Hey there Mom Endeavors readers! I'm Jen, the gal behind
I Can't Stop Crafting. I was asked to fill in here for the day, and I couldn't be more excited about it! I really like reading Mom Endeavors, and am always interested in the great ideas and encouraging perspective Sara offers as a hands on mom.
A few months ago I came across this children's table at my local thrift store. Seeing through the layers of caked on paint, the poorly laid "lattice" table top and the beat up wood, I saw a fantastic little table, perfect for tea parties, coloring, and crafts for my little ones. And, for $3.00, what could go wrong?!
I started out by bringing it home and letting it sit in my basement for a few months. Once that waiting period was over, I got right down to business. I whipped out my circular sander and got to work sanding down that awful lattice pattern. It's hard to tell in the pictures, but there was quite a ridge of dried paint along each of the crooked tape lines. I sanded for a long time! Once the table top, underside, and legs were all sanded down, I wiped them off with a clean rag.
Using plain old craft paint, I painted the legs and underside of the table a vibrant leaf green.
Once the legs were dry, I flipped the table over and painted the table top yellow. Then my husband came home from work and asked why I was painting the kids table in John Deere colors. Then I lightly sanded the yellow paint and painted it again, this time using a taupe-grey color that I had in the basement from a previous project. Much better!
I have fond memories of listening to vinyl records at my Grandpa & Grandma's house as a child, one of my favorite songs being, "The More We Get Together". This is a song I've taught my children and enjoy singing it with their little voices raising up with my own. So, to personalize this table to our little family, I decided to paint, "Oh the more we get together the happier we'll be" on the tabletop.
Using some craft paper, I created a template for the table top. I folded my paper into quarters, and cut it into an oval shape. I secured the paper in the center of my tabletop using a little bit of painter's tape.
Following my paper oval as a guideline, I lightly penciled the words onto the tabletop. You could easily use a stencil if you're planning on doing a similar project, or a
Silhouette if you're so lucky as to have one of your own.
But, I had neither a stencil or a Silhouette on hand, so it was down to me and my handy pencil. Once I'd gotten everything drawn on the way I wanted I used a little bit of the leaf green craft paint diluted with just a tiny bit of water and filled in the letters with a small paint brush. I let the lettering dry, then did a second coat to add a little more contrast.
Once the lettering was dry, I felt the tabletop looked a little sparse, so I filled in a few areas with some freehanded green bubbles, clustering them together in groups.
After letting the table fully dry, I took some coarse sand paper and scuffed up my artwork and wiped the tabletop down with a clean, dry rag.
I felt like the tabletop still lacked dimension, so I dry brushed it with some watered down white paint.
To dry brush, you simply dip your paint brush in the paint, then on a clean piece of scrap paper or cardboard, brush off most of the paint. Then you paint in long even strokes over whatever you're wanting to dry brush, giving it a weathered and worn appearance.
Then I highlighted my lettering just a little bit with the same green paint I used earlier, let it dry, and sprayed the whole table with a layer of clear coat to protect all my hard work!
"he" is before highlighting, "ha" is after highlighting. I added just enough paint to allow the lettering to pop through the dry brushing.
We had these little chairs given to us by some friends of ours. Who can say no to a great freebie?!
To spruce them up I did one coat of watered down white paint, to give them a white washed appearance, and painted a few little green bubbles on the chair backs to finish them off. A quick spray of clear coat and they were done in no time!
Phew! Sorry if this all seems really complicated! All in all the project didn't take too long, there were just lots of little steps. My kids love sitting at their newly refurbished table, singing "Oh the more we get together" over cheese and crackers.
Thanks so much, Sara, for having me! It was a pleasure being here.
I'd love for any and all of you Mom Endeavors readers to come visit me
here at I Can't Stop Crafting. I've got some exciting plans coming up in the next weeks and would love to share them with all of you!
Be blessed,
