What I've been doing this week

I know, I know, I haven't been blogging much, for quite a while now, but I want to correct that.  Instead of aiming to post every day (which gets overwhelming), I think I will aim for 2 or 3 times a week.  I want to share some of my creative projects with you.

 For this week's projects that is going to take more than one post.  For the first one, our dining tables.  Yes that is plural! Rather than choose a large table that we only use part of most of the time, or one of those extendable ones, we decided to buy two smaller tables which can be used separately when needed or pushed together to make a larger table when we are entertaining.  So there is one that we eat at normally as a family and the spare table I use more as a desk most of the time.

But we had chosen the most basic pine tables, and had not stained, varnished or painted them.

We used tablecloths, keeping one of the plasticised tablecloths underneath the fabric ones all the time, to protect the table.  But a problem had come to light.

This is the tablecloth on the table I use as a desk.  Can you see the ripples?  Take a look at the edge of the table.

The plasticised tablecloths had permanently warped.  Now imagine that on a desk. . . . . . . . When writing in a book, it was OK, but if ever I needed to write on sheets of paper, I would have to place a book underneath  because I just could NOT get the paper to lie flat on top of that wobbly tablecloth.

Something HAD TO BE DONE!

So I decided to paint the tables.  I decided against bright white, and chose one of the off whites available at my local DIY supplies store.  Cotton White.

I decided against buying a tin of primer (remember the tables are bare wood) and decided to use extra coats of paint if necessary as this smallest tin available would be more than enough for 2 coats on the 2 tables.  I used a small roller for the tops of the tables and a brush for the legs.

The tops took 3 coats of paint and the legs only needed 2 since you tend to put paint on thicker with a brush than you do with a roller.
I couldn't paint the whole things in one go, and with leaving time between coats it took a good 2 days to finish the painting. I wasn't going to wash the roller, brush and tray each time I paused in the painting to wait for a coat to dry, to I stored them in plastic bags and all was fine.

All is now finished and back to normal.  A desk.

And a dining table.

I noticed as I put the items back on top of the tables that in turning the table up from the position I had it in for painting the legs

I had knocked a tiny bit of paint off one side.  That will need a quick touch up job.

I finished by doing something I had never thought to do after painting projects before.  I marked the outside of the tin with a line that ROUGHLY shows the level of paint left in the tin.  As I was doing that hubby suggested I also mark it with the project that the paint had been used on.

One very last photo for you.  If you have looked closer at one of the earlier photos you will have noticed that we have not redecorated this room since our wonderful children were at that age where children occasionally try their own bit of redecorating.  YES they drew on the walls. 

So THAT will be a project for later in the year.

Although I'm not 100% certain that this project is finished.  I am thinking about possibly coming back in a few weeks time and stencilling a pattern onto the tables.  I just can't find one I like at the moment.