Painting and Sealing A Dining Room Table. Pt. 3 Refinishing A Dining Room Table Series

Hello all welcome to the final installment of the Refinishing a Dinning Room Table Series.

Today we'll be covering the painting and sealing process. The type is you use for a high use piece should be durable to be able to withstand a lot of action. Some great paints are Benjamin Moore's Advance(which is what I used) and Sherwin Williams ProClassic. These paints are latex based paints that perform to the standard of an oil based paint. If you really want durability use an oil based paint. Just know that the odor is strong and clean up isn't so easy.

Things you'll need:

Enamel Alkyd paint such as the ones listed above or an enamel based paint

Nylon or horse hair brushes( I recommend and use Purdy brushes)

Polycrylic(topcoat/sealer)

Tarp

Soap and water with a rag for clean up

Paint tray

Floetrol

Before you get started, pour your paint into the tray and mix your Floetrol in with the paint. This will help the paint last longer. It doesn't thin your paint out it just conditions it so that it dries slower and helps you leave less brush and roller marks. For one gallon of paint you will use 8 ounces of Floetrol or one cup. Since I only used a quart of paint I used 2 ounces. Or 4 tablespoons. When in doubt, Google :)

I'm sorry I don't have pictures of me painting. I only have pictures of the finished project. And of the things I used. So here we go!

Purdy 1", 1.5" and 2" Nylon brushes( I love them!!)

Floetrol for paint conditioning action

Minwax Water Based Polycrylic for protection. I'm paranoid so I may slap on an extra coat or two :)

The table. Isn't Melba gorgeous now??

The corner details. The lady who sold this to us was extremely nice and gave us four chair covers. They get the job done ;)

It's almost like looking up someone's skirt isn't it? Wink wink lol.

Upclose shot of the feet.

And the whole thing. This is our just didn't give a crap minimalist approach to Christmas decorating.

We only have enough covers for four chairs. So the ugly step sisters have to stay behind the table. Kind of like putting a bag over your head.

And our little nutcracker that Nana gave to us a few Christmas' back. I love this gift because it came from someone who loved and cared for us very much. And it's unfortunate that she is no longer with us. So every Christmas we place him in a visible space so that we can remember Nana around the holidays :)

If any of you have any questions about refinishing furniture, please don't hesitate to contact me directly. I'd love to hear about your projects and your thoughts on this project. 

Is anyone attempting a refurbishment on their own? Any other DIY painting projects in the future?

Don't forget to see the $40 Table Makeover, Part 1 and Part 2 of the Refinishing a Dining Room Table Series.

Priming A Dining Room Table Pt.2 Refinishing A Dining Room Table Series

Welcome back!! Today we'll be priming a stripped and cleaned dining room table. Over the last two days I've shared with you the before and after pictures of my $40 Dining Room Table Makeover and how to strip and clean your dining room table.

Priming your table can be frustrating. I'm going to share a little secret with you. Are you ready for it?

Go on. Press your ear to the screen and imagine me whispering to you. Too close for comfort? Yeah I thought so ;) But are you ready for the secret? Penetrol.

That's right. This stuff baby.Now, I admit,  I should have used this. But I didn't. I wasn't sure I had to. What is Penetrol you ask? It is a paint conditioner for oil based paint and primer. It allows paints and primers to dry at a slower rate allowing for less brush and roller marks. Which if you look really close at my table, you can see them. 

Items needed:

Oil based primer(it's more durable than latex based). I used Zinsser Cover Stain Primer. But Kilz in the equivalent is fine.

Three-five 3in foam brushes(large areas)

2-3 1in foam brushes(small areas/details)

Tarp

Penetrol( I highly recommend it)

Mineral Oil(clean up for accidental spillage)

Extra fine grit sanding block

Cool thing about foam brushes? You can buy them at your local dollar store for less than a dollar a piece.

Priming doesn't have to be exact because you'll be painting over it. But be sure you sand with an extra fine grit sanding block to smooth out the primer.

