Curbside Coffee Table Rescued

November 17, 2011 in Building and Repurposing, Furniture Makeovers, Living Room

It’s true. I picked this one out of someone’s trash. Yup.  No shame.  Well…. Maybe a little shame. I did drive past the house 3 times before I got up the urge to pull over.  Then I staked it out for a minute to see if anyone was home. I bit the bullet and made a mad dash for the table, glanced it over up close and threw it in the back of my lil ol’ SUV. Woop!

Here’s the story of how my chippy little curbside find made it’s way into my living room!

I’ll admit – the table sat in my basement for a few weeks months until I decided to get cracking. If you saw my basement, you’d be calling TLC to sign me up for Hoarders.  My college roommate Bonnie was in town this past weekend for an UH-mazing visit with her gorgeous baby girl and hubby.  Every time someone went down to the basement, I shouted after them “Don’t judge me!” or “I can feel you judging me!”   Am I the only one that uses my basement as thrifty-finds-storage until the urge hits me to tackle a project?  Please say no.

In the pics above… here’s the breakdown…

  • Top Left – …..pictured in all her chippy, unfinished, cobwebby, “ewww what is that?” glory. It looks like she originally had glass inserts. No sweat. I can work around that.
  • Top Right – I went to Lowes and spent about 20 minutes mixing and matching varying width boards until I found a good combination. I highly recommend laying your boards out if you are going to butt them up like this.  You wouldn’t believe how many of them are warped! I (thank goodness) snapped this photo at the store so I would know how to line them up again at home.
  • Bottom Left – When I got home I laid them across the table top to see if I’d like the way I was headed with this project.
  • Bottom Right – ….yeah I missed a few pictures. Here’s a quick rundown:  Painted 2 coats of Annie Sloan’s Old White Chalk Paint right over that black finish (after washing it down first of course). The boards were sanded VIGOROUSLY and got one coat of Minwax Special Walnut stain.  I used wood glue and my brad nailer to attach the boards to the coffee table frame. Moved the table into the living room and “lived with it” for a few days to see if I liked the stain.

Decision made.  Needs more stain. I decided I wanted the color to be just a bittttt richer.

Pics Above:

  • Top row – Wet stain. Taken a couple seconds apart, but the lighting was a hair different. Decided to show you both!
  • Bottom row – Dry stain after wiping off the excess. Much better!

….and there she is in the living room!  After the stain dried I lightly sanded and distressed the base and gave the entire piece some Annie Sloan clear wax. One coat bottom and two coats top. Lil’ buffin’ and there she be. :-)

Originally I had thoughts of painting numbers or a design  (logo or something of that sort) on the boards to make them look like they were older and possibly snagged from a crate or wooden sign. After putting it in my living room though I was afraid it might make the room look a little too busy. I have the gallery wall, the dresser with the TV, a console table… would a jazzed up coffee table be overload? Thoughts? Discuss amongst yourselves… :-) I also had thought about adding some “jewelry”… maybe some metal hardware to the top to make it look like a gate or crate turned table top?  I searched high and low for something, but didn’t really know exactly what I wanted… try explaining THAT to a store employee when they ask if they can help you. Ugh. After living with the table though, I realized I put my feet up on it… a lot. And if I added metal to the top it could make it uncomfortable.

So here are a couple last shots of the table as it is today…. still not sure if I’ll jazz it up a bit… but for now I’m content. Maybe another day!

…and as I write this post, here’s what I’m looking at… last night’s Survivor on TV, my gallery wall, and a cute lil boxer face begging for attention.

Yeah she looks a little crazy there. I’ll admit it. Here’s her sleepy face:

Awww… snuggles!  I’ll show you more of the ladder you saw hiding out in the corner of the living room in the next couple days… and maybe a couple good shots of my new (old) scale that’s camped out on the coffee table right now.

PS – Can you believe those little pumpkins you see scattered throughout the living room were bought at Walmart last week for TWO CENTS a bag… less than a penny a piece! What!

Please check out some of the awesome link parties where I’ll be linking up. There’s a day-by day list in the sidebar to the right and a full run-down on my Features and Parties page!

Be sure to check out the awesome link parties where I’m hanging out this week. They’re organized by day on the right toolbar and can also be found here! Special thanks to Home Stories A2Z!

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