Dolphin Coffee Table

The Cats * Christmas * Walking * Twelfth Night 1 * Twelfth Night 2 * Herbs * Flowers * Homemade Paper * SCA Costume * Framed Pics * Tucker & Clark * Dolphin Coffee Table * New Furniture * Mom's Cabinet * Harley * Harley's First Birthday

Skip to the pictures--> I've been watching a lot of home decorating shows, including Trading Spaces, Surprise by Design and The Christopher Lowell Show, not to mention hours and hours of HGTV. I've seen some really interesting projects and have been inspired to redecorate my home and get a little more organized. Last week I got woodworking fever. Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately considering my extremely clumsy nature) I don't have the proper tools for woodworking. So, I decided to go back to an old love, tole painting. I found some acrylic paints on sale, bought some new brushes and started looking for the right design to decorate my new coffee table. I knew I wanted a tile look, with blue green waves and dolphins. I found the perfect pattern on a wallpaper website. I used it as a guide and created my own version on the computer. Once I had exactly the right design, I printed a fullsize copy... 12 pages of it. I taped the pattern together and then created a sheet of graphite paper. Graphite paper is similar to carbon paper but is safer for painting because the graphite doesn't mingle with your paints and muddy your colors. To create a sheet, just rub a pencil lead on a piece of paper until it's thoroughly covered with gray. Once that was ready, I taped the pattern to the table and slipped the graphite paper underneath it and traced the design with a pen. The finished design has dozens of waves and 50 (FIFTY!!) dolphins. I transferred the pattern on Sunday and painted half the table the same day. It only took 12 hours of hard work. ;) I did about half of the remaining work on Monday, finishing the last short side and doing all of the blue green border and waves. Today (April 1, 2003) I finished off the remaining 20 dolphins and painted in the white tiles between the waves, topping it off with a splash of silver on each dolphin and some pearlescent overpainting on the white. Tomorrow I'll add a coat of polyurethane to protect the paint and the wood and I'll be done. It was a lot of work, but I got the effect I wanted. Considering the size of the project, I think it went rather quickly. It won't win any prizes, but it really helps to tie the table to my room, and I'm sure I'll enjoy it for years.

You can see the printout of the original wallpaper design in the background as well as my sophisticated supplies, like the plastic Dixie cup for water.	The dolphins aren't perfect, not even close. I don't have the patience to paint 50 perfect dolphins. I figure that with that many of them, if one of them is ugly you can just look at the next one.	I decided the dolphins needed definition, so I outlined them in black. I think it helps. At this point, the table was half done and I stopped for the night, because, after 12 hours without a break, I was getting careless.
Exactly one half of the table is done here. This was Sunday night, less than a full day into the project.	It took four hours on Monday to finish all of the blue green and to complete the remaining short side. It took two hours tonight to finish all of the dolphins.	When I saw the table like this I almost wished I hadn't done the white tiles. I think they look good, but I almost prefer the design without them.
Two more hours of painting tonight, and it's done!	This is definitely one project that looks best from a few feet away.	One last closeup