More visual learning aids :) I'm just looking our for you. It's ok you can tip me later ;)

I think this is a 2". Definitely use a 3". It makes your life so much easier.

Now, I know that you can have your stain tinted. But When I opened my can of primer, it was this color. I wasn't sure if someone had it tinted and then returned it or what. But I used it anyway. It worked fine. I did one coat for the base and two coats for the table top.

I did not prime the brass here. I'm not sure why. I think I wasn't sure on if I was going to paint it.

Upclose shot of the detail.

The whole piece.

This is one coat of primer, sanded. You can see areas of the wood showing through. The top definitely needed to coats.

Corner detail of the table top

Close up edge detail.

Some areas of the feet and base needed two coats of primer.

One coat on the table top primed and lightly sanded. REMEMBER to sand lightly. You don't want to take off the layer of primer. It's best to sand by hand. An electric sander, even on the lowest setting would be too strong.

And then even taking extreme precautions, your son could accidentally damage your priming job :(

Don't forget to check back in tomorrow for the painting and sealing process!! It's almost done!!!

Prepping and Stripping A Dining Room Table Pt. 1 Refinishing A Dining Room Table Series

Welcome to the Refinishing A Dining Room Table Series. Over the next three days I will be going over how to strip, clean, prime, sand, paint and seal a trestle dining room table. 


In a previous post I shared some before and after pictures of a $40 dining room table find. If you missed it you can find it here. 

Today I'm going to show you how I prepped, stripped and cleaned the table to prepare it for painting.

Things you'll need:

Indoor/outdoor paint and varnish stripper

Plastic scrappers

Horse hair or brass stripping brushes

Medium sanding block

Tarp

Chemical gloves

Goggles

Bucket of warm water

Trisodium Phosphate

Sponge

Towel

I'm a visual learner so i'm incorporating lots of pictures :)

Sanding with Toby. When you prepare a table for stripping, sometimes the piece(if old enough) may have loose polycrylic or polyurethane peeling or flaking off. I sanded it with a medium grit sanding block. My cat thought I was trying to play with him lol. Also DO NOT do with with a new manicure. Mine was ruined.

After sanding, you're going to dust off the extra particles and use a stripper. Citristrip Paint and Varnish Stripper is good for indoor use as well as outdoor use.  I chose this brand because I did this entire process in my dining room. It doesn't smell too bad but make sure that you have tarp laid out and baby gates up to keep children out and to keep the stripper from getting onto the floor. If it does clean it up right away. Also you'll need chemical gloves so as not to damage your skin. And take off your jewelry.

I used a spray stripper because it was the easiest at getting into the crevices on this dining room table base.

The stripper doing it's work. When you're using this shake the can and spray generously. Making sure to get in everywhere you want stripped. It'll take about 15-20 for this brand stripper to do it's job.

After your allotted time expires, you're going to use the flat plastic scraper to scrape off all of the stripper and varnish/paint. And the bristled brush to scrub out all of the little areas. I didn't included pic because my hands/gloves were nasty. Also remember, if you're not sure what the stripper will look like when it's ready, it'll look like a top layer of hardened frosting. How it gets a very hard thin layer on top of it? You know what I'm talking about...cool...ok:)

Ta-da!! Look it's wiped down!! In the wiping process I used shop towels and paper towels. I prefer paper towels because they are thin and you can squish them into crevices better. 

Now I chose to wipe down the table with a dry towel because I wanted to see if I needed to re-strip the table. You don't have to do this, it's an extra step but to me it's worth it. Do you see the blanket? That's all of the scraped off gunk from the trestle base. Nasty huh?

Now, there is still stripper on this base. So here comes the cleaning part. If you leave stripper on your furniture you run the risk of messing up your project. The stain/paint won't adhere well and may not stay on.

