A Table Tale

Our troubled tale of a table begins on a dark and stormy night   … okay … it wasn’t stormy, but it was dark. I had been lured by a Craigslist ad and the price of $40 for a dining room table and six chairs.  When I saw the table it wasn’t love at first sight, but it was solid wood, had four leaves, and you couldn’t beat the price.  So I brought it home.  Little did I know what terrors that awaited me! Well maybe not terrors, but definitely stress and frustration!

I first mentioned this table here. My first inclination was to just paint it.  But then I saw a couple of examples like these in blog land and I was smitten. 

Miss Mustard Seed

Simply Inspired Home

I loved the contrast of the wood top with the white painted base and legs.  So that’s what I was going to do.  The problem was I may have known how to paint, but I didn’t know how to refinish.  I had never tried it before.  But really, I thought, how hard can it be?  So I glanced at a couple of online tutorials, read a couple of blogs, and off I went to the hardware store!

I sanded the top coat off (or so I thought) and jumped right in with a brush (the stain can said to use a brush or a rag) and dark walnut stain.  It looked shiny, and you could see the brush marks.  Hmmm, I thought, this doesn’t look right.  I’m quick that way.  So I figured I’d have to let it dry, sand it off, and try again with a rag.  I thought the shine was because it was wet.  So I waited a couple of hours like it said on the can. 

Then I waited a day.  Then another day.  Then another. 

At the end of the week it was still sticky and I sensed it was a bigger problem than I originally thought – like I said, I’m quick that way. So I called a friend who has refinished furniture before.  “Did you make sure you wiped off all the excess stain?” she asked.  Wipe it off?  I was supposed to wipe it off??  I double-checked the can.  Sure enough, that’s what it said.  Guess I just kind of skipped over that part. And the shine?  I didn't get all of the original poly coat off.

So out came the electric sander.  The stain jelled up into little pieces that looked like mouse doo-doo or something equally as appealing. 

I sanded.  And sanded some more.  Finally I gave in and decided I needed to use a stripper.  I had read on a couple of blogs that Citristrip wasn’t as toxic as other strippers, so I tried that.  And it worked, except for a couple of spots where I had to redo.

 

I stained it again, and I made damn sure I wiped off all the excess.

Okay, so the first failure was totally my fault.  But after that I say mysterious forces were at work.  That's my story, and I'm sticking to it!

Apparently there were a bunch of spots with the original finish that I had missed.  Invisible to the eye, but lurking there, waiting to pop out! So once again with the Citra-Strip the electric sander.  I sanded.  And sanded.  And sanded some more.  Parts of the table looked great.  But other parts had strange marks on them, and the more I sanded the more the weird squiggles etc. showed.

I tried putting some stain on one of the spots, thinking since it was lighter than the rest of the wood, the stain may even it out when I put a coat over the whole table.  That didn’t exactly work. 

More sanding.  More Citra-Strip.  But I still ended up with strange spots and areas that wouldn’t take the stain.

I tried again.  I wasn't going to let this table get the best of me!

Finally, it won. I just couldn’t take it any more.  The table beat me.  It beat me bad. And I had to have a dining room table for a meeting I was hosting last week. I gave up.

We pulled it inside and used it for the evening.

So here’s my latest dilemma:  Do I just put on a coat of poly and try to live with it?  I think it would bug me too much. Do I take another chance and strip it down to try again?  Who knows what the table has in store for me next? Or do I just chuck it and start over with a new table? 

I’m still pondering. If any of you experienced refinishers out there have any advice for me, I'd love to hear it! Right now I’m thinking it could come in handy for firewood this winter!

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Giveaway Follow-up

A couple of months ago I had a giveaway to try to increase my followers. Yes -- I used a bribe to get people to follow my new blog and build awareness.  Pitiful. It was basically extortion.  And let me tell you I'm not above doing it again!    Anyway, the prize was a $50 gift certificate to HomeGoods and the winner was Jane from Cottage at the Crossroads.  When I read her comment after randomly picking her entry, she said that the nearest HomeGoods was an hour-and-a-half away. So I offered to exhange the gift certificate for a $50 Visa gift card or something she could use closer to home.  But she wasn't having any of that -- she was willing to drive miles to get a HomeGoods fix!  It turns out she made it a family affair with her, her husband, and her brother and sister in-law making the drive.  Today she's sharing what she bought.  go check it out!

