Farmhouse table turned desk

Hello there! First of all, I must announce the winner of the Wuslu.com giveaway!!(Finally, I know!) Congrats to Reeban at Rejuvenating Trisha Lou! (She went on the Goodwill Shop and Hop with us � how cool!!) Please email Yasmin at yaso_n (at) yahoo (dot) com.

I hope you all had a wonderful weekend! I got a project completed with a little bit of help. Actually�a TON of help. But it was worth it. :)

You may remember my travesty of a desk I showed you a couple of weeks ago. It was a hot mess of mixed colors, woods, textures�just a smokin� hot mess:

I didn�t even finish it, I just knew it was on the road to nowhere. ;)

Then I found a farmhouse table through a friend of a friend and it was everything I was looking for and more�in a table. Vintage looking, the perfect size, beautiful curves, and it had me at $15:

But it was mess as well. WHY can I not find something I don�t have touch? Oh yeah, I love this. ;) Drats.

So I geared up at my local True Value and one day started out by chipping away the little bits of brown paint with a scraper:

I thought it would come right off, but most of it was holding on for dear life. Awesome!

I figured I would give it a once over with my sander to see how much I could get off. Thankfully, I had picked up a lead test at True Value as well, just for this project. I showed you last year how to do a lead test, and whooee, I am SO glad I tested this before I moved forward with any sanding:

Not good.

By the way, pink means lead. RED means LOTS of lead. :)

Fantastic!! (Do you sense the dripping sarcasm yet?)

I highly recommend doing this test any time you�re going to sand anything you even suspect to be vintage or antique. The lead on this table was not in the brown paint, (that was more recent) � it was in a layer I couldn�t even see!

I was so bummed out. My easy project had turned into a total science fair. :) It took about five minutes of staring at the table before I realized I wasn�t going to tackle this one on my own. There are two things that freak me out when it comes to older pieces. One is lead, the other is mold:

And this one had both. :) Double AWESOME!! YES.

So I searched online and found a nearby refinisher who I talked to at length, and then decided to just bite the bullet and take it in. Because I was only having them take it down to bare wood, it was less than half the cost of a total refinishing job.

And the peace of mind (with a three-year-old in our house) was SO worth it. They had to take the whole thing apart to work on it, which was fine because I needed to change the direction of the legs anyway:

(Since my plan was to use it as a desk, I need the legs to go long ways with the table.)

When I first saw the table, I wanted to just poly over it and keep the lovely patina. But when the wood was really cleaned off, it wasn�t in the best shape. My only option was to paint it, so I laid everything out in my workshop on the driveway, and spray primed it all:

Spray primer is a Godsend when I comes to legs and hard to paint pieces! Then I took it all inside and put it back together before finishing it up with a brush.

Because I�m using some blue in the fabrics and paint colors, I decided on a slightly lighter tone of the blue paint I picked out for the room � it�s a True Value color called Soft Hearted and I got it in mixed in Dutch Boy paints.

It�s a lovely light blue, almost grey color:

(It�s hard to see the blue in these pics.) I had never used Dutch Boy before and I loved it! Just the container is enough to make me a fan for life.

Because the table originally had leaves that dropped down, the previous owners reinforced the table and the leaves by using a thick piece of plywood:

Because you could see the edge when it was all put back together, I trimmed it out with with some scrap trim I had in the garage:

I didn�t have enough, so I still have more to do. :)

My plan all along was to take the whole tabletop apart and put it back together, because the wood had separated a bit:

But I kind of fell in love with it as is. When I painted it, I took a toothpick to each gap just to make sure it stayed goop-free. :) I think it shows the character and age of the piece, and I adore it!

I�ve mentioned about a bajillion times how much distressing stresses me OUT! This table was calling out for it though, so I did quite a bit on the legs and along the pretty edges:

And now it�s finally done!:

I know it�s hard to imagine it as I see it in the final room, but it�s gonna be GORG. The walls around the desk will be white (for the most part), and the art will be just beautiful. If you could see inside my head, you�d so be oohing and ahhing right now. ;)

The previous desk was HEAVY, so I have to work on getting those ruts out of the carpet. (I let ice melt on mine and it always works great!)

Now I need a cover for my parson�s chair � anyone out there know how to make one? Helloooo? Anyone? (Remember peeps, I use hemming tape�I�m not a sewer! Much of one anyway.)

You Squeezies know how much I detest cords�so I took another trip to Target for one of those fantastic, honkin� baskets (I returned something from another room just so I could OK it in my head. ;) )

I put the shredder and the computer cords in the basket, and I can easily plug them in when needed. The basket lets everything breathe (even though they won�t be plugged in while in there anyway):

I love, love, LOVE all the space I have!! I can use the computer, craft, whatever. The table is surprisingly even on top, but I may get a piece of glass cut, or cut down some wood and paint it to make a smooth spot for writing.

I still need to get some clear, water-based poly to coat it a couple of times, but otherwise, I�m DONE. It was way worth it to pay for the help. ;)

When I asked the owner of the refinishing shop his guess at the age of the piece, he said it was made in the 1920�s, at the latest. That made me very happy. I love old pieces, and I love bringing them back to life:

And this one has me fired up to get some paint on the walls!! Maybe tomorrow. Or next week. Soon. :)

 

*I was one of the bloggers selected by True Value to work on the DIY Squad. I have been compensated for my time commitment to the program as well as my writing about my experience. I have also been compensated for the materials needed for my DIY project. However, my opinions are entirely my own and I have not been paid to publish positive comments.*