Stage 1

Well I almost completed my first piece this weekend.  I'm not sure if I'm in love with the color but it's a nice color nonetheless.  Let me know what you think!  The picture below is with two coats of paint.  Prior to painting I did a light sanding with 80 grit sandpaper, did some minor cleaning, and then began the painting process.  It's been sort of difficult getting an efficient painting technique down.  After the first coat I got some paint runs on the piece so I have to be really careful to make sure there isnt too much paint on the brush - which is really tricky!  You are supposed to paint in the direction of the wood grain but in my case the piece was already painted so it was hard to know which direction that was!  So I made sure my paint strokes were always in one direction. The most difficult part of the piece to paint were the legs, because they are round and curved. I'm comtemplating whether I should risk weathering my first piece because it takes some techniques with chain and hardware that I've never done beore. I dont want to ruin the piece but at some point I'm going to have to try to make the pieces look distressed. Hhhhmmmm....I guess you'll have to follow me find out!