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Stained

We moved over to MorMor & FarFar's house to camp out while I worked for 48 hours to stain the new built-in's in the sunroom. So, everyone escaped the fumes. Well, except for me. But most of my braincells are already compromised anyway.

Here is an example of the unstained version of the poplar benches and radiator cover that TK made for us.

Yeah. It's pretty spectacular.It was so pretty, I hated to finish the wood and cover up how he lined up the different grain patterns so perfectly. But then Grace wanted to draw on it. And then she wanted to paint on it with milk from her sippy cup. So, I knew I had to act sooner than later.

Here it is so far. Matches all of the other trim.

Using poplar saved us loads of money. But it was more of a challenge when it came to finishing the wood. Poplar is a softer wood than oak or cherry or walnut. It tends to get blotchy and spotty when stained.

I got around that by sanding the heck out of it first. I stumbled upon this by accident when I was finishing the poplar trim and had to sand out the marks left by the planer. The sanded poplar stained evenly while the unsanded poplar was blotchy. Lightbulb goes off above my head. You don't have to show me twice.

So, everything got sanded with 100 grit sandpaper until the "shine" was off of the wood. I can't explain what this looks like on poplar, except to say that the unsanded poplar had this hardly noticeable hard sheen to it. And that sanding it was like exfoliating your face and getting all of the dead skin off before you put on your moisturizer**.

**This is why my male DIY pals crack up everytime I try to explain something. Note to self: Get more metrosexual DIY guy friends. THEY would understand the analogy. Hmpf.

(Edit: Much thanks to Steve from Brooklyn Row House for reminding me that I also used wood conditioner before staining. And I applied the stain within an hour of the wood conditioner application. So, Steve, are you a metrosexual? Do you manscape? Did you understand my analogy? Is that question too personal?)

And what is THIS mystery cabinet for?

Ah, yes. We'll explain that shortly :)

Posted by jeanne on September 8, 2008 at 11:46 AM

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