Aprons Gone Wild

Old Wood...New Table!

Everybody is talking about recycling these days. But I think about recycling as being something more than just putting a plastic bin out for the recycle truck. I like the aspect of recycling where someone else makes use of something I'm getting rid of, i.e. yard sales, thrift stores and such. But, I also like recycling of a different kind. I think the new term for it is "repurposing." This is my first time joining Susan at Between Naps on the Porch, http://www.betweennapsontheporch.blogspot.com/
to share my "repurposing" story for Metamorphisis Monday.
Our old house dates back to 1724. Oh, we've added on a garage and new living room and we've remodeled the kitchen and breakfast room. We still have enough projects here that need doing to last us a lifetime. Hubby says it's his retirement job. I agree. Not only do we both enjoy remodeling and recreating, but it's the best investment we could make living here on Old Cape Cod.
When we took up the old floors to redo the kitchen, some of the boards were over twenty inches wide. Many were rotted and in horrible condition. Not to be denied, I set out to sort through them and save a few. Hubby has already "repurposed" a few of the boards and made several items for our home out of the old wood.
Ahhh...but I can always think of something else. We needed a small table in our new kitchen/breakfast/tv room. Eating on our laps has proved to be detrimental to the furniture. I spill things. A lot of things. There are always crumbs around me when I eat on my lap. It's an easy but bad habit to develop...watching television and eating on one's lap...Nasty.
Fast forward to this morning when I got to photograph the new "pub" table hubby crafted out of a beautiful old, wide pine board (pictured above) that we salvaged from the original floors. It's a "Table for Two," and it fits perfectly under the double window that looks out onto our back yard and deck. The board turned out to be a beauty. After planing it down, the grain and knots stood out more clearly than I'd even imagined. Hubby has a way of making table legs that gives the illusion that they are chamfered. I don't know how he does it. I just know that I like it. We decided to paint the legs and base black to accentuate the top which was, after all, the crowning glory.
But...nothing ever goes completely smoothly in our house. I wanted to finish the table with a stain and tung oil finish. Hubby wanted to use polyurethane. This wasn't going to be an easy persuasion, because using tung oil finish requires more time and elbow grease than brushing on a coat of poly. With tung oil, you need about 5 coats at a minimum. Between each coat, you need to lightly rub it out with steel wool. There's not much "bang for your buck" with the first couple of coats as they don't appear to be doing anything. But, by the third, you start to see the soft glow of the wood coming out. The end result is a finish that doesn't look too shiny or like it's been coated at all. It just looks like beautiful, glowing old wood. I love it.
Anyway, after begging and pleading, I finally convinced hubby to try the tung oil. Now he's a convert and in total agreement that it reaps a most beautiful finish. I think you can see it in the pictures. I love, love, love it! It's perfect. We ate dinner last night, seated at the new table, on the antique chairs I purchased years ago for ten dollars each. It was nice. It also completes our new room. I'd been switching things around in that space in front of the window, but up until now, nothing seemed right. The new table is perfect. Really perfect. And because it's a piece of the history of this old house, it's even more perfect.

As usual, I'm working on a new apron. Check it out at
http://www.apronsgonewild.etsy.com/
And...for the record...I love it when you leave me a comment.