Laminating is Tedious.

I Have these great visions in my head about what I would like to be able to do with wood. Except then I remember that pretty much everything you do with wood, stain and urethane takes FOREVER! to finish because there is the stripping, and sanding and staining and waiting and sanding and waiting and sanding and cleaning and spraying and waiting and spraying again and waiting even longer and spraying again then THEN, MAYBE being satisfied with the finish you get. And thats IF you were able to keep the stray dog hair from sticking to your last coat.

I started with this, my late great grandmothers tri-fold table that she clearly used to hold plants from the evidence of water rings galore:


So I started scrapin' and stripin' all the laminate off the top that was pealing up.
The whole top layer had to come off. After I scraped and sanded, I laminated the top again. Cutting laminate to anything other than a square is difficult, and getting it to fit the original curve of the design was pushing my skill set. My limited laminate abilities could only handle doing the large center part. In my need for speed I got a little aggressive with the scraper and put some nicks on the edge that I wasn't able to recover with laminate but, hey, it still looks better now.

I stained the top edge the same color to match the legs and did a couple layers of lighter and darker stain with a stencil to create the patterns on the top. It fits perfectly at the end of our kitchen, and every time I walk by I pray that the laminate doesn't curl up. The chairs that are there now are being borrowed from the dining room table and are wayyyy to big. I purchased a couple bent wood chairs that I am going recover soon. And I like knowing that it was my Great grandmothers. I think she would be happy to see what I have done with it...and maybe I too can leave it to my great granddaughter with water rings and see what she comes up with...