"Not all who wander are lost!"

An ordinary drum table 'found her way' to stardom using stain as her secret ingredient!

I'm sharing with you another of my stain art projects. Some of you may have seen the video tutorials with a sneak peak. This was certainly the most detailed work I have done to date. And I loved every minute of it!!

I started out with the base. I used a grey chalk paint and added some distressing with white chalk paint and ebony stain. I finished it off with wax and polished her up with brown paper.

Now for the top ~ the ICING on the cake! I painted 3 coats of off white chalk paint after a quick sanding.

I found this image of a compass rose and added scroll work to it to come up with my inspiration picture:

Looking at this photo, I will admit I was a little overwhelmed and hesitant. Especially when the dear husband said "Wow, that's going to be a LOT of work!" lol But I figured I could always start over if things weren't going as planned ... it wouldn't be the first time. So on I went and transferred the image:

As you can see, I don't transfer every single line... just the basic outlines. It would be impossible with this one to transfer all those extra details.

{Deep Breath} Here we go....

At this point, I wanted to be, errr, I thought I was done! But... that would be too easy. I was debating whether to add more shading to the outside of the scrolls. I was hesitant because the chalk paint proved a little difficult to shade on and I didn't want to ruin it. (doubting myself). I spoke to a fellow-artisan who does this kind of work and she advised what I already knew.. there was more to be done.

The following picture shows the difference between the before and after of the outside shading:

Can you see the differences? Although it is slight, the extra shading adds depth and quality to the piece.

All I had left was to add the direction..

Time to put down my brush!! I put 3 coats of GF High Performance Top Coat on her. This time, I tried a wet sanding, which I didn't really like on this particular type of piece. I would like to try it again on something that isn't my stain art, though. So, after the sanding, one more coat of GF High Performance and then the imfamous polishing with brown paper!

And...... she found her way home!

Wellllll..... she is not REALLY home - she's still looking for her forever-home! :) But for now, I will gladly keep her and love her and all the hours we traveled together!