Resurfacing My Sewing Table

Yesterday I mentioned that I resurfaced my sewing table.  Ahh, my sewing table.  A labor of love for my husband.  A year or so ago, he took an old fold-up table that we had around and cut holes in it to fit my sewing machine and painted it a nice dark brown color.  It’s a great little table!  A good size for working.  However, there a couple issues I discovered over time.

The paint that he used has a matte finish and every time I would need to pick up a pin or pieces of thread or whatever, inevitably my nails would run across the surface and it was like scraping across a chalkboard.  Yikes!  It doesn’t seem like a huge problem, but I realized it was becoming quite an irritant when I started using other surfaces to put stuff on just so I didn’t have to touch the table.  Plus, because it was so rough that any little thing was scratching it so it has become quite worn-looking quite quickly.

Also, do you notice the gaps?  Yes, there’s a huge one around my machine (need to fix that), but I’m talking about the skinny ones running crossways.  I have lost a lot of needles and pins through those cracks…

So I decided to take some contact paper and cover the table with it.  It’s an awesome solution!

First, I cleared off the table and pulled out my sewing machine.  Then I ran a clean, dry cloth over the surface to brush off the dust and bits.

While the contact paper stuck to the top just fine, I did have trouble getting it to stick to the unfinished underside of the table.  I took some shiny, metallic tape I had found in a pile of stuff I cleaned up and placed strips of it all along the edge underneath.  The contact paper stuck to it perfectly!

I had an entire roll so there was plently to cover the entire surface.  I used a long ruler and pressed it across as I carefully peeled the backing away.

You can really see the difference between the smooth and rough surfaces here.  I loved running my hand over the contact paper.

And here it is complete!  It took me about 2 hours from start to finish.  It’s not the prettiest job done, but it makes a huge difference in my enjoyment of sewing.  I had to put some non-slip rubber mats underneath my cutting board to keep it secure, but other than that this surface is waaayyy better to work on.

I placed the contact paper over the entire table top to cover up all the cracks. 

Then I gave it its inaugural test run.  I needed to repair a small tear in our duvet cover and add a button closure to it (can’t believe I didn’t do that sooner!  Our comforter was constantly falling out the bottom of it) and this new surface is a dream to work on.  Now I can easily shift my fabrics around while I sew, no more lost pins and needles, and most importantly, no more chills down the spine every time I try to pick something off it!

About these ads