I finished my coffee table:
And I also finished some other furniture:
The Bullet Bill is a subwoofer. The other furniture is to hold games, consoles, and accessories. Just a little over a week until the big move–I suppose I should get back to work!
I’ve finished the desk drawers, lined them, and put on the pulls, and while the bird skulls LOOK awesome, there’s something about the curvature of the drawers and the thickness of the wood that makes them cling tight to the face of the drawers, making them difficult to open even when empty–when filled, I imagine it would be near-impossible, so I’ve contacted the seller to return them. Oh well, I suppose I’ll find something I like as much, and in the meanwhile, I’ve got a LOT of other things to do because we got the house! We’ve signed the lease and move in on April 16th. I’m fixing up some furniture in my place to go into what we have deemed to be the “game room” (the most important room of the house for us nerds), and in addition to that, I need to pack up all my crap. I’m excited to be in the new place, but I HATE moving, all of the packing and unpacking and the periods before and after when each place looks like a tornado hit it, and the period toward the end when you think “Ok, I’ve just got one more box to pack” and when you’ve finished packing that box, the amount of crap in your place is somehow exactly the same, and it ends up being another six boxes before all is said and done. Once we’re there, I’m going to get my hands on a cheap old oven to put in the garage and I can FINALLY start monster makeup school, which I am seriously excited about.
I’ve got some things to write about and post here but I’ve been keeping myself so busy that blogging has really taken a back burner. I’m hoping to get on the wagon again soon–I’ve been posting here for just about seven years and it’s not something I want to fall out of the habit of doing entirely.
Aside from yesterday, which I spent gossiping with Jeanine, looking at housewares, and drinking coffee, I have spent the week sanding and staining my desk–I finished sanding the drawers on Tuesday and applied my first coat of stain to them that day as well. I also sanded down the top of my coffee table–on one of his first nights over, Jason pulled my scented oil bath and body works doodad out of the wall and set it down on the table so he’d have a place to plug in his laptop. Hours later, I noticed that oil had leaked out and onto the table, and when I went to wipe it away, it took ALL of the finish with it. I was pretty upset, but the table had to be refinished anyway as a hot white pizza box had left a big mark on it a few months earlier, so this wasn’t the first finish ding, though it was the impetus to finally fix it instead of looking at it and mumbling that it really ought to be refinished someday.
Wood stain is pretty magical–I’ve been using a water-based ebony stain as I want the desk to be near-black when I’m done–but it’s really quite remarkable how different the stain looks on different wood. On the oak of the desk, it immediately picked up red and amber qualities, making it a rich warm brown. On the pine (I’m fairly certain it’s pine from the smell it released when I was sanding it) of the coffee table, the stain immediately turned it a cooler brown-grey. I am six coats in on the drawers and five coats on the table. The drawers I am going to continue to stain until they turn black or very close to black, and I estimate that I am perhaps two to three coats away from that. I’m hoping to stop on the table before it turns black, however, there is a part that has been more resistant to the stain and I’m going to keep coating it until it’s even, regardless of how dark it gets.
The gunmetal bird skull drawer pulls arrived in the mail today and they are AWESOME. I can’t wait until the desk is all done and put back together, because it’s going to look amazing. I can see why people get hooked on refinishing furniture!