Alright! We are finally off to the races! After winning a great debate, with myself, which lasted at least a week, I have finally decided what I should do for my learning project! I had many ideas of what I could do and it came down to a final two – painting or woodworking. I absolutely, could not decide which I wanted to do. One hour it would be painting and the next, it would be woodworking. They both have their pros and cons. It wasn’t until I was looking at a former ECMP 355 student’s blog about refurbishing furniture that it finally hit me as to what I want my project to be. The design that she had painted on the tabletop reminded me of something that I had seen on Pinterest once. So off to Pinterest I went!
After looking through all my woodworking pins, I finally found what I was looking for – a dresser top that had an image of a flower stained onto it! It essentially combines both of the directions that I wanted to go for this project. I get to use stain and painting/shading techniques to color wood! It can’t get better than that!
So now that I am finally inspired and know what I am going to do, I need to actually start doing it! As a starting point, I think Bethany’s Beginner’s tutorial on shading wood with stain will work perfectly. It breaks down the steps, has useful how-to videos and links, talks about material preparation, and also what materials and techniques work well for her as she completes these types of projects. She also includes pictures of some of the projects that she has completed and they are unbelievable!
Well, I think that is it until tomorrow. Home Depot here I come!
Brad Slepicka 
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