We have had this table for years.
It was marked with spills, carvings (darn kids while doing their homework), scratches, and everything else.
As heart warming as it was to have those marks on the table...
telling its history to anybody sitting by it,
it was screaming for an update.
My in-laws gave us the table for Christmas, when we lived in our previous home.
We had tile floors and it looked great there, matching nicely to our natural oak cabinets.
Our current house, however, has wood floor, and between the floor and the table, there was an overload of natural wood color...
it's like the table was growing out of the floor.
I had been wanting to refinish this table for a long time.
The time finally came.
I had my boys carry the table to our patio, and the past week we had been living Japanese style (well, I don't really know what Japanese style is...but we had no table...just benches and chairs).
Last night we finally got our table back, and it looks rather nice...
and it is great to have a table again, so all those piles of stuff can be moved from benches back to the table.
I first sanded...for hours...
Then I stained the table with Red Mahogany...which turned out too red/purple...
My husband and Markus carried the table back to the kitchen...I confirmed that it was too red
...it was carried out again, to thier dismay..
Then I sanded again...and stained it with Dark Walnut
For the final touch I put two layers of varnish...just for the table top...
We do have four kids after all...
who like to leave their mark...
everywhere :)
