"New" Kitchen Table

I'll be back with more Egypt pictures in a little bit, but in the meantime, here's a project I've been working on for a while.

As I mentioned here, Dan and I are currently borrowing a kitchen table and chairs from Dan's work, but those will have to go back any day now.  When we mentioned this problem to some friends of ours, they told us they had an extra kitchen table in their garage and we were welcome to take it!  It is a solid wood table but it has seen better days.  Since the table was free, I figured I can take a bit of a risk with it.  So, I decided to spray paint the table gray.  Crazy, I know!

As part of Ladies of Leisure--now Spouses on Sabbatical--Rachel and I have been working on the table for the past few weeks.  First we hand sanded the legs using 80 grit paper.  After several hours and many scratches on our arms later, we had two naked table legs.

I tackled the next two legs on my own by spreading out a tarp in front of the TV and spending another few hours working on it.

While our friend Alisha refinished a rocking chair, Rachel and I sanded the top of the table. This time though, I splurged and bought an electric sander.  What a difference!

Sanding is fun!

After a couple more hours of sanding, it was time to start spray painting.  I grabbed my paint in "dark gray gloss" and went to work.

I may have gotten overly-excited...  Good thing it came off with just water and elbow grease.

Why, yes, that is my footprint in spray paint

Following my BFF's advice, I did several thin, even coats and then let the legs cure for double the recommended time.

At our first S.O.S. meeting, I spray painted the table top. 

Spray painting in my garden

Here's where things went wrong.  I tried to do thin even coats on the table top, but there are dark spots on the top that I can't get rid of.  I sanded down the spots between coat, but they keep appearing.  I think I need to start the spray off the table and then go all the way across.  I'll try that today and let you know how it goes.  If you have any tips for me though, I'm all ears!