Faux Farmhouse Planked {drop leaf} Dining Table

I've been wanting a rustic 'old' plank topped farmhouse table for the longest time.  A new table is not in the budget any time soon and even purchasing materials to attempt to build one is not an option right now. 

So what does any DIYer on a mission do?  Use what ya got to get what you want, that's what!

I'm so excited to share my new Faux Farmhouse Planked {drop leaf} Dining Table with you! 

Say that 5 times fast why don't ya?  Quite the title!

The table was {you guessed it} another trashy find!

The hubster was so pleased with himself the day he brought this home

{oh, only about 2 years ago}

and it's sat in my dining room covered with a drop table cloth ever since.

This is my 'paint' table, where I work on many of my paint projects.  What a sad little table it was with all of it's nicks, scratches and unsightly watermarks.  I have hated this table from day 1!

Until now!  I wanted a rustic chippy plank top table... but I wanted it to be light and airy.

This wood below was my inspiration.

I'll show you how I did it!  Now, do as I say - not as I do!

Seriously!

Now, I can hear you already... I can't paint, I can't do that, yada yada yada!

Lift your arm and swing it slowly from left to right or right to left,

think 'wax on, wax off' Karate Kid {the original} and Danial-San / Mr. Miagi

OK, now I'm really showing my age!

If you can do that, you can attempt this paint treatment!

After a light sanding and good prep coat of Kilz primer spray, the entire table top was given 2 coats of creamy white paint, I used Steamed Milk from Sherwin Williams.

Every other layer of color on this table is paint used as a glaze!

{shades of brown, grey, turquoise, & tan thinned with water, 1:1}

With a straight edge and a black sharpie, I marked off unevenly spaced lines across the table top to mimic the planks of wood.  Next, I drew on faux knots and dots - both large and small.

 Here's the do as I say part - Do NOT use a black sharpie!  It was a real b*#%! to cover up!

Either skip this step

 or just use a thin brush and some full strength brown paint to paint these accents on.

 The whole table top finish was adding layer upon layer of thinned paint and spreading it out as far as possible.  Leaving streak marks as you go to mimic the wood grain.  Above, the tan was dabbed on in random spots over the steamed milk color.  Below, it was feathered out across the table top allowing some of the creamy white to show through.

Continue layering the thinned paint across the table top.

Below, you can see the layers of white, grey, brown, and turquoise building up.

At this point I also added splotches of petroleum jelly and crackle medium randomly around the table. 

 I am not very patient when painting, so I do not wait for the mediums to dry... my perogative.

I recommend you follow the directions on the bottle though,

do as I say... remember!

{giggle}

You can see the cracks beginning to develop here.

luv!

after many, many, many, many more coats and layers later,

the black from the marker was still showing through looking oh so fake!

Don't use the marker!

I ended up grabbing my burnt umber and a liner brush to go over the blackness of the sharpie.

It was almost like starting over!

With a very thick {almost full strength} coat of Sherwin Williams Steamed Milk I went over the knot marks, added a few more thin layers of brown, tan, grey and shots of turquoise and was finally happy!

To finish off the table, I grabbed that burnt umber again and went over the 'faux plank outlines' where the planks of the wood would meet, both lengthwise and randomly width wise.  At each faux 'joint'  I used the end of a paintbrush dipped into both brown and silver paint to add 'nails'.  This dip dot method for making the dots is super duper easy!  The legs of the table are painted in the same muted turquoise used in the table top.  I may go back in and add a darker brown glaze to accentuate the  legs further.

 A few coats of clear wax were applied for a protective soft sheen.

I couldn't be happier with my new plank topped farmhouse drop down table!  Getting some work done at this table is a pleasure now... I think I may keep it for a while!

What do you think?  If you're new here at T&B and like what you've seen, be sure to head over and follow via GFC, linky follow, FB and Google+.  You can even find me on Twitter as SminkeyDinks!

I will be linking up with these terrific blogs {here} as well as French Country Cottage

Crackling with Elmer

As I've been clearing the craft crap from the dining room, I've been trying to spruce it up a bit as I go along. I'm am admittedly one of those people who still doesn't quite know what my style is.  I'm loving a look of French Country, a touch of Tuscany, with a wee bit of Shabby Unique Chic mixed in.   So I have a few pieces of furniture in that room that have needed some sprucing up and I've decided to just go for it!  Starting with an old bookshelf we've held onto... I wanted it to look old, chippy... and white.

For about as long as I've been painting, whenever I've wanted an old rustic type of finish on furniture or wood I've relied on store bought crackle mediums to achieve my result.  Guess what?!?  I don't have any!  But, with the upcoming Stashbusting September challenge I've chosen to participate in and the sheer MaSS of craft crap I've been going through... heading out to the craft store is just not an option.  My ever shrinking budget will thank me for getting in the busting spirit a bit early too!  I remember reading via a blog (Lord knows which one now so as to give proper credit) that you can use good old fashioned school glue to achieve the same results.  Being the skeptic I am I was a bit worried but part of this whole challenge is to use what you've got...

Yes, this is the same bookself... all a part of the "don't know what I want" process!  When we originally aquired it was a solid old creamy white which we painted black ( so into the black distressed movement then) and it served a purpose as an entertainment unit.  Since hubby brought in another tv unit the shelf moved to the dining room.  Since then it's been a bright teal (hated it) then a chocolate brown (hated it) and will now become what's in my head - a beautiful old cracked and chippy white.

Ok, so I gathered all of my supplies: white paint from the $1 bin @ HD, small 'weenie roller' as the hubs calls them, an OLD paint brush, left over Elmer's glue from last years school stash, and an old chinese take out container (to hold the paint).

Next, I squirted the Elmer's glue in patches along the top and side edges of the piece in big puddles.  As you can see in the photo above, I just used the old brush to smooth it out, fading into the center top where I felt the crackles would most likely occur on an old piece of furniture. 

The directions then suggested to wait 4-5 hours for the glue to dry. But Oh, No... Not I... I immediately started to apply the white to the wet glue.  I used  a heavy thick coat over the patches of glue because you cannot go back over those spots or the crackle will not work.

You can see here how the paint starts to "shrink" as it dries over the glue creating the cracks.  Be very careful not to touch it until it is completely dry or the paint will lift off and shift around.  I am pretty satisfied with the look I've achieved using this common household item. 

Now I'm off to sand and chip up the edges a bit; perhaps add some wax to protect it.  By the way, YeS, the interior shelving is still the bright teal blue... I'm doing a little something special in there but that's a suprise for next time!