A New Old Table

Welcome to True DIY Love, a blog about two people who love DIY almost as much as they love each other, but not nearly as much as they love their dogs.

Recently (about 6 months ago) we acquired some old furniture from Mikey's Aunt and Uncle. Mikey and I both tend to operate under the theory of "If it's free, I'll take it." We had just moved from a 700sqft apartment to a 1220sqft house, so we needed the furniture. One piece we needed was a dinning room table. We have a very small dinning room area and we managed to get a small dinning room table. 

We started by sanding down the table. Our plan of attack was to stain the table top and paint the legs and chairs. This was mainly due to laziness, we could easily sand all of the original stain out of the top of the table with an electric hand sander, but it would have taken far too long to sand the legs and chairs by hand.

First we flipped the table over and covered the bottom edges of the table top with strips of butcher paper. We spray painted the legs and chairs (after removing the cushions). Remember: When spray painting, hold the can about a foot away from the object you are painting. Always start moving the can before pressing the button. Spray a very thin layer over the object first, then go back and spray another thin layer. The first layer should be splotchy and then the second layer should coat almost everything. Let everything dry completely before spraying another coat.

After the spray paint dried, we flipped the table right side up in order to stain the top. It was our first time staining, so it took us a few tries to get it right. We found that an old ripped up T-shirt worked perfectly to get the stain on smoothly. Just remember to work quickly so that the stain dries evenly and always wipe the stain on in the direction of the grain. 

While the stain was drying I reupholstered the cushions with two old dresses that I had hanging in my closet. I cut the dresses up and stretched them over my cushions and fastened them with a staple gun.

Once the stain dried, we sanded down a few corners on both the table and chairs, in order to give it a distressed look. We then added a wax to protect the table from the food and liquids that were bound to fall onto the table if I would be eating there.

So here's the finished project: (Please ignore the mess in my kitchen)