Table makeover and how to make your own chalk paint

Before I go on and on about how much I love my "new" table here is a photo!

I have been looking for what seems like forEVER for a bigger table to replace our round pedestal table. I liked our old table but our kitchen chairs are so gigantic and we only had 4 I didn't want to try and find additional chairs.

I love the french provincial tables and I got this one for a steal ($40 in fact) on Craigslist! It's huge, heavy and was perfect for my first stab at refinishing a piece of furniture.

I got a lot of advice online including from Miss Mustard Seed herself (yes I was totally excited when I emailed her and she replied haha). She's the QUEEN of this kind of stuff! And her table was my inspiration.

Back to the table. It sat in my closet under the stairs for a few weeks until I had time and the weather was cool enough to start. Fall break was the ideal time.

I love it's shape! The old finish wasn't too bad but not what I was looking for.

Refinishing the top was a pretty easy task (thanks to my awesome neighbor Chelsea and her palm sander!). The base and the legs-not so much. Call me lazy but I didn't want to put the effort into getting all the old finish off. Annie Sloans Chalk Paint is all the rage right now since you can apply it without priming the piece and I soooo wanted to try it but couldn't justify the cost for it!

Thanks to the blogging world someone recommended that I check out this website for how to make your own chalk paint!

No Minimialist suggests using powdered calcium carbonate, which I couldn't find anywhere! But plaster of paris was readily available (and cheap!) so I went with that. It gave it the perfect chalky finish that I was looking for and made it really easy to distress.

A little sanding to distress the table and then I covered it with the Rustoleum Satin Poly like I did on the top and it was all done!

After letting it cure for a couple of days I managed to manhandle it into the kitchen by myself!

I was too excited to wait for the hubby to get home from work :) I've turned the table every which way, kept the leaf in, taken it out, put all 4 chairs plus the bench, taken out of the chairs...you get the idea.

I'm still getting used to having such a big table in this space but we love it!

Having the bench (which I got months ago at Marshalls) is great since two kiddos can sit together and when we have more people over we can add the leaf and more chairs!

Now I'm just trying to decide if I should refinish that bench...

Who's ready to come over for dinner?!?!

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