We may earn money or products from the companies mentioned in this post.

I’ve been wanting to redecorate the house room by room for a while. My plans got put on hold when we were ordered to shelter in place and stay home. I didn’t want to spend a ton of money if we didn’t have much coming in. I figured it would be a perfect time to start a quarantine project by staining our coffee table.

My husband got our coffee table when we first moved in together and before we bought our house. We didn’t have anything except couches in the living room and we needed something. I think he found it on Offer Up or Craiglist for like $20. Cheap, but I liked it and it did it’s job.

When we moved into the house we bought I was hesitant to buy any new furniture. I had the option of donating our cheap coffee table and buying a new one, but I didn’t want to. The table was still usable, sturdy and actually made better than a lot of the other ones I was eyeing. Plus, I didn’t have to shell out a few hundred dollars for something new. I’m cheap sometimes.

Supplies We Used

You can get away with buying a combo pack of sanding sheets like the Pro Grade Precision 9 in. x 11 in. 80, 150, 220 Assorted Grits Advanced Sanding Sheets (6-Pack). We already had some on hand! An electric sander would have been a good investment, especially since they are under $20. We ended the good old fashion way…by hand!

The first thing we did was sand the entire table with the Pro Grade Precision 9 in. x 11 in. 80 Grit Coarse Advanced Sanding Sheets. I keep saying “we” because my husband helped big time! Especially with the sanding part!

There were a few scrapes and scratches so we made sure to get them all out with that first course sand. It took about two days by hand.

We then went in with the Pro Grade Precision 9 in. x 11 in. 120 Grit Medium Faster Sanding Sanding Sheets and Pro Grade Precision 9 in. x 11 in. 150 Grit Medium Advanced Sanding Sheets to smooth everything out and make sure it was even. The old finish was gone by this point and it was starting to look like a fresh new table! We made sure to sand with the grain on this step.

Finally we gave the table a quick sand with the Pro Grade Precision 9 in. x 11 in. 220 Grit Fine Advanced Sanding Sheets and wiped the whole thing down to make sure there was no dust or residue left.

We then got ready to stain! I suggest putting a painters tarp down and make sure you have all your supplies before starting. It can be messy, but at least it’s a lot less messy than actual paint.

I really liked the whitewash color I picked. My goal was to lighten the living room since all of our furniture is darker browns. The Antique White Satin Semi-Transparent Water-Based Interior Wood Polyurethane and Stain worked perfect and since it’s a two in one type product, we didn’t need anything else to seal it in.

We did four coats on the top and three coats on the bottoms and legs then let it dry for two days in the garage. At first I wasn’t liking the way it looked because some areas seemed to be gloopy and too much stain. When it dried down, it was perfect!

Staining our coffee table involved a bit more work than I thought, but it didn’t take too long at all. We spread it out into a week, but we could have worked a bit quicker.

I am so happy with our quarantine staining project! We have PLENTY of stain left in case we get the itch to work on anything else in the house! I’m now a big fan of second hand furniture…especially when you can re-do it to your liking!