A Little "How To" from a NON-Pro!

Okay so I thought I would share a project that I am pretty dang proud of! I successfully was able to re-finish/ distress 2 pieces of furniture!

First up was my Grandma's old China Cabinent- Yes- it was very retro/ 70s... and I had a vision.

Here is what to do:

Take the furnitures AS IS, and sand it down. Even if it looks like it doesnt need it, you have to get any sort of finish off before you paint. (Electric sander for big surfaces, sand by hand for small ridges, molding, etc)



Then, paint the furniture the color of your choice. I chose black to go in my dining room and compliment our new China!



Then, you need to let this dry for 24 hours... you do not want to try and distress if the paint is even slightly wet- wait longer rather than shorter...

The next night I went back over to sand the black paint... on areas you want distressed, hold the sander there longer so that some of the wood grain will show through. AGAIN, be very careful on sensitive corners, molding, and edges... I did ALL of that by hand so I could control how much paint came off. (I am a bit anal and a perfectionist, but with sanding/ distressing it will NEVER match or be the same...its pretty unpredictable, so just CHOOSE to go with it haha!)



THEN, the messy part. This is best w/ a team so Logan got volunteered :) I never would have thought to do this, but the exposed wood is now the original wood grain- if you want it to look pretty, you need to STAIN the exposed wood/ distressed part. To make it look consistent everywhere, stain the entire piece of furniture.

We had a stainer and a wiper... use old towels or rags...literally that can be thrown away. Pick a pretty stain color- you can go cherry wood, blonde wood, etc. The longer you let the stain sit, the darker it will get. The wood DOES soak this stuff up FAST, so paint small areas and have your teammate wipe it off almost immediately after you stain the surface.



TAH DAH!!!!!!!! This took longer than I thought... just as a warning...thought I could knock it out in 1 day, but it took me probably a total of 8 hours! BUT hey, $40 vs. $3,000.... I will take it!

Part 2 uses the SAME process. Look at this $30 piece of junk from Canton! haha... we made her look REALLY cute for our breakfast nook!



Freshly painted Big Bird yellow!



Now distressed and stained. NOTE: When staining LIGHT colors, you need to wipe thoroughly and immediately! With the black, we could get away with a lot more than the yellow! You dont want your yellow table to look brownish/ orange!



Look at my cute bfast nook now! perfect with our little stained glass lamp :)



If I can do this ladies (or gentleman too), you can!!! Its fun and insanely rewarding (not to mention, a heck of a lot cheaper!)