Tables Galore

I have been keeping my eyes out for furniture and in the last couple of weeks I have had some great finds.

At the swap shop at the local dump, I found a solid wood, octaganal end table that has a door in the side and a swiveling top. I love the design on top and it will clean up quite nicely when I refinish it. The sides and base are in good shape, so if I can match the stain color, I may be able to get away with just doing te-doing the top. Then upon opening the door, I found about 70 music CDs,  about 30 of which are to my taste - double bonus!

 

Early last week, at the side of the road,. someone put out another nice end table. It too is solid wood and has a small drawer for holding odds and ends. Although a bit beat, it will clean up nicely with sanding down , re-staining and a bit of polyeurathane.

 

The next day, at the same place as I found the square table, there was a bunch of furniture out. I bypassed the dresser (I have plenty thanks to Cop Car and HH), and the chest of drawers (which was not solid wood, so would not have refinished well. However, amongst the other stuff was a solid wood coffee table. It is extremely heavy and 60" long (our current coffee table is 50") so getting it from the Jeep, up 2 flights of stairs, thru the hallway into the back room was challenging, but I prevailed.

 

All of these pieces of furniture are older, made of heavy wood, so will easily serve me well for the rest of my days. A little TLC, which I am well practiced at, and they will be as good as new.

Comments

[Cop Car]

Ah, yes, Bogie - I recall that you refinished furniture while you were living in the little apartment (on Main?) in Wichita back in about 1980. You are well practiced! BTW: I am jealous. Years, and years, and years ago (think 1960s), I wanted to buy such a table/record storage piece. Alas, we did not have the money and, by the time I had figured out how to scrape it all together, the piece had been sold. It was pretty pricey, new. You got a deal!

I am now using the chest of drawers and "vanity" desk (with mirror) that I used as a teenager. The pieces are much the worse for wear (Mom loaned the desk to a neighbor, who had seven or eight kids, for 10-15 years. It came back with some of the trim pieces missing!) I've been trying to get up the nerve to find someone to price re-finishing the pieces. I don't have the patience to tackle it, myself.

[bogie]

I not only refinished furniture on Second street (Main was the next street over), but I have done a whole lot of it while living here. Our current coffee table came to us used, and it looked it. While I was out of work fall of 2001, I stripped it down and refinished it. It still looks freaking awesome (if I do say so myself).

Also have gotten a whole lot of furniture new, but unfinished; the two stereo cabinets and the linen closet come to mind. I had to sand and finish those. Oh, also did the trim and base of the bay windows and several shelving units hung on the walls. Also have renewed almost all of the wood trim upstairs, although that involved very little sanding.

I also refinished some of the drawers of the dressers you gave us. And most recently - last fall when I was off work, I refinished the drawers, doors and cabinet faces of the kitchen.

It is easy to me because it DOESM"T take patience. I can work on something for 10 minutes or 2 hours. There is no set up time, or figuring out where I left off to waste time. Sanding, and staining be done in short or long stints.

Now, when you put on the polyurethane, you either do the whole thing (or section), or don't start. Also, once the base layer is on, you need to add coats within a certain amount of time, or you have to let dry for 2 days before starting with another coat. Don't ask me why, but that is how it works.

[Cop Car]

You have me at a disadvantage. I could work/dawdle at such projects to my heart's content - while I lived alone. Now...I must wait for HH to leave town for a few days. He tolerates neither noise, nor mess, nor odors well. I've had to do a bit of re-finishing in our current kitchen; but, never while HH is at home.

You may/may not recall that I finished a few pieces of unfinished furniture, myself (one of which you re-finished while on 2nd St). You would not recall that I re-upholstered a couch and chair (which, with the table & 4 chairs that you later "inherited" and a coffee table, cost us $95 when we bought it used from a secretary with whom I worked at Boeing. That would have been when we moved to Derby in 1960.

Mentioning the table & chairs: I refinished all & re-upholstered the chairs, myself, and paid someone to refinish them a 2nd time, as I recall. I always liked them. Your dad...not so much.

[Cop Car]

P.S. And I long ago lost track of how many rooms I've painted over the years - on Lakeview, in the town house (Eastborough Arms), and at least twice for each room on Sunrise and on Vesta. I never mind the painting as much as I used to mind scrubbing walls & ceilings to remove the smoke residue.

[bogie]

Ha - I would rather scrub walls. I can't control where the paint goes. I have had an entire room floor covered with plastic and managed to get paint splatters under the plastic - even though I hadn't removed the plastic yet. I am such a spaz with paint; although I have done the living room, dining room, hallway and master bedroom at least once a piece, there are still spots of paint on the floors, At least when I did the bedroom (oh, and the den, the carpet had been taken up so there was just concrete (that was after the boiler burst and we had to have the carpet replaced).

[Cop Car]

Ah! Now I recall how you teased me when I was helping you give the walls in your spare room the first coat of paint. Perhaps I was the one who got the spots on your floor? Regardless - it isn't hard to get paint where it ought not be. And...it can take weeks/months/years before one finds some of the spatters that went unnoticed! *sigh*