.  One table wouldn't have been so bad, but of course, I had to get carried away and do 3 pieces.

Aside from the 'hunt' to find the tables (several months actually), I started the first one on January 19 and the coffee table was moved into my living room late yesterday (February 8).  Almost 3 weeks.

My coffee table actually has 'sage green' legs - they don't show nearly true color in the photo.  I used a fabric swatch of my drapes and had the paint matched to that.

In case you missed the original post - here's what it looked like when I started... pretty ratty and scratched up - but all wood and quite solid.

So, I sanded... gave it 2 coats of primer (then curing for 7 days), 3 coats of sage green on the legs and skirt, 2 coats of stain on the top, then 3 coats of polyacrylic on the top.  In case you're counting - that's TEN COATS of some sort of paint, with all the waiting/curing time time between each one which means it wasn't a quick project!  I don't understand how they do this kind of stuff so quickly on HGTV.  Oh wait!  It's TV, right?

And, here's the inspiration photo (which did come from HGTV):

And here's what it looks like altogether:

I considered doing the coffee table in yellow (did I mention, I love yellow?), but decided to use the green.  I'm really pleased with the results - but I did get pretty tired of painting stuff.    (note - that's a cat on arm of love seat, and dog sitting on love seat... though he does like his new dog bed.)

Furniture refinishing update

I've added a coffee table to my projects!  And no, not nearly finished with the two end tables.

Here's the coffee table sitting on saw horses ready to be sanded.

I'm pleased with my coffee table find.  It's pretty rough and beat up, but solid wood and I paid practically nothing for it.  Since it's not a family piece I am comfortable doing 'whatever' to it.  Plans are to stain the top and paint the sides and legs - haven't decided on a color yet... something to coordinate with my living room.

I sanded it this morning - and about did myself in doing it.  I didn't get the entire top down to bare wood like I wanted, my back gave out first.  Will get the primer on legs and sides later this afternoon after I recover a bit.  Then it sits for 7 days and I'll be able to work on the tables.

The primer on the tables had to 'cure' for 7 days so the first ones have just been 'sitting' and waiting.  Got the first partial coat on the dog bed table this morning.  Partial because the table is upside down getting the 'underside' of everything painted. Second coat goes on that later today.

These projects were much easier when I was younger :-)

Refinishing furniture

Found a great idea online to create a cute dog bed from an old end table.  FINALLY found the old table - really ratty and beat up, but that's okay.  Actually found a second (very different) table about the same time and decided to use both of them - after all, my love seat does have two ends.

Here's the original idea - I love it.

I still have to choose the fabric for the inside.  Looks like I'd better get busy with that.

Anyway, thought I'd have to wait a bit to start work on them but yesterday turned out to be a pretty, and relatively warm day - so I dashed out to Lowe's, got my supplies and got started.

Sanding was first.  Well, no that's not actually correct.  FINDING the sander was first.  Son finally found it in hubby's shop.  (The shop is such a mess it's difficult to find anything - we've GOT to clean it up - but that's another story.)  My patience level is zip and I'd probably have given up and bought another on... so I'm especially thankful that he found it.  Of course, there was sandpaper galore - hubby always had plenty of everything.

Took the entire project outside as I didn't want fine powdery dust over everything in the garage (the shop is in too big a mess to work in there - oh yeah, think I mentioned that).  So, got the sanding done.  (Yes, I wore a dust mask.)  I hate sanding! 

This is the table as I bought it - you can't really tell, but it's REALLY rough and beat up. Found it on Craigslist for next to nothing.

After sanding - but before cleaning.

This is the second one - has a little drawer in the top and then a file drawer in the bottom.  One can never have too many drawers to put "stuff" in - right?  Got this one at an antique mall - also really cheap.  This picture is before any sanding or anything.

Cleaned all the fine dust off both tables and moved everything back inside (well, son moved everything back inside).  Got the original idea table up on saw horses and applied primer.  Now, this table doesn't look very big, but there's LOTS of wood surface so that took awhile.

It's been drying overnight and now son has switch the tables and I've just finished putting prime on the second one this afternoon. Then they need to cure for 7 days before first coat of paint is applied.

When I was younger, I loved doing this sort of thing... (except the sanding - I always hated that part) but my back is still bothering me from yesterday, and I have body parts that hurt that I'd forgotten I have.  And you know - it's not like I really needed any more furniture in my house.  But, I've been slowly morphing my living room into something different for a couple of years now and I think I'm gonna like these little tables.

It's a good thing I didn't have room to work on both of them at the same time though or I probably wouldn't be able to walk. 

More on this project later...