From Trash to Treasure, check!

Well, one of my goals for this summer was to refinish at least one piece of furniture.  I am happy to say that I have just finished with three pieces.  Funny enough two out of the three are recent acquisitions (haha acquisitions, as if they are really valuable) and therefore not on my list of things to do.  So I still have three more things I want to refinish, but for now I'm putting those projects on the back burner.

I got this cute little end table from my mom.  At one point she had started to refinish it but got only so far a sanding the top.  Yea, that's the easiest part of the whole job.  So it stayed like that for years...until now.

Before

Naked shelf
Yes, it was tedious to do the legs.

Fini!
Red mahogany stain, satin polyurethane  

If you had asked a week ago, I wouldn't have had any opinions about polyurethanes, but now I do.  The tried and true way we've always done it is using minwax polyurethane and it works very well.  However, I found that rustoleum makes a really nice satin finish polyurethane.  It goes on milky so you can tell what you've done and where it is too thick.  The final product has a nice finish to it.  I recommend it for your next refinishing job.  It is funny what you learn while doing projects like this.

The second thing I did was a "new" night stand that I bought at a cute little consignment store near my parent's house.  It seems like every time I visit home mom and I take a trip to this store.  I bought the night stand for $25.  It was too cute to resist.  At that point I had already started sanding down the table above so I figured that I would throw this into the mix and before long it would go nicely with my bedroom furniture.  I can't wait to get moved into the new place and see it all together.  

Before

After
Black walnut and red mahogany stains

This last one is my favorite.  It truly went from trash to treasure.  My mom loves to pick up furniture that people put on the side of the road.  Now, I'm not sure if people all over the country do this (I didn't see it often in Kentucky or South Carolina), but around Maynard it happens all the time.  One of the reasons she doesn't want to give up her mini van is because it makes it possible for her to pick up all this good stuff.  I am too shy to stop and pick anything up myself, but for mom it is nothing.  

So one night mom and I were walking Cliffy around the neighborhood.  We happened upon the remains of a yard sale.  There was this little table.  At the time I was a little overwhelmed with the thought of having to fill my new rental house with furniture (not the case anymore as mom just called offering me even more of her stuff), so I figured why not.  We finished our walk and went back with the van.  You can't beat a free table!  Plus this one has so much character.  It just needed a little bit of attention.

Trash

Treasure

When the leaves are open it become a cute little oval table.

I had started sanding down the legs, but quickly realized that would make a seemingly endless job actually endless.  Mr. LeBlanc (the grandfather who lives at the house where I am staying) suggested painting it.  Perfect!  (I just wish he had suggested it before I put any effort into sanding the legs.  Apparently he had the idea all along, but was hesitant to suggest it because he thought it would decrease the value of the table.  Ha well, it was FREE so I'm not worried about that at all!)  Anyway I stained the top because that was easy to sand down and painted the legs creme (or Woodrow Wilson Blush if you want to be exact).  I'm still not sure what function it will serve in the new place, but I do know that it will be pretty where ever it goes.  

So refinishing these three pieces has been my job for the last week.  It was hard, long work, but totally worth it when I look at the finished projects!