Refinished Dining Room Table and Chairs

My dining room table and chairs set is finally complete! I started sanding the table in May! But could not decide on chairs and then fabric for the chairs! I am SOO happy with how it turned out!

I blogged about refinishing the table previously, you can view it here!

After I was done sanding my table, I realized there was no way I would have the patience to refinish the chairs, so I was in search of "new" chairs that I could use instead. I found these lovely chairs on Craig's List for $15 a piece. They started off SOO ugly!!!!





I was afraid to remove the cushion to see what was there! I gave these chairs several coats of spray paint. I did spray prime these before using about 8 cans of Rustoleaum Heirloom White.


So ugly!!!


The hold up, was I was not able to figure out what fabric to use to upholster the chairs!! Below are a few fun patterns / prints I enjoyed!


I went to the store thinking that I wanted to do gray or gray and yellow, and these were my only choices! I do really like these prints.


My newly upholstered chair! And I realize I did not take any pictures of the upholstery part! It was SOOOO easy!!


My finished chair and finished table! I LOVE IT!!

Ugly chair turned cute chair

Every August 14, college students move out of their old college apartments and into their new apartments, so this year we participated in "hippie Christmas" as its called by some, and drove around the campus area and picked up a few free things. We got 2 chairs and I finally got around to fixing it up! Here is the before with the torn fabric.


I spray painted the chair with a Krylon gray spray paint! No pictures of this step, since its pretty straight forward!!

I then upholstered the front and back sections of the chair, again, pretty easy! I have never used cording before, so that was a new challenge for me. But it was actually pretty easy. I used the cording that was already in the chair and worked my way around the outside of the chair, saving the corners for last. That seemed to work out for me.



I stapled close to the edge and pulled it tight.

Attaching the front and back to the chair took a little longer than I thought since I could not find the right screws for it. But once I found the correct screws it went together very easily.

The finished chair!



I am going to use this for my little man's booster seat since our dinning room chairs are upholstered and this will be easier to clean up.

This free chair turned out pretty nice!

Playroom Chalk Wall

I am finally finished with my chalk wall in my son's playroom!! I painted a house on the playroom wall with Rustoleum chalk board paint in 3 different colors! When we moved in there was a small wooden piece on this wall covering our sewer clean-out valve. So I replaced this with a "door".

I started with the deep blue Restoleum chalk board paint. Here you can see the wooden board covering the sewer clean-out.



After 3 coats, I taped off the roof line, and painted the house green, again with 3 coats.


I had 2 pieces of MDF cut from Home Depot for the back of the door, and a door that opens - since my son LOVES to open and close things! I painted both pieces of MDF with Rustoleum Moonstruck.


I then taped off the roof line and chimney and painted it with Rustoleum Moonstruck chalk board paint. I spent a significant time measuring our the roof lines and the chimney and used a level to make sure everything was straight!

Done with the chalk paint!

Painting my outside door, I decided to add trim to the door, which I found at the Home Depot. I could not decide what color to paint the door. At first I was going to make it a chalk board again, but I could not decide on the color. So it has a few coats of paint on it!


I was very excited when I found the new Martha Stewart crafts at Michael's and the magnetic paint!! I was a bit skeptical about it at first. I liked that it was water based and did not smell! Compared to other magnetic paint I have seen! I used a plastic knife to stir it, since its really thick!


I ended up giving the board 3 coats of the magnetic paint.


My first coat I put on way too thick! As I said I was skeptical about it, so I thought a thicker coat would be better! But nope, the thick coat cracked. So highly recommend thin coats!!!

I also did not wait long enough for my thick layer to dry, so it smudged a bit. After my first bad coat, I waited much longer to put on my 2nd and 3rd coats.



After 24 hours I then applied a Martha Stewart paint in Habenero, after testing the paint out to see if it really worked. And to my surprise it works!!!

Do my finished chalk board wall, with a magnetic door!

I am so excited that the magnetic paint worked! I loved that it was easy to work with, and did not smell bad!

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Table Refinishing Project

We inherited a solid oak table from my husband's grandma which I love! But it showed some wear and the color was not exactly my first pick of color, so I refinished my first ever piece of furniture!

This is the table before, shown in our old house!

A close up of one of the table leafs.
I was nervous about refinishing this table since it has family history, and I have never refinished furniture before. I knew I wanted to stain it a darker color, so I started sanding...

And sanding and sanding and sanding! I did not realize how long this would take me! But it took a lot longer than I thought it would take! I found having a beer while sanding helped make the sanding easier to deal with! I drank a lot of beer while refinishing this table (and beer is not my first choice of drink!)

An original compared to a sanded leaf.



Once I was finished sanding, I was WAY too excited that I was done, that I did not get a completed picture of the sanded table! I was so excited to be onto the next step of cleaning up, wiping the table down, and picking out my stain color.

Picking out the stain color was A LOT harder than I thought it would be! I thought I would just run to Home Depot and pick out a color and be on to staining the table. Well I was wrong, it took me a while to figure out what I wanted to do with the stain.

I ended up getting two Minwax stain colors: Ebony and Jacobean.


I did some experimenting with color on the bottom of one of the 3 leafs until I found the shade I wanted. I figured I had 3 leafs and if I ruined one I would be fine with the other two.

I ended up using 2 cans of jacobean to 1 can of ebony Minwax stain. I combined them into a plastic container and later transferred the mixed stain into an empty paint tin.

I wiped the mixed stain on with old t-shirts, and wiped of any excess.

To get the color I wanted I put on 3 coats of stain, which I experimented with in my sample.


I then gave the table 3 coats of spray polyurethane. I was not happy with how that covered, so I also gave it an additional coat of brush on polyurethane.

I am so happy to be done with my table!!! HOWEVER, the chairs that originally matched the table and as seen in my first picture, are way too detailed for me to sand down and re-stain. I do not have enough patience's for re-doing those chairs! So that lead to the next problem.... what to do about chairs.

So after lots of searching on Craigslist, I was able to find 4 chairs that will work with my new table. The finished table and my new chairs I will post as soon as I finally finish them!!