Started with a jog...

So I decided to take a little jog, which is not too unusual for me- but it was the events that came from going on a jog that were out of the ordinary.

During my jog, I came across this wonderful sunflower patch!! With Minot rapidly expanding, most of these fields will no longer be in jogging distance, so I am trying to soak it up before a row of houses have taken their place. 

On the way back from the jog, I took in the scenery of a nearby pond.

While jogging home through my neighborhood, I came across a coffee table sitting on the curb.  In Texas, an item located on the curb is the sign for "Come and Take Me for Free", so I hope the same rules apply here in North Dakota.  You can see below for a look at the coffee table.

Our guest bedroom is sized to accommodate a sitting area, so I figured the coffee table would be a great fit once it had been "refreshed". 

My idea was to remove the existing paint, sand, and repaint the table with a "crackle medium".  After visiting the hardware store and doing a little Internet research, I was ready to tackle my project (or so I thought...)

You can see that I successfully finished steps 1-3. One being paint removal, two being sanding, and three being priming for a new coat. 

After priming, my confidence carried me through the next step: painting the base coat brown.  You can see my supervisor on the other side of the screen door checking my work. 

It was about step five or six where things started to get a little hazy....I sprayed the top coat for the crackle process, and lets just say after the 1-10 minutes of required waiting, there wasn't much of a crackle and I ran out of crackle paint. 

Refusing to make another trip to the hardware store or start the process over, I decided to improvise. And as I mentioned previously, my craft/homemaker skills are in their beginning stages, so this was where it took a turn for the worse. 

I made my way to the tool area which had some paint leftover from the previous owners.  Little did I realize that it was white paint and not ivory (which was the color I had just used for the top coat).

After painting a section and noticing the mismatch of color, I ran upstairs (tripping over my supervisor) to grab some paper towels to try to wipe off the white paint. I learned that you cannot easily wipe off paint after applying to a wood surface.  (I was envisioning the results from using an eraser on a white board)

After some improvising, I decided I would go for the multi-color/layer shabby-chic look. So I added the white color as well as the brown in streaks, and used sand paper to give it an aged look, and below are the results. 

 

As you can tell, my supervisor was worn out from the two day project,  and she found herself admiring the fruits of her my labor. 

Also, because I went on a run and saw a coffee table resulting in me being outside all day, I happen to see this fly over our back yard!  Who knew they did hot air balloon rides in Minot?