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I'm so excited to share this project!

I'm an avid reader of this lovely lady's blog. She is a bargain-shopping, furniture re-doing, project-conquering fool. Sigh, girl after my own heart.

She made the antlers in the below picture with paper maché clay. Genius!

But do you see the table she used to stage the photo with? A little understated, a little rustic, simple and clean lines...when I saw it, I knew it was exactly what I was looking for. You see, I have this teeeeny tiny little space for an entryway. I'd been looking for a table tall enough, shallow enough and wide enough to fit my space for months. But when I saw this picture and mentioned aloud that it would be perfect, Cowboy suggested we build our own.

I love that man.

So what was I to do but agree? It certainly appeared to be simple enough for our first try at building a piece of furniture. Why not??

So we started measuring out the space to fit our custom table.
We took our handy little plan and list of measurements to Home Depot and had them do all of the cuts (for free). Saved us a lot of time/work AND the need to haul extremely long pieces of lumber.
We tapered the legs at a friend's house (with a circular saw) and then brought them home. I sanded all of the pieces down (yes...that is snow...and yes...it was COLD) so that they would be ready to assemble.

I won't bore you with the details of measuring, centering, gluing, nailing, etc., so I'll let the pictures speak for themselves!

Around three hours later, the entire piece was together and the glue had set for long enough that we could flip it over.........only to realize how awkwardly tall it was! Come on, say it with me...AWK-ward! It's like a 12-year-old boy who went through a summer growth spurt; nothin' but tall lankiness.
We laughed. And laughed. We had made the legs 36 inches tall, thinking three feet wasn't all that high. Boy, were we surprised. Luckily it was an easy problem to solve. We borrowed a friend's saw and trimmed four inches off of each leg.
Much better.

All that was left was sanding and staining. We stained it with english chestnut, which has some significance.

This year for Valentine's Day, Cowboy built a solid oak box for me (I'm the type who keeps letters, ticket stubs, coffee jackets, etc. from memorable days...I have something from nearly all of our dates saved) to keep the things I love (and letters from him) in.

The night before V-Day, we were at Home Depot looking at spray paint. As we walked past the stain and sample board, he asked (knowing full-well this could be potentially end badly) what stains I liked. To keep a long story short, I specifically pointed out english chestnut and said, "I don't like that one...it's too red." To which he replied, "OK...well, these samples are in both oak and pine...which wood do you like?" To which I quickly said, "Pine...oak is just too grainy for me!" Of course, at this point the [oak] box was already built and stained [in english chestnut]. So, needless to say, english chestnut holds a fun memory now. This beautiful box sold me on english chestnut. (And in my defense, I was picturing the stain on wood floors or cabinets...too red... :D )

So back to this table; we were going for a rustic look, so I sanded down all of the straight edges, corners and legs before staining it.
First coat of stain...(look! no more snow!)
Second coat of stain...
After three coats of stain, I took a piece of 220-grit sandpaper and started roughing up the edges. I did a once-over with a light coat of stain (almost immediately wiping it off) and then did two coats of polycrylic to seal it.
And here she is! (Cooper can't let the table get all of the attention.)


I love it in all of its rustic, custom, DIY-ed perfection. There's something so FUN about being surrounded by things you've made. Best part--we spent less than $30 on lumber and supplies. I also lucked out with a pretty talented and handy Mr. to help. We're already thinking of things we can build next!

Happy Friday, all!

You can also see me at...

Tip Junkie

The DIY Showoff

The DIY Home Sweet Home Project

Coastal Charm

A Diamond in the Stuff

C.R.A.F.T.

Hope Studios

The Girl Creative

Chic on a Shoestring Budget

New Nostalgia