My New Fall Table!

I really wish this post could discuss how fun and awesome it was to do this project, but, I gotta be real.  It's me, I'm going to mess it up.  So, here's how it went down.

First, I decided to paint the top of the table white and leave the rest the natural wood color.  Later, I would wish I had done the opposite, but only after I had already applied a layer of primer - too late, sucka!  So, naturally, I get sooooo excited that I start this project in the doorway between the kitchen and dining room because there's no other possible space in the house that would be more convenient for a project.  I find some painter's tape and tape up what I'm not painting.  Then, I realize that I should move the table out to the patio, but that I can't get the table out there without taking the legs off.

I got too excited

So, I break the painter's tape and remove the legs and leave them in said inconvenient place and head downstairs with the table top.  I reapply the painter's tape, spread a tarp over the patio, and set the table down.

Paint me!

Following the great tutorial on Young House Love, I get some oil based white primer and give a coat to the table.  Of course, this is me we are talking about so I drip paint all over the tarp while stirring and even fling drops of primer onto the concrete while painting.  And, because I don't read directions well, instead of sticking to one coat of primer, I do two.  Hopefully not a disaster-maker, but annoying since it added more time to my project.  Because....IT RAINED FOR A WEEK AFTER THE PRIMER COATS.  I was actually lucky to even get in the primer coats.

I got skillz with Kilz.  You see what I did there?

Already looking better with just one primer coat!

Back to THD to get some paint.  Now, there are a jillion shades of white, so in what is either extreme laziness, extreme indifference, or extreme time-saving, I just get a semi-gloss paint in white base.  Besides, how does a paint machine "create" white?  Mysteries.....Anyway, the table gets two coats of "white" which looks a lot like the primer, but is easier to stir and smells lots better.  I do significantly better at keeping the paint on the table and not so much on the patio.  I think it's because the white paint is so much thicker than that stupid oil-based primer.  PS, I hate you so much oil-based primer, I left you half full out in the rain.  Take that!

Oooooo...coats of white paint.....

With that, all that was left (other than the cleanup that still hasn't happened - eek!) was to put on a coat of Minwax Water-Based Polycrylic Protective Finish in “Clear Gloss,” which is for making it shiny and more wipeable.  Because, let's face it, I've got a toddler and I'm a huge klutz, and I'm making myself a white table.  It has disaster written all over it.  Once the shiny stuff was on and try, I put the legs back on and noticed, in typical Mrs. Move-a-Lot fashion, that I had dripped white paint past the painter's tape.  Lucky for me, the rest of the table is unfinished (kinda - Mr. M. pointed out there was a definite gloss of some sort, but it looked unfinished to me) so I just used sandpaper to wear down the dried paint.  Not ideal, I'm sure, but it works!

The mistakes I sandpapered out of existence

To finish, I put it in the middle of my cat fur covered, pukey dining room, and put some fake leaves from Michael's and some pumpkins we got at a nearby pumpkin patch and some candles from our "fake" wedding 4 years ago (don't ask) in the middle to make it look awesome.  So, it's an island of awesome amidst a mess, but I just like to peek in on it cause it's so so pretty!

Here's the before:

A definite "before shot"

And here's the "after-the-before-but-before-the-final-after"

Small but lovely finished product.  The table, obviously, not the rest of the dining room.

I love baby pumpkins

I know it all looks kinda weird in the middle of the chaos.  And without chairs.  But, I'm still working out the details.  Just happy to have actually finished a product that looks pretty nice!