$11.99 Goodwill Find Side Table Stenciled Makeover

I had to go on the hunt for my furniture piece! As I said above, I found mine at the Goodwill. But other thrift stores, yard sales, and other apps are great ways to find used furniture. Make sure to find pieces that don’t have any weird smells/stains, insects, and are well made. 

I cleaned this piece off. It wasn’t dirty, just dusty. Plus, I always wipe down pieces before I paint them. It helps the paint stick and just makes for a smoother surface to paint on. When stenciling, that is super important. 

I started by painting the base color of the table. I chose a really pretty darker blue color that really popped. It took about 2-3 coats to really gain full coverage over the original wood stain. The beautiful thing about chalk paint is that it dries quickly, so painting multiple layers doesn’t take long. I do recommend waiting for each layer to dry before applying the next. 

Once my table was completely blue and dry, I pulled out my beautiful fern stencil and positioned it on the table the way I wanted. I used a light coat of spray adhesive on the stencil to hold it in one place to help prevent messing up and paint bleed underneath. 

I grabbed my stenciling brush and the lighter chalk paint I chose and began lightly dabbing the paint over the stencil. I never do big gobs of paint because there is more likelihood of paint bleeding underneath.

Instead, I used a plastic tray to help dab some of the paint off of the brush before I applied it to the table surface. I completed about 2 coats of paint over my stencil and gave it plenty of time to dry.

After the paint completely dried, I slowly peeled away the stencil from the table top. From there, I applied the stencil to the lower half of the table to fill in part of the pattern to make it look continuous on the top and bottom. I hand painted a little dip around the top of the table to continue the pattern from the side view. I made sure to give that plenty of time to dry. 

I decided to paint the part of the table between the legs the lighter paint color that I used for the stenciled portion. Once I saw how well the stenciled part came out, I wanted to continue that on the rest of the table design.

Once everything dried, I used furniture wax to seal and protect it. I applied the wax with a waxing brush and also a plain cloth rag. I started with the brush and then I buffed in the 2nd coat with the cloth. After the protective layer was applied, I gave it a day to dry and cure.

If pictures aren’t enough, I also created a video tutorial to go along with this project. 

What do you think of the finished product? Doesn’t it look light years better than it did?