The One With Another Kobey Find

Along with our coffee table and guest room dresser, we also found these random barstools at Kobey Swap Meet way back in October of last year.

For the most part, they've been taking up space in our garage and occasionally get used as a last resort when we need a little more seating around our counter-height table. Last week, however, Brad was in charge of hosting poker night for his co-workers, so we figured it was about time to sand down and paint those barstools to avoid any random splinters in the rear-end.

With this project, there were definitely some lessons learned- the first one being to buy a face mask when taking on any sanding projects. After sanding (with a power sander) for about 2 hours, Brad insisted that I wear something to cover my mouth and the best solution he came up with was a dish towel wrapped around my face and secured with a hair clip. Also, it should be mentioned that I'm wearing dark sunglasses while I sand (since we don't own any clear goggles/glasses) and that I must look like some crazy bandit sanding away in our garage with the doors wide open for all the neighbors to see.

Second lesson learned- always buy the small, tester samples of paint and/or stain before splurging on the full gallon of paint. Our first idea was to stain the barstools with a cream/white colored stain, which was immediately vetoed as soon as we applied a thin layer of stain to one of the barstools. Unfortunately, we had purchased an entire gallon of this colored stain and really have no other use for it. Maybe Home Depot with take it back- anyone know?

Next idea- gray paint. This time we bought a small sample size of Martha Stewart's 'Zinc' gray and loved it. Back to Home Depot for a full gallon of Zinc (which would actually be a great second pet's name to go along with our Copper) and after two full coats on four barstools the gallon of paint is still about three-fourth's full. I guess our next painting project will have to include some gray?

Oh well- we learned our lesson and now we have 4 'new' gray barstools.