It's not Perfect, but it's our Home -- #1

Pretty much everyone in the decorating/diy blog-world shows photos of their homes.  Since I started this blog four months ago, I've been putting off a house tour for a couple of reasons. For one thing, it seems like every time I think about taking some photos I'll notice that the furniture is dusty, or there are dog nose smears on the windows, or something needs to be picked up. So I'll start cleaning, and by the time I'm done I've either forgotten what it was I started to do, or need to be doing something else!  But really the main reason is I tell myself I should wait until the room is "perfect."  For instance, we need a new sofa in the living room.  The poor thing is just worn out.  The dogs (who aren't supposed to be on it) love to sit on top of the sofa and look out the window anytime they think they can get away with it.  Apparently they get away with it quite a bit, because the back cushions are now scrunched about two inches shorter than they used to be! 

However, today I realized that as far as I'm concerned, our house will never be perfect.  There will always be something I want to do or think needs to be replaced. So I'm starting a series of room views to share with you.  I'll let you know the things I want to do, and when I do them I'll show you a before-and-after.  In the meantime, it may not perfect, but it's our home.  It shelters our family, provides a playground for our dogs and cats, and gives me an unending list of projects! 

The first in this series will be our living room, with the aforementioned sofa.  We have a basic Colonial style house.  You walk into a foyer, and in front of you are the stairs to the upper level.  To the right is the dining room, and to the left is the living room.

When we first moved in every single room had wall paper.  Each room had a different pattern, and the entry and hall had a dark grass cloth.  Because of all of the trees surrounding the house, it's not particularly light, and all of that wall paper just made it look darker.  So the first thing I did when we moved in was pull down all the wall paper, except for the living room.  It had a pretty, soft blue silk paper that I loved and kept. 

See what I mean about the sofa?  To the right of it is a chair I bought from Miss Mustard Seed at the Lucketts Fair, and an old skinny door or window that I found at an antique shop. My guess is it was probably a panel on the side of a larger door.  I love the patina of the old white paint on the wood.  I originally planned to put mirrors in the top, and I may get to that one day!

(Please ignore the fact that you can see the tag on the pillow -- I just noticed it, but I am too lazy to go take another photo!)

To the left of the sofa is an antique buffet that belonged to my mother.  It's been through many iterations over the years.  My mother used to have it in her kitchen.  Since I've had it, it has been an entertainment center, a dining room buffet, an entry console, and now it's a bar.

Here's a close-up of the Fall arrangement I have next to it.

Here's the view continuing to the left.  You can't really see the watercolor above the chair because of the reflection of the lamp, but my Aunt Peggy painted it and gave it to me for Christmas years ago. I have her paintings throughout our house.

You'll notice that the only window treatments I have in this room are cream-colored valances.  Because of the trees and the way the house sits on the lot, it is very private so we don't need drapes.  I wanted to let as much light in as possible, so I had the valances made.

Directly across from the sofa is this wall.  I found the console table at a flea market.

Here's a close-up of a couple of my recent finds -- a $1 shell I found at my favorite thrift shop, and a first edition of Horace Greely's The American Conflict that I found on Craigslist for $25 and bought for my husband who is a big Civil War history buff. The books aren't in pristine shape, but they're pretty cool!

Continuing to the left is this little reading corner. (Again, I was a bad stylist since you can see the cord to the lamp!)  On the wall are a couple of wall pockets.  I used to collect them, and when I had my cottage in Seattle before I got married, I displayed all of them in my office/guest room.  Now I only keep a couple of the special ones out.

There is a set of French doors that lead from the living room to the family room.  Here's a peek:

So that's it for our living room tour.  It's a mixture of new and old, favorite pieces and not-so-favorite pieces!  One of the things I like best about the room is the cream-colored furniture against the blue walls. My "to-dos" for the room in addition to a new sofa are to paint and reupholster a cane French-looking chair I found on Craigslist to compliment the one from MMS, and I'm looking for a swag Chandelier to add in the corner with the old door.  Of course I'll post those projects when they're done, but by then I'll probably have another list of things I want to do to the room!

Have a Seat

If you looked in my garage right now you would think I have a chair fetish.  I have the six chairs that are going to go with my dining room table when its done (still working on it!), plus two additional sets of six chairs, and two occasional chairs.  Hmmmm.... maybe I do have a chair fetish!  Anyway, I found this chair on -- where else -- Craigslist. I bought it for just $10!

I love the fan detail and the scrolls on the arms. 

It was actually in good shape, but I just wanted to update it a bit. So I painted it black.

I recovered the seat first in a light cotton, then I covered that with burlap.  It still looked a bit blah to me though, so I did a couple of stencils on it.

This was the first time I've tried stencils on fabric, but it was quite easy.

 

I have a matching chair, so now I'm trying to decide if I should do a matching one, or sell this one as a one-of-a-kind. What do you think?

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