A Little Table Saved

I've had sort of a rough week. I have one of those vacuum cleaners dogs that like to occasionally get into the trash

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and this time it was trouble! My little Bishon began to get sick on Wednesday, and on Thursday when I took him to the vet, she told me he was going to need surgery! Being the angel that she is, she stayed after hours and did the 3 hour surgery. Once they cut into his stomach and intestines, they found a stopper from a sippy cup, a few unidentified's, a piece of a trash bag, and some thread...isn't dog food enough?? She was able to remove everything and he came home on Saturday :-) She saved his life! He's doing well and hopefully we will never have to go through that again!!

So moving along....I have been working on a lot of things this week, but wanted to just show you quickly a little table that my mother-in-law gave me. I used this table over the holidays to display my beautiful Christmas tree! Who would have known under that drop cloth was this beauty!

 I painted it using Old White and Graphite.

No longer needs a drop cloth!
Hope everyone is have a great week! I also want to let you know that I will be guest posting over at Family Ever After Saturday night! Rachel has an AMAZING blog, head on over there if you'd like to see what I did with this bench:

As always, I love to hear what you think and if your not already one of my awesome followers, would love it if you'd stay!!

Linking up:

The Shabby Creek Cottage

DIY by Design

Miss Mustard Seed

Family Ever After

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Dining Room Finished and SOLD!

Right before our move I decided to start refinishing my dining room (post here), but wasn't able to finish it before the move and it went into storage. Well in the mist of our move, my brother and sister-in-law were redoing their kitchen and dining room. My sister-in-law had seen the pictures on my blog and decided that it would be perfect for their newly remodeled home. So it got a "sold" sign on it and I had a lot of work to still do. So, Saturday it was delivered to there place and off to work I went. Before we moved I had finished painting the table and the hutch, and 4 out of 6 chairs. I still had to sand EVERYTHING, except the table top, and put a top coat on. After sanding everything smooth I distressed the black so the the brown would show through to compliment the top and on the part that came out too light, in a pinch I used brown shoe polish (which worked great and then hand waxed all of the pieces with Minwax finishing paste wax. The squares in the chairs and base of the table were a killer, but in the end it was SO worth it!! The sheen is beautiful. I feel lucky that family members chose it so I can still see it :-)

reminder

 before:

AFTER

I have a confession...I still only have 4 out of the 6 chairs done, but they will be done soon

I would love to hear what you think!

Thanks for stopping by!!

Linking up at:

Somewhat Simple

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FINALLY BACK TO WORK!!!! AN ANTIQUE PEDESTAL TABLE MAKEOVER

I know that it has been over a month since I have posted anything, but for those of you who follow me, you know that we were moving. Well I won't bore you with the details (at least not in this post) but it couldn't have gone (and this is putting it mildly) WORSE!! So from the time that we moved from our last house to the house we are in, I had to put all of my treasures in storage, UGH!!! I couldn't do any work.....and it drove me CRAZY!!

Well, we moved into our house a couple of weeks ago, and before I could start on any fun work, I painted our bedroom, and gave the kitchen cabinets a makeover (I'll post on that soon...along with the ups and downs of that project). Yesterday I felt alive again, doing what I love....redoing furniture!!

I found this amazing pedestal table a few months back for $30. We were still in the process of packing but I couldn't pass it up. It had a terrible paint job, white paint slapped on and maybe a little glaze....but not good.

I know it doesn't look bad, but up close it was rough

LOVE THE CLAW FEET!

I didn't manage to take any pictures of the process, but I'll explain what I did step by step and bore you with some after pics ;-)

The first thing I did was stripped the top of the table using Klean-strip Stripper. It works great! You brush it on, wait about 20 minutes or so and it sort of bubbles up. Then you scrape it off. It's kind of messy, but much easier than sanding off the old finish. It took me a couple of times using the stripper to get of the paint and the old finish, but once that was done I sanded it smooth with my circular sander.

I stained the top with 2 coats of Minwax Dark Walnut (which is my fav!) sanding in between coat with steel wool. I used Minwax wipe on Poly for the top coat. I did 2 coats also sanding with steel wool.