In comes Trisodium Phosphate. What's cool about this stuff is it's one of the only cleaners that you can use inside. Pretty much every degreaser I was looking at was for outdoor use. This powder you mix with warm water and it'll clean the stripper right off. It also can be used to clean items in your home. But it may remove the finish on your floors. Just warning yah :) The mix is 1/2 cup with 2 gal of warm water. Mix with your gloved hand and sponge and wipe/scrub clean.

Those darker areas I had to re-strip.

Do you see how much lighter the wood is after I cleaned it? It's amazing.

Nasty, messy work area. Now you see why you need gates, drop cloth/tarp(my suggestion) and other precautions. This is terrible dangerous for children and pets.

He wanted to help out. Luckily, I took this when everything was put away and the trestle base was drying from being cleaned.

Sorry for the bad pic.

And it's all cleaned!! She's a beaut isn't she? At this stage I named her Melba. 

Come back tomorrow for the priming process!!

$40 Make Over

Looking at the title, how many of you thought that I got a make over?? Come on :) Be honest. Well, I didn't but my dining room table did. And no, it's not the one Richard built me. It's a $40 find that came with a set of four chair covers and a huge custom framed picture. Don't worry the picture is getting booted. I'm replacing it with a mirror :) You can always make something better right?

This is no ordinary table. To some of you it might be...shame on you. This thing is at least 40 years old. How perfect is that? It cost me $40. But it comes with two leaves and 6 caned back upholstered chairs. The piece is gorgeous. 

The design process for the piece was a quick one. I knew I wanted to stain the table at first. But after stripping it( a pain in my b-u-t-t!!), I saw that the wood it was built with wouldn't turn out like this gorgeous table that I found on Restoration Hardware. 

Of course it would have been stained in Minwax's Classic Gray Wood Stain. Of course...right?

Well, that just wasn't in the plans for this table. You can always stain darker, never lighter. And I wasn't about to sand this thing with all of it's nooks and crannies all the way down to bare wood. I would have destroyed it.

I'm going to share some before and after's with you all and over the next few days I'm going to share with you how I did the makeover.

A Chair

Some detailing around the chair. Now the chairs haven't been touched. I've only removed the back cushions on two of them. I'm still deciding on if I want to paint the caning or not.

Isn't the caning gorgeous?

Front of the table leaves

The table top. Imagine if I had stained this??

Table edge detail

I love the details of this table. At first when we brought it home, I was going to refinish it and sell it. But then I found out it was a trestle table(something that I have wanted forever) and I just had to keep it. So the homemade Farmhouse table has found a new home on our back deck with the two benches. I hate to see it out there but hey, now we don't have to build a back porch table and benches!

Trestle base

Brass detail on the feet.

The finished prduct. Sorry for the mess. I just applied a coat of Polycrylic to the top of the table.

The color f the table took me a minute to decide on. I picked out four grays. Two from Benjamin Moore and two from Sherwin Williams. I chose Ben Moore because Ace Hardware is right up the street(and the have a 10% military discount). But I chose a completely different color. I chose Pebble Beach and I used Benjamin Moore's Advance after a few email consultations from Kate at Centsational Girl. Thank you so much for your advice, it turned out beautifully!!  I love this gray it's so soft and bright!! I also discovered, after accidentally painting my wall, that it would serve as a good paint color for the kids bathroom. Which I plan to do after The Hubbs goes to sea :) 

And look...a trash bag... I should have edited it out. Oh well. Now you know we're normal.

Look at that detail. It was a PAIN to strip. But I'll do it again :) I decided to paint the brass. I didn't think this color gray with it's blue hue would look good with brass details. Especially if the brass were restored to all it's brassy glory.

Oh look,  bad washed out picture of the top of the table. The lighting in this room is terrible. I need to invest in a new lense. Anniversary gift maybe? Hehehe...

So there it is. The Before and After's. What do you think? Please weigh in. As hard as this was, I really liked doing it. When I was finished I had a sense of accomplishment. It took a total of a week and a half to do. Or about 10-12 hours. If I hadn't of stripped it I think it would have been 4-6 hours.