Stenciled Table

I chose the paisley allover stencil…it’s kinda country, kinda modern, and I’m kinda in love with it.  No, I’m totally in love with it because these stencils are so easy to use. I’m not just saying that because they sent me a free stencil and that’s the nice thing to say…really, the whole top took me about ten minutes and turned out perfect.  All I did was lay the stencil on the table, secure with a piece of tape, and apply the paint with a small foam roller.

It didn’t bleed or smear or anything…though I was really careful about not using too much paint. After it dried (so like two minutes) I distressed it with my sander and this is what I had.

 I KNOW, I love it too.  Stenciling by hand is for the birds.

Next I decided to stain over the stencil and give the table a more rustic look.

I used Dark Walnut by Minwax and applied two coats. It darkened the white paint to an uneven tan and brought out the wood grain underneath. It actually turned out just the way I wanted it too in my head…love it when that happens.

(Please soak up the dying plants, messy porch and double fly swatter yielding toddler…it does’t get much more real than this!)

As I was admiring my work I couldn’t stop looking at the legs. They just looked…blah. Boring, plain…bright. They were ruining the awesomeness of the top.

I decided to paint them turquoise and give em the old “dirty cowboy” treatment. The dirty cowboy consists of drybrushing dark stain over your painted surface, smearing, and sealing. It just makes it look like dirty cowboy furniture…and yes, I made it up :)  (I’ll make a tutorial for the process and post it next. UPDATE -see the tutorial HERE)

Here is the finished table!