Then for the base of the table, I couldn't wait to try the DIY chalk paint that I read about on Sherry's blog from No Minimalist Here (post seen here). I used a sample pot of Behr Ultra Spartan Stone in flat, and like Sherry's instructions, used 2/3 paint and mixed in 1/3 Plaster of Paris. The consistency was thick so I just added a little water. Shook it up and was ready to paint! It went on kinda gritty, but went on very evenly and the were no brush marks ;-). Oh, before I painted, I gave the table a good cleaning and the paint I used has primer mixed in, so I think it will hold up well. I used 2 coats of paint sanding between coats and it sanded SO smooth! The Plaster of Paris did change the color a bit once I sanded it, but luckily I liked it either way. I read that for some people it lightened the color, but in my case it darkened the color a little.

I didn't distress much, but just as read in some of her comments that said the paint can come off chippy.....it can, so be careful when sanding.

I waxed the entire table with Minwax finishing paste wax, and love the sheen and the feel of it! I'm not really sure if you are supposed to wax over wipe on poly but I did anyway, and it turned out great. I know know for sure that you don't have to.

I haven't use ASCP, and I am sure that the DIY chalk paint doesn't compare, but I have to say....I LOVE how the DIY chalk paint turned out compared to plain paint. I seems much smoother and was so easy to work with. I would say that if you are going to finish pieces that are waxed or have a polyurethane finish you should continue to take the necessary prep steps to ensure a long lasting finish.

I still can't wait to try ASCP....but a BIG thanks to Sherry @ No Minimalist Here for coming up with a secondary chalk paint technique!!

So after WEEKS of not blogging or taking pictures I went a bit crazy with the after pictures. I hope you enjoy!

One of my favorite things on the table is the picture of my Grandmother when she was young. It's a beautiful picture, and I miss her

linking up with these awesome Friday parties:

Miss Mustard Seed

French Country Cottage 

At The Picket Fence

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Dining room update

So what started as a project (you can see the beginning here) I thought that I could finish by today (what was I thinking??) has turned into one of those projects that have proven to be one that I should have maybe have waited till the move was over, uhhhh! I have most of it finished already (3 days, not bad) but I'm soooo tired now! Here is how the progress is going....

a reminder of the before:

I put 2 coats of Minwax Dark Walnut on the top...

I can't believe this is what was under that old finish!

followed by 4 coats of wipe on poly....

2 coats of black suede paint on the skirt of the table and the base...

You can't even tell that a chunk of the leg was missing!!

While that dried, I tackled the hutch. I first removed the hardware and took off the doors. The picture is after only one coat of paint, although since I have put 2 coats on, just haven't taken a picture of that yet. I'll post when I have the doors and everything put back on.

This is a picture to show how lazy I am by not taping ;-)
It comes right off with a razor blade!

I still have to paint the chairs, but it's been so cold and with the baby it's been difficult to find that much time away to tackle them....so I decided to redo the seats in the meantime, see what I mean about a small project that just keeps growing??

The first seemed very boring and I have had this fabric for a couple of
months now just waiting to find something to use it on! What's even better is that
it is outdoor fabric that will hold up great with the 3 kids!!

I think that this fabric will be great with the chairs painted black!

I know it would have made more sense to keep the table apart and in the garage till we move next month, but how could I admire it then??

So my husband reluctantly helped me bring it in and put it back together :-)

I've been trying very hard to take a picture that makes it look as good as it does in person, but for some reason, I JUST CAN'T.....so you get a lot of them

I've added a coat of poly on the base and it looks much better.
I still have a couple more coats to do till it's complete

Oh, and I think that the deglosser has worked great! I was able to destress the edges and the sanding didn't take off all the paint! So, in my opinion....a success!!

My next post will be of the finished dining room, hopefully it will be soon!

Have a great weekend, and thanks for stopping by!

Would love to hear what you think!

linking up to:

Feathered Nest Friday

Furniture feature friday

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