Simple Dining Room Table Redo

I never thought I’d be any good at painting furniture and have it look good.  Many months ago when I was still working, I bought an old armoire on a marketplace site with the intent of painting it for the upstairs bathroom.  I knew I didn’t want a typical bathroom closet in there since it wasn’t that big, but that we also needed some sort of linen storage in there.  That was one thing we gave up from our old house, large hall closets.  But again, for what we gave up, overall we got more in the new house.  So, when I found this armoire online I thought it was a pretty good deal and I’d refinish it later.  Well, months went on and I hadn’t got to it (for that matter, as I write this, I still haven’t painted it).  It is in the bathroom, I did clean it and add some of the self stick shelf liner, but it’s still the old stained wood.  So, after a few months, I messaged a friend online who was posting regular items for sale that she had painted.  I told her what I was looking for, just a simple grey chalk paint and distressed look and that I already had the piece, just needed it painted.  She came back and said it would be around $200.  WHAT??  That was twice what I had paid for the cabinet – TWICE!!  Now, again, I was working then and didn’t have the time, but I also didn’t want to shell out another $200 to paint it.  Surely I could figure it out, but for the time being, it would just have to wait.  I know the $200 was valid for the time invested to paint it, but I just couldn’t bring myself to spend that. Like many of the projects we took on initially, the room itself was only about 90% complete.  It was functional, it had tile, the walls were painted, but we were still missing a piece of floor trim or two, the door trim needed to be painted, the window trim needed caulked and painted, so what was one more unfinished thing.  I told her thanks and I’d let her know but in the back of my mind, I knew it would just have to sit until I got to it, eventually, maybe, one day….

Fast forward a few more months and it was November.  I worked with someone who’s boyfriend made farmhouse furniture and I wanted a big table for our dining room, so I had given him measurements and he assured me that he could get it done before Christmas. 

I paid a deposit, and we reviewed the look and size a few times, checked in back and forth and as the weeks went by and he continued to assure me that it would be done and delivered by the week before Christmas, yet of course, it didn’t happen.  He had excuse after excuse, but in the end, we ate our Christmas dinner on two folding tables pushed together.  Not long after while searching online, I happened to see a large table posted for around $100. 

I knew it would need refinished, but I couldn’t pass up that deal.  It wasn’t the large round table I wanted, but it wasn’t looking like I was going to get that anyway.  I got my husband to go borrow a trailer and off we went to pick up this table.  I messaged the guy and canceled my order for the farm house table and started on this ‘do it yourself furniture refinishing process’.  This table was huge, and HEAVY!  It took me, my husband and both my parents to carry it inside, but it was cheap and it had character and I was determined to have the farmhouse look to it and to DO IT OURSELVES!  We found out when we got there to pick it up that it had been an old library table at the University of Kentucky and it was actually still stamped on the bottom.  The seven chairs we got with it were also library chairs and most still had the asset tags on it.  So, while only having 7 chairs for a table that would clearly seat 10 was an issue, I figured surely if the University had sold out this furniture on surplus at one point, there had to be more out there and we’d just keep looking for them.  So, after we brought it in the house, we put the large drop cloth underneath and within a few weeks, we started the process of refinishing it.  We had to sand down several coats of polyurethane, varnish or something on the top to get down to the actual wood.  Of course this made a terrible mess in the house, but, there was no way of taking it in and out since it was so big and heavy.  Once we got down to the actual wood on the top, we bought a can of stain, a can of clear poly, a can of white chalk paint, a can of finishing wax and one of the waxing brushes.  It took two coats of stain, then while it said one coat poly, we opted for 3 coats since it was a table and would get some wear and tear.  We did have to lightly sand in between poly coats to get the bubbles out, so a fine grit sand paper is needed, but I was surprised at how well it turned out.  We had actually waited for several days to start the stain and poly process since the boys were going to be gone with my parents for a week or so and we thought the smell would be over powering.  I had only had experience with using poly on floors before and that smells for days, maybe weeks and I knew it was a strong odor I didn’t want the kids around if I could help it, but this wasn’t overpowering and really didn’t have much odor to it at all. 

The chalk paint on the lower half of the table was the easiest part.  No sanding needed!  I did use two coats of the paint, but you can add the second coat pretty quickly since it dries so fast.  Now, when it came to the distressing, my husband doesn’t like that look, so I went pretty minimal on it.  I had watched a couple online videos and one thing that stuck out for me was a woman said the best method for distressing was to focus on areas that would naturally be distressed over time, so, off I went on the corners, table legs and a few spots where the chairs would push in.  Let’s be honest, with two young boys, anything could be distressed at any point!  The areas sanded super easy with a fine grit sandpaper and then I just wiped it down with a damp cloth to get all the dust off before I waxed it.  The wax was also super easy to do.  I chose the regular wax, but you can also get an ‘antiquing wax’ that will give it a yellowish, more rustic look.  Within just a few days we had the table done!  I don’t know why, but after finishing such a large piece, I knew I could do this, I could refinish furniture and it wasn’t hard, it just took the time and effort.  And, it saved A LOT of money! 

Of course, while creating this post, I realized that I do not have a picture of the completed table, so that will be added here soon.

Now, I didn’t do the chairs right away, they needed chalk paint, distressed and waxed, and there was the issue of finding 3 more, but I had been buying wood chairs I saw online to go with my big round table, so we had seating if we needed it for now.  Fast forward nearly a year and here we are in November and I’ve finally started on the dining room chairs!