Christmas Centerpiece and much more!

I have been busy this month making some Christmas gifts and planter boxes in the garage.  I

also got a new tool and it has taken me a while to figure it all out.  Here are some pictures:

 

 

 

 This is a pretty Christmas Centerpiece I made.  The bottles are IBC soda bottles.

 My inspiration was from a blog called Shanty 2 Chic.

This is a planter I made for my front porch out of cedar wood.
I wanted it to match my front door so I stained it with Minwax Mahogony 605 Gel Stain
and then sprayed on a few coats of Rust-oleum ultimate spar varnish.

I made two planters to go on either side of my garage door.
They are made from cedar and I am going to let them age naturally
so I didn't coat them with anything.

 

 

 

My parents gave me a router as a gift earlier this month and

then my brother and sister surprised me with a router table.

I have been busy this weekend setting everything up and figuring out how it works!

I did manage to use it today on a few scraps of wood.

Now I am excited to actually make something!

 

 

 

Well that's what I have been up too!
I am looking forward to some big builds after the holidays!

Thanks for stopping by.

My newest build, a Trestle Table!

I wanted a new challenge in the garage, so I tried my hand at building a trestle table. I stained the top a dark English Chestnut, followed by Hickory gel stain- both are by Minwax. For the bottom- I mixed my own charcoal gray.

 

This table is: 72" L x 32" W x 31" H. It's SOLD.

 

Let me know what you think- I love to hear from you.

 

 

Dinner for Two

A good friend asked me to update an old table and 4 chairs for her.

The table was a gift from her mom and has been through 25+ years of use in her family
and in her son's family!
Everything was in good condition except the seats of the chairs.

I stripped and stained those and painted everything else.

The table top is Formica so it didn't need anything but a good cleaning.

 

 

Here are some BEFORE pictures!

I forgot to take a picture of the chair seats before refinishing them :( 

 

AFTER - Now it is ready for another 25 years!

Just the Right Size

 

 

A friend asked me to make a table for her back entry.  Her door enters right into the kitchen and all the "stuff" ends up on her kitchen island.  She wanted a table 9" x 24" to fit in a small space near the door.  The plan is that all the :stuff" will end up on the table allowing her space to actually cook using the island!

Here it is:

It is very tall and thin so it really needed something to fill all that space - the X was my friends idea - I think it turned out great!  The top is oak stained with Minwax English Chestnut stain and the bottom is pine painted with Porter Paint's Copper Penny, distressed, rubbed with the English Chestnut stain and then everything is finished with Minwax Polycrylic.

New and Improved

As I mentioned in a previous post I refinished an old maple table for my Aunt Cris.

She took it home and sent me some new pictures so I thought I would share!

 

Just to refresh your memory here are the BEFORE pictures:

 

Here are the AFTER!   A very nice change!!

A Quick Fix

Nate and Emmy bought new appliances for their kitchen and wanted a shelf for their microwave.  Here is a before and after:

 

 

Lot's Been Happening in my Garage

I have been very busy in my "Garage" for the last few weeks!!

Here is what has been happening:

 

 #1

This isn't very exciting but it was lots of work.  Now I have a wonderful organized workshop!

Our garage was filled with garage sale items and lots of lawn equipment, golf clubs - you name

it so I got organized, had a very successful garage sale and now I have this:

A place for all my tools:

 

Plenty of space to store wood and projects:

And best of all the rest of the garage is empty, so there is room to move my work tables around when I am working on projects, but they can be easily folded and put away when we need room for all 3 cars in the garage - everyone is happy!!!

 

 

#2

 

In my last post I showed you  the bench I made for the back hall.

Here is the hall before and after:

 

BEFORE

 

AFTER 

 

 

#3

 

The other project that I have been working on for a while is refinishing my Aunt Cris' table.  It is a maple table and was finished with the spray on maple finish like many pieces of it's age as you can see from the before picture.

 

BEFORE

 

 

 

 

AFTER

  Here are the pieces all ready to go. I hope to get a picture of it all put together

in her dining room when she gets it home!

Here is the top looking good spread out on my ping pong table!

The table is drop leaf with three drop in leaves.

 

 

Here is the bottom painted a satin black.

 

 

OK - So now we are up to this week!!

 

It has been an exciting September for our Bell Choir with three grand babies being born.

You saw the box I made Madelyn and here are three more.

Two little boys have been born and I thought Paxton's big sister needed one too!!!

 

 

 

#4 

 

Now for today!!!

I have been playing around with building a trestle table for some time now.

I have found lots of inspiration on the web - two blogs in particular:

Ana White

and

Shanty 2 Chic

 

I have also looked at the tables in Pottery Barn, Arhaus Furniture and Restoration Hardware.

So . . . today I decided to build.

I have the bottom done and now I need to build the table top.

 I plan to make it approx. 72" X 36".

I am excited about how it came out so here is a preview.

I laid some boards on top to get the idea of a table top.

 

 

It still needs lots of sanding and then I think I will paint the bottom black

and stain the top a brownish gray!!   What do you think?

 

Well that's all for now.  I will be working on a project for Emmy this weekend and

then back to the workshop next week!!!

 

Thanks for stopping by!

 

An update for my back hallway!!

My back hall is always a mess :(  so . . . I designed and built this bench to use back there!  I will be back in a few days with pictures of it in it's new home!

 

 

 

Baby Boy Book Crate

 

I made this rustic crate for a baby shower gift